COVID-19

A new report from CNBC offers a deep dive into how the contact tracing partnership between Google and Apple came to be. Perhaps most interestingly, the report details the speed at which Apple developed the technology.

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We learned yesterday that the UK has decided to reject the joint Google/Apple API, and instead go its own way in creating a coronavirus contact tracing app.

This decision is not just dumb – reinventing the wheel, when there is already a plug-and-play solution available – but it is no exaggeration to say that the flaws in the UK approach will end up costing lives …

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The joint Google/Apple contact tracing API for coronavirus has ‘a stunning blindspot’ claims one company working on a rival approach designed for adoption by businesses for their own employees, as a second company says there is good reason for companies to use a location-based approach.

Not everyone has a smartphone, says Microshare, which is instead proposing the use of Bluetooth badges, keyrings, and wristbands …

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The German government has announced a change in policy over the weekend, and now favors the Apple/Google contact tracing approach for the coronavirus over the rival one proposed by the European Union.

Apple, meantime, is pushing an alternative term designed to emphasize the benefits over the methodology …

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Apple and Google announced their partnership two weeks ago to develop contract-tracing via Bluetooth in iOS and Android. Last week we shared details about how it will work and roll out, and today we’ve got answers to frequently asked questions about COVID-19 contact tracing for iOS and Android as well as updates on the Bluetooth and cryptography specifications.

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A new story from CNET today highlights how employees at Silicon Valley companies, including Apple, are struggling to balance professional demands with childcare while working from home. For its part, Apple says it is taking several steps to help its employees through this transition.

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Apple has been at the forefront of pandemic relief efforts by donating resources like masks, shields, financial support around the world, and more. Now, CEO Tim Cook appeared on the BBC and shared that Apple is making another big contribution to the network’s entertainment relief event “The Big Night In.”

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Tim Cook held talks with European Commissioner Thierry Breton yesterday regarding the upcoming contact tracing frameworks, that Apple and Google are jointly collaborating on. The companies announced a privacy-preserving API that allows devices to be notified when another user’s device who reports positive for COVID-19 was in close proximity, based on Bluetooth, without sharing the identities of said user.

However, some governments want more data like location information and user identification. Breton said that tech companies should do everything possible to develop solutions for the national use cases, but did not mention specific cases. As reported by iGeneration, Cook also announced a new date for the rollout of the contact tracing API.

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As Apple and Google develop contact-tracing technology, France says a technical obstacle in iOS is preventing its government contact-tracing app from working properly. Bloomberg reports that France wants to deploy the app by May 11, and it’s asking Apple to “lift the technical hurdle” that’s currently in the way.

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The entertainment industry continues to rely on Apple products and services to continue production amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A new report from Deadline today details how ABC is working closely with Apple to continue production of American Idol from home.

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A Facebook coronavirus symptom checker run in partnership with health researchers at Carnegie Mellon University has just published its first maps, showing the highest levels of suspected infections.

The survey has been collecting one million responses per week, and Carnegie Mellon is building an API which will allow other researchers access the data …

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Police, consumer organizations and Internet security companies are warning about an increasing number of coronavirus scams, as the FBI says cybercrime reports are up 400% …

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Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger have launched their first new project since leaving Facebook. As detailed in a report from TechCrunch, Krieger and Systrom have debuted Rt.live, a website dedicated to tracking how fast COVID-19 is spreading across each state in the U.S.

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Apple has been contributing to coronavirus relief efforts in some big ways like donating over 20M masks, producing face shields, donating money, allowing Apple Card customers to skip payments, and more. Now Apple CEO Tim Cook is going to be helping in another way with California’s business recovery task force that will meet regularly throughout 2020.

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White House Coronavirus Task Force lead Dr. Anthony Fauci has inadvertently revealed in an interview that he doesn’t understand how the Apple/Google contact tracing API works.

Apple and Google have gone to great lengths to safeguard privacy when designing the API, with two key features being that it doesn’t log either locations or identities …

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The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has praised some aspects of the Apple/Google coronavirus contact tracing API, while saying that the companies need to do better in three areas.

The ACLU says that any electronic contact tracing needs to respect six principles. The Apple/Google API makes “a strong start” with these, it says, but it has three criticisms …

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