Exposure Notification tech for Covid-19 now available to public health agencies: Sundar Pichai

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Wednesday said that the Covid-19 exposure notification technology is now available to public health agencies. Google had built the notification technology in collaboration with Apple. The technology works for both Android and iOS users. 

“The COVID19 Exposure Notification technology we built jointly with Apple  is now available to public health agencies in support of their contact tracing efforts. Our goal is to empower them with another tool to help combat the virus while protecting user privacy,” said Pichai in a tweet.

Pichai’s tweet follows the official announcement by the two companies that the technology has been made available. Called the “Exposure Notification”, the technology is aimed at helping the health authorities to build applications that notify users if they have come in contact with a person who has tested positive for the Covid-19. 

“User adoption is key to success and we believe that these strong privacy protections are also the best way to encourage use of these apps,” Apple and Google said in a statement. “Over the last several weeks, our two companies have worked together, reaching out to public health officials scientists, privacy groups and government leaders all over the world to get their input and guidance.”

Ahead of the release of Exposure Notification technology, several countries have built their own version of contact-tracing applications. For instance, India has Aarogya Setu. Singapore uses an app called TraceTogether. Australia and the UK have also launched their official contact-tracing apps. 

These contact-tracing applications have become an important tool for the governments and health authorities to monitor the spread of the virus. Privacy advocates, however, have been critical of these applications and have raised questions around how the governments are storing and managing the user data.