After governments worldwide have tried leveraging smartphones in contact-tracing efforts for covid-19, private companies have now started jumping into the ring.
But while desperate times require desperate measures, these private apps know where we are, where we go, who we come in contact with and even our health data.
Privacy experts have repeatedly pointed out that such methods could do more harm than good. On 25 March, international digital rights group, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) raised privacy questions about a coronavirus screening website made by Verily, a healthcare data subsidiary of Alphabet, Google’s parent company.