CONTACT TRACING: WHERE WE WERE, WHERE WE ARE, WHERE WE ARE GOING. THE INFLUENCE “PRIVACY BY DESIGN” HAS HAD ON CONTACT TRACING APPS AND THE LASTING IMPRESSION IT WILL HAVE WELL AFTER THE PANDEMIC IS OVER
Author: Taylor Farrow
As COVID-19 has spread globally, the underlying conflict between personal privacy rights and public well-being rages on, with no clear solution to either in sight. With the intention of managing the spread of the virus, “tech companies and governments have both sought to come up with effective yet socially distant ways to keep close tabs on people’s health status and movements.” The presented solution, digital contact tracing, uses technology to collect vital but sensitive health and location information, which has presented issues that have not yet been featured in the long-running privacy debate. According to Kate Goodloe, Director of Policy at BSA: The Software Alliance, the pandemic has highlighted the “need to use data in important ways, but also the importance of getting it right when it comes to the type of privacy and security safeguards that need to be placed on different uses of data.”