Researchers suggest a method of tracking coronary artery by smartphone

As COVID-19 continues to spread, research teams around the world are using their time and skills to find innovative ways in which technology can help us identify pain. Last week, the number of confirmed corona cases exceeded one million, with the countries most affected by the USAThe Italy, Spain and the Germany.

China, as the country that first reported COVID-19 incidents, is known as a surveillance state. Citizen identification numbers, data collection, cameras, biometrics and smartphones are all used as tools to create digital profiles of citizens.

While privacy advocates have been frustrated for years, the spy network, which took decades to build, has helped monitor the spread of corona through it. country (regardless of whether the official infection numbers released are true).

Smart and GPS location data have been used to monitor citizens' movements, and when combined with face recognition technology, Chinese organizations have been able to identify high-risk individuals from the coronavirus.

The chaos caused by COVID-19 has led Chinese authorities to pressure private companies to hand over citizens' data for "anti-epidemic purposes", the Financial Times reported, and despite fears, these demands could make Chinese society movement permanent - even stricter censorship - governments around the world nevertheless learn lessons from how the China applied the technology to the rise.

Many of us in the West have a smartphone, from which modern devices come with GPS functions for maps, instructions and local applications. Smartphones could be used as tools to monitor new cases and detect the activities of newly diagnosed or suspected respiratory disease - but privacy must be respected.

South Korea has created a map of hotspots based on data smartphone. Singapore has created an application to monitor the movements of patients with COVID-19. Germany is reportedly considering the request.

The UK Information Commissioner's office said the applications were acceptable as long as the data was anonymous and the removal of personal trackers, such as the pan-European PEPP-PT initiative, a new supervisory authority to monitor mobile infection, had been highlighted. that is key to protect our rights to privacy.

Now, researchers at Boston University have come up with a new way to know what's going on.

In an article published Thursday (.PDF), IT experts Ari Trachtenberg, Mayank Varia and Ran Cannetti explained how mobile phones could be used to help formal Organisations to detect COVID-19 - especially as we expect future lockdowns.

Participation, however, must be voluntary. As noted by Trachtenberg, anything else can have significant legal, moral and bureaucratic consequences.

It works like this: it could create an application that uses short-range broadcast technology, such as NFC, Bluetooth or SSID, to send a randomly generated ID to neighbors.

This random ID changes over a period of time - which can be a minute, five minutes or every day - so the number is not easy to locate or use to locate a user.

The numbers are kept the same Appliances, along with timestamps, as well as any other number that has been transmitted nearby.

"When a person is positive for COVID-19, the person could choose (through the medical administrator) to voluntarily join a list of random numbers - either their own numbers created or the numbers observed in the application," he explains. Trachtenberg on a blog.

These numbers could then be sent to medical authorities and organizations, such as the World Health Organization (WHO) or the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). THE mobile device it could also connect to databases and check if the user can come in contact with a new incident and therefore must be isolated or tested.

"It suggests a way of gathering information from the community to help (a) guide medical staff on how best to allocate and use test resources; and (b) guide individuals on when to test and self-restraint."

These types of mobile applications could be a way to limit the potential abuse of the direct connection GPS or location data in an individual - especially if coronavirus monitoring programs are long-term.

The Boston University team wants feedback on the idea and says that while they have the technical expertise, they will need help from people in the medical field to develop the application.