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So is it centrally logging and recording your location and your phone's IMEI code?

Presumably, knowing the Government and Cummings, is this a Frankenstein app with bits of centralised identification and tracking bolted on to it?

If the app behaved that way, GApple wouldn't permit access to their api.

But don't take their word for it: check all the code yourself (both apps and server backend) at the NHSX account on github?

Why is there so much of a concern that the app may be too sensitive, and is likely to over estimate the risk of infection from people 2m or more away?

This type of problem is inconvenient, and may lead to people quarantining and or getting tested, and may actually help save lives by alerting an at risk person that they have ben in the vicinity of an infected person.

Failure to detect that the user of the app has been in the vicinity of an infected person is likely to be a fatal error - literally!

Cobblers on all fronts.

Firstly too many false alarms and people wont use it.

Secondly the odds suggest your "fatal error" is unlikely to be fatal. (and is poor sense of humour imo)

Have a fail icon sir!

Someone who is in their "contact list" gets Covid, they're notified, self isolate and don't get it. Was that because:

a) The person was more than 2m away and could not infect them; or

b) The person was within 2m but did not infect them?

Either way, they were near someone who did have it. It may be inconvenient to have to isolate, but it is better for too many people to do so if the reproduction rate is to be kept to a level that a second wave is not triggered.

Strange, that in countries that have the apps in use, people have stopped touting them. Couldn't have anything to do with the lack of efficacy, could it?

Isolation isn't just inconvenient it's also potentially expensive.

Talk of a second wave is nonsense and continuing to do so is likely to fuel "covid fatigue". The virus is now effectively endemic so outbreaks are inevitable as the recent outbreak in New Zealnd demonstrates. The focus has shifted to dealing with and containing those and improving treatments for those that need them. Oh, and a hugh sigh of relief from all concerned that mortality rate is as low as it is.

Would be interested in seeing the evidence that supports that.

It's quite simple: the idea of a second wave suggests it's been and gone. But the fact that it's endemic means it's not gone away and will continue to flare up. This requires different tactics.

Number of new cases in England has been going up steadily for weeks. It's now doubled in the last month (1000/day) - Wales and Scotland largely under control. Funny that.

[Number of new cases in England has been going up steadily for weeks]

But the number of hospital cases has not risen significantly for a while which leads to:

a) the people being infected are under 40 and less likely to suffer extreme symptoms that require hospitalisation - possible given the demographic of pub/bar/restaurant goers and generally less concern in this age group

b) the reason for the uplift is a greater number of people being tested not necessarily a greater number of cases - of course this one could hint that England is doing better at testing than Scotland or Wales so it couldn't be right

c) a blend of both

Hospitalisation data https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/covid-19-uk-hospital-admissions/

(Note: the page says May 1st but the data is current)

The rolling 7 day average has risen by 70% in just over a month. That rise will be starting to show in an increase in deaths but the deaths figures have not been published, and now, apparently, the infection rate figures have not been received!

The disease is not endemic yet - 5% of the population has been effected in the UK, NZ will be clean in a month or two, we could if we took it seriously.

You are supposed to install the app, give it all necessary permissions, and then there’s nothing you have to do except taking your phone with you when you leave your home - which you would do anyway. You would only use the app if you test positive, or when it alerts you that you are at risk.

Alternatively, you do as a company did in Northampton, blanket tested 2000 staff and discovered 300 with CoVid19..

To be technically accurate, 300 of them had a positive test. Which tells us little about how many of them actually had it at the time of the test, or had had it and recovered etc.

"they're notified, self isolate and don't get it".

Certainly you want to have a test quickly first.

Only the test can tell you if you have it. One of the issues is asymptomatic carriers.

Just like all the Track & Trace, leaving details at bars, quarantine, isolation and testing on symptoms everything is based on trust. The App is just an additional tool however the single biggest improvement will come from the population behaving responsibly.

It works both ways and currently we are lucky to live in a country where we are not forced to be monitored like Singapore. Unfortunately there appear to be so many who do not give a stuff that at some point we are going to end up with another major outbreak. All that we (and everyone else) are doing are suppressing Covid19. Nobody is beating it or eradicating it, that is the nature of the virus. Looking at the research on immunity they only ways out of this are:

A viable vaccine with sufficient take-up to be effective.

Live with the virus and no restrictions accepting a significantly higher risk to the population as a whole.

Continue with the restrictions (up and down) and to try and to make the best of it whilst having an increasingly horrendous economic situation.

One of the issues is asymptomatic carriers.

Which is true of nearly all viral infections. But use it enough and it sounds more sinister.

No it is not better. for reasons given in the post to which you replied.

Look at it on a personal level. If, having emerged a day or so ago from your 3rd groundless period of self-isolation - unpaid if you can't work from home - what are you going to do when you're told yet again you're a contact?

If you lack the imagination to see how it plays out in that way ,let's try reductio ad absurbam . If false positives are good let's just declare the entire population as contacts and have everyone self isolate. A bit rough on those depending on carers to live but once everyone's emerged again and cleared away the bodies we're free from the virus. Was it a good idea?

The requirement of any sort of test is its ability to discriminate with a minimum of false positives and false negatives. The problem with this sort of test is that it hasn't really got a good discriminating power. The appropriate response isn't to bias it towards false positives toavoid false negatives and leave it at that. False positives are just too expensive at both the individual personal level and at the collective economic model; we can't afford them.

What should be done with a test like that is to refine it as much as possible but then treat it as an indicator that a more definitive test is needed. The number of tests currently being processed is well below capacity. Instead of telling the positive contacts to self isolate use that spare capacity and test them. I suppose in another month or two the idea might dawn on Cummings or somebody.

as I do want to know

A) What data and how long is stored

B) How identifiable is it

C) Are they storing what data they claim to be

Do your own research - its not hard.

To my downvoters. 30 secs googling. Hand in your commentard badges at the door.

https://faq.covid19.nhs.uk/

The Data Protection Impact Assessment and risk registers are living documents and are subject to ongoing review, improvement and clarification.

Hmm...

@Gordon10

The only way to find out how much to trust the app is to read and understand the code. As a population, not many have that skill (though the readers here are skewed higher). Then, of course, you need access to the code, and verification that what you see is what was used to build the app distributed. Trust in this government is very low - it has been caught lying far too often already.

I agree it now has proper privacy terms. However it's not surprising that people will treat it with a degree of distrust.

Firstly the original world-beating plan was going to harvest personal details and keep them (strictly for limited purposes of course ) for a few decades.

Secondly successive governments have shown themselves to be data fetishists and the current government's reliance on more of the same only makes things worse.

Thirdly the whole shebang has been put under the charge of a serial failer when it comes to protecting customers' PII.

There should be a lesson for governments here. There will come a time when you really need peoples' trust about handling personal data. Trust is a fragile thing. Once you lose it it's not very readily rebuilt. Best not to lose it in the first place.

Having used the Stop Covid NI app while I was visiting for two weeks shortly after launch I was pretty impressed by the data use policy, very clear about purposes of use, what data was collected, what data stripped and at what point, conservative on retention period and with an opt out available at any time. This is in very stark contrast to the policy for the previous NHSX app (and the contact tracing programme) which said approximately, we'll hold all the data you give us for 20 years, we'll be using it for whatever we can think of, no you can't withdraw consent, yes, we'll make it available to Serco.

Even if a reasonable number of people use the app, which I doubt, people probably won't bother to quarantine even if it tells you to. The logic being that if the source of the infection is anonymous to you you'll probably just think it's a false reading or was someone who was not really anywhere near you. I just don't think there will be any trust in the app, and since everything is anonymous who is going to know if you just ignore it.

I know it's going against everyone's security concerns but if you don't think you're being watched and you don't know particularly why you're being asked to quarantine most people will probably just ignore the app, even if they've gone to the bother of installing it.

The point of the app is to alert you to a possibility of infection. If you don't trust the alert, why use the app ?

All those people who don't care about quarantine, protecting others and saving lives will not use the app for sure. Those who do likely will, and likely will pay attention if alerted.

The flaw in the app is that those who don't use it are, because of probable associated anti-social behaviours, more likely to be infecting you but not generating warnings. Which really marginalises its efficacy.

A bad omen for when the anti-vaxers undermine any chance of herd immunity by the immunisation route.

I'm looking at you, Dominic Cummings!

Can we have an app that detects people in your vicinity running this app?

I would like to keep my distance from them. I think such an app could be much more popular and both could be really useful when employed together.

Covindr... "hook up with like-minded people in your area"

That's been forbidden.

I'd prefer one that detects holiday-makers from England, so I can keep 1000 linguini away. Although you can usually spot them: many of them ignore social distancing rules, don't wear masks, and get irate when it's pointed out that Wales has different rules to England.

"I would like to keep my distance from them."

You should be doing that anyway because you should be keeping your distance from people in general. The whole purpose of the app is to tell when you've failed.

We have had a formal NHS Trace and Track app here for about a month and a half - launched with much fanfare.... here anyway.

It works either side of the border, so I think its a reskinned version of the Irish version (never tested this though)

https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/coronavirus-covid-19-stopcovid-ni-proximity-app

the link above is to the public discription.

I wonder why the NHS UK or the govt haven't publicized this in the UK? Perhaps because its really the Irish one - and unionists might get nervous?

Just normal politics -

If something is good and not yours - Ignore or spin it to bad.

If something is bad and not yours - go to town with righteous anger & indignation.

The same company did develop both North and South versions, and they are supposed to interwork, so you're probably correct that they are effectively the same software.

Irish app cost: €850,000 - seems to work

English app cost: £12,000,000 - doesn't work at all

And I assume the Irish one was at least bi-lingual. I trust the English one also catered for a wide range of the languages used in the UK (if not in the IoW).

But I suppose that's better than £150 million on face masks that don't work at all.

Why, oh why, aren't we all marching down Whitehall with pitchforks and lengths of rope?

So far as I could see, it wasn't even really being publicised in NI, though I didn't go into Belfast, so maybe they have signs up there. Currently 252k users, which isn't as many as needed to make it effective, however apparently NI's contact tracing effort has been quite successful compared to England, so ironically it may not be as necessary.

Anyway, it's pretty slick and the T&Cs and data use policy are well-crafted (bar a couple of typos). I have noticed that despite saying it runs if the app is closed it doesn't actually appear to do potential exposure checks (according to the android notification settings) unless it is running. Not sure if that means it wouldn't be collecting contact RIDs either.

The principle involved is called "Not Invented Here". The purpose is reducing the visibility of egg on face. It's got a long tradition in government circles but particularly desired by the current one at present.

So rather than deliver a useful basic tracing app when it's needed (based on the successful work of others), we're still waiting for one with useless bells and whistles?

I predict we'll have an effective 2nd-generation vaccine before we have a useful app in the UK.

And here I could have written it in a week without help from Apple, Google, Germany, Ireland, the Alan Turing Institute, Uncle Tom Cobbley and anyone else who was passing.

"and anyone else who was passing"

Providing they passed under social distancing rules.

Yet another failure by British bureaucrats to commission an effective piece of software.

There are lessons which have been demonstrated many times, but which are being just ignored by our PPE (*) establishment.

PPE - a. Personal Protective Evasion.

b. An Oxford degree for waffly essay writers.

Don't worry, Dido Harding's in charge. [1]What can possibly go wrong?

[1] https://www.theregister.com/2015/11/03/talktalk_incident_management_review/

The Irish provided moral support and disinfectant.

Read: They hung around in the office, singing and drinking.

Hmm, that is somewhat redundant, I already said they were Irish.

Somewhat more constructive than the government, then, who merely fiddles with the specs and wasted time on a tangent.

And why shouldn't they? They'd developed a working app in a matter of weeks, for pretty well peanuts, which had already been adapted for other countries. Their work here is done. Time for a well-deserved pint or two of plain and a chorus of 'Fields of Athenry'.