Industrial standard application design was employed in the construction of the government's COVIDSafe tracing app, a Tasmanian expert says.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Prime Minister Scott Morrison confirmed on Friday that more than 3.5 million people had downloaded the app since it's launch last Sunday.
Coronavirus: All the latest updates on COVID-19 for Tasmania
There have been concerns raised over how the app works and what data it collects.
Dr Lindsay Wells is an associate lecturer at the University of Tasmania and co-ordinates their mobile application development course.
"According to what other developers have found by decompiling the Android app, they have found that it all seems to be above board in terms of industry standard," he said.
In other news:
"In terms of the messaging from the government, all of that messaging of what they said the app does is consistent with what the deconstructed source code would indicate the app does.
"There is nothing hidden [in the code]."
Right now, the Apple version of the app will only work if it is open, your phone can be locked but the app needs to be open when you unlock it. Dr Wells said the app works by recording Bluetooth connections between your phone and other Bluetooth devices.
"This data is stored locally on your phone and is not accessible by other applications or even transferred on the internet," he said.
"[Data] only goes up to the internet through one location in the application and that has to happen with consent."
In related news:
Mr Morrison said millions more Australians needed to download the app.
He said Australia was meeting 11 out of 15 conditions handed down by the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee to reduce restrictions.
"Of those that remain outstanding there is one that Australians can do something about and that is downloading the COVIDSafe app," he said.
"This is a critical issue for National Cabinet when it comes to making decisions next Friday about how restrictions can be eased."
Concerns remain about the use of Amazon Web Services to store the data but Dr Wells said that was industry standard practice.
The data is being stored on a server in Australia and Health Minister Greg Hunt made a determination under the Biosecurity Act which would make it illegal to move the data outside of Australia.
However, no protections have been legislated yet.
Sign up to one of our many newsletters: