world's best weapon MIT app tracks the spread of coronavirus while protecting your privacy
In the fight to stop the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus, control is currently the world's best weapon. When an infected person is identified, they are quickly put into self-quarantine, as experts locate their former whereabouts to disinfect areas and test another person with whom the person is Have come in close contact.
According to a group of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), it is a labor-intensive process, prone to errors in memory, not to mention potential privacy concerns. In a new white paper published this week, scientists describe a new app they've developed called "Private Kit: Safe Paths", which lets you know if you could possibly contact a person Has tested positive COVID-19.
The app — which is still a prototype, but is available for download on both iOS and Google Play markets — attempts to streamline the contact-tracing process. According to the World Health Organization, the process traditionally has three components. First, professionals identify anyone who has come in contact with an infected patient. Then, they record potential contacts and eventually follow up with them.
In the paper, the researchers noted that lessons from China showed the value of identifying an intersection between healthy people and patients using GPS localization who contract COVID-19. Of course, China has an authoritarian government and location data has been pulled from individuals' phones and processed by the government - something that is simply the U.S.
Still, the researchers figure that a consumer app that users can voluntarily download may be a happy medium. Particularly, the MIT scientists believe that the application could lower the R0 (pronounced R-naught), the reproduction number of an infectious disease, which shows how contagious it is. R0 is a measure of the average number of people who will catch a disease from a contagious person. Epidemiologists say that the lower this number becomes, the more likely a disease will die out.
Private Kit: Safe Paths collects users' location data, keeping a time-stamped log every five minutes. In total, 28 days of data can be stored in the app in under 100 kilobytes of space (that's less storage space than a single photo takes up). Your data never leaves your phone and is encrypted so that users cannot identify you. If you end up later testing positive for COVID-19, you can send your location data to public health researchers by using a QR code, thereby facilitating contact-tracing.
Even if a user chooses not to report their disease status, researchers expect that if a person realizes they may be at potential risk of COVID-19, they immediately Will self-quarantine, which will contribute to lower R0.
For example, researchers note, if you estimate more than x percent among a given population, assuming that part of the population reacts to a known risk by self-quarantine, the R0 degree basis But that percentage will decrease to several percent of the mixture within the population.
Furthermore, with an increasing number of x in terms of user base, there will be an exponential decrease in R0, the researchers say. In other words, the research team hopes to have a higher rate of adoption — the very only way this app will be able to make a distinct difference.
In the fight to stop the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus, control is currently the world's best weapon. When an infected person is identified, they are quickly put into self-quarantine, as experts locate their former whereabouts to disinfect areas and test another person with whom the person is Have come in close contact.
According to a group of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), it is a labor-intensive process, prone to errors in memory, not to mention potential privacy concerns. In a new white paper published this week, scientists describe a new app they've developed called "Private Kit: Safe Paths", which lets you know if you could possibly contact a person Has tested positive COVID-19.
The app — which is still a prototype, but is available for download on both iOS and Google Play markets — attempts to streamline the contact-tracing process. According to the World Health Organization, the process traditionally has three components. First, professionals identify anyone who has come in contact with an infected patient. Then, they record potential contacts and eventually follow up with them.
In the paper, the researchers noted that lessons from China showed the value of identifying an intersection between healthy people and patients using GPS localization who contract COVID-19. Of course, China has an authoritarian government and location data has been pulled from individuals' phones and processed by the government - something that is simply the U.S.
Still, the researchers figure that a consumer app that users can voluntarily download may be a happy medium. Particularly, the MIT scientists believe that the application could lower the R0 (pronounced R-naught), the reproduction number of an infectious disease, which shows how contagious it is. R0 is a measure of the average number of people who will catch a disease from a contagious person. Epidemiologists say that the lower this number becomes, the more likely a disease will die out.
Private Kit: Safe Paths collects users' location data, keeping a time-stamped log every five minutes. In total, 28 days of data can be stored in the app in under 100 kilobytes of space (that's less storage space than a single photo takes up). Your data never leaves your phone and is encrypted so that users cannot identify you. If you end up later testing positive for COVID-19, you can send your location data to public health researchers by using a QR code, thereby facilitating contact-tracing.
Even if a user chooses not to report their disease status, researchers expect that if a person realizes they may be at potential risk of COVID-19, they immediately Will self-quarantine, which will contribute to lower R0.
For example, researchers note, if you estimate more than x percent among a given population, assuming that part of the population reacts to a known risk by self-quarantine, the R0 degree basis But that percentage will decrease to several percent of the mixture within the population.
Furthermore, with an increasing number of x in terms of user base, there will be an exponential decrease in R0, the researchers say. In other words, the research team hopes to have a higher rate of adoption — the very only way this app will be able to make a distinct difference.
