There's Contact Tracing and Then There's Contact Tracing
by John Lawrence, May 21, 2020
I think Governor Cuomo is great, but what he described as contact tracing for New York State is so twentieth century compared to what China is doing. If someone tests positive, NY State will send a contact tracer to interview that person and ask that individual whom they have been in contact with recently. A noble effort, but not anywhere near the scope and power of the Chinese method which relies completely on the latest technology. Their method puts an app on every cell phone which automatically records in a data base the contact information for every individual this person has been near, say within 6 feet of. I don't know exactly how it works, but I also assume it would record in the data base how much time this person has been near each of the contacts. The contacts might be persons they knew or just persons they passed on the street. If one of the people in the data base tests positive, the person's cell phone color coded app changes from green to yellow, and that person is not allowed to be admitted to any public space until they are tested and/or quarantined.
It seems to me that this method is more thorough and can contact trace in a matter of microseconds compared to Governor Cuomo's NY State method which would take days, and in the meantime the contacts of the person who tested positive would be spreading the coronavirus to other people. That represents antiquated technology. Some people might say that the Chinese technology is too intrusive. Americans would be giving up their privacy rights. So who might not want the government to know with whom they were in contact? Mainly criminals. Law abiding citizens should have no problem with the government knowing with whom they were in contact. People up to no good, however, certainly would have a problem with the government knowing with whom they were in contact. Husbands cheating on their wives, wives cheating on their husbands, fugitives, tax cheats, escaped convicts, murderers, terrorists, white power hate groups, illegal telemarketers, scammers, identity thieves, people in trouble with the law - all these would not want the government knowing with whom they were in contact.
Google and Apple came up with a similar system to the Chinese, but it's totally voluntary or in other words completely useless. People have to voluntarily turn the app on on their cell phone. The government, any government whether it be Chinese or American, does not have any interest in wasting its resources on law abiding citizens. People in the act of committing crimes have been caught on security cameras and videos. Body cameras worn by police have tended to make an officer think twice before violating someone's rights. Does this seem too intrusive? Maybe rights need to be somewhat redefined. Perhaps there should be laws about what the government can and cannot do with data collected if it had a mandatory data collection program using a cell phone app. If the purpose is to trace contacts, then all other purposes, with the exception of detection of criminal activity, should be circumscribed by law. America has a hard time capturing criminals even when the data is staring law enforcement in the face. If a contact tracing app also results in criminals being caught, I say so much the better. In the meantime a superior system to eliminate COBID-19 would result in American society getting back to some semblance of normal sooner rather, than later.