Contact Tracing With TraceTogether

As the pandemic that is COVID-19 rages on unchecked throughout Europe, Singapore's approach to battling this outbreak has won international praise. To be sure, it hasn't all been smooth sailing. Singaporeans tend to fall into two extreme categories - those who sow distrust in the Government, adopting an every-man-for-himself approach and obstinately refusing to cooperate; and those who complacently think that the Government will handle this without them needing to lift a finger to do their part. Both are equally toxic to a situation like this, and potential poster boys for Darwin's Theory of Natural Selection.

But back to the topic. Singapore's approach has been to aggressively track down people whom infectees have been in contact with, so as to identify other possible infectees and potentially prevent more avenues of infection. It's worked - to a point. While the numbers of infected people have been increasing, without these efforts, one shudders to imagine how much worse it could have been by now.

And now, with the aid of mobile technology, Singaporeans have the opportunity (one might even say, a duty) to help.

GovTech, in conjunction with other Government statutory boards, has released a mobile app named TraceTogether. Once installed and the appropriate permissions granted, TraceTogether runs in the background and via Bluetooth, keeps records of other cellphones in the vicinity running the same app. Should any one of the owners of these phones be diagnosed with COVID-19, the Government is able to locate all those people who were in close proximity to the infectee.

This is a concept eerily similar to the plot devices of many modern movies. And it's awesome.

Of course, it would be unethical if the Singapore Government surveilled you in such a way without your express permission; thus the app takes pains to acquire it during the setup.

And even after setup, the app does not automatically upload the collected data to the Government. No, you have to explicitly do it yourself.

The setup is pretty easy, though not without some annoyances here and there. Friends inform me that the app doesn't run in the background on iOS products. The app sends an OTP but then immediately auto-approves the OTP without the user specifically keying it in, leading to some confusion. The app doesn't seem to sale very well, flashing a server overload when more than a certain number of people started signing up. The text and buttons aren't well-spaced in spots. Things like that.

But it would be grossly unfair to quibble over all that. TraceTogether is obviously a Minimum Viable Product that was hastily hammered out over the course of a couple sprints, and as such, there are sure to be a few rough edges. The concept is terrific and has the potential to greatly ease the task of contact tracing. That's all that matters at the moment.

Stuff like this is why I was interested in joining GovTech before. Projects that matter. Projects that make a difference. The dev team at GovTech sure lives in exciting times!

Final Note

Please install the app, and encourage others to do likewise. It could make all the difference.

Without a trace of irony,
T___T