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How Apple And Google Are Going To Enable Contact Tracing

JOEKENT.NYC: “This post is a technical translation of the contact tracing specification Apple and Google recently released, aimed at folks that are interested in understanding the implications for security, privacy, and usage. If you are not familiar with contact tracing, I suggest you first read this blog post that explains the topic and the various methodologies that are being used and developed globally. At a high level, the way this technology works is by having an app on your phone broadcast a random, unique identifier over the device bluetooth antenna, and simultaneously listen for other phones broadcasting their identifiers. Your phone keeps a log of everyone you come into contact with who is running this app and is broadcasting advertisements over the Bluetooth service. It is important to note, Bluetooth is not the same as GPS, it cannot determine your physical location. Your contact list is simply a giant list of random numbers representing other devices that were near you at some point. If you test positive for COVID-19, you can upload the unique identifiers your phone was previously broadcasting to the cloud. Meanwhile, everyones phone will be pulling down a list of identifiers that tested positive on a frequent basis so they can compare them to their own contact list. If a match between the cloud list and your local list is found, you will be notified to self-isolate and follow CDC guidelines…”

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