UK's Contact Tracing App Will Reportedly Use Apple/Google Solution After All

In what appears to be a reversal of course, the BBC today reported that the United Kingdom's National Health Service will adopt Apple's and Google's Exposure Notification API for its COVID-19 contact tracing app after all.

exposure text feature centered 1
Other countries that have committed to using the API include Italy, Latvia, Switzerland, Germany, Poland, and Saudi Arabia, among others.

Apple released the API as part of iOS 13.5 last month. At the time, the company said that 22 countries had requested and received access to the API, along with the U.S. states of Alabama, North Dakota, and South Carolina.

Apple and Google created the API to allow iPhones and Android smartphones to interface with one another for contact tracing purposes. If and when you happen to be nearby someone who later tests positive for COVID-19, you can receive a notification and take the appropriate steps to self isolate and seek medical help if necessary.

The API relies on Bluetooth, is designed with privacy in mind, and is disabled by default. Read our Exposure Notification guide for more details.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

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Top Rated Comments

i-Liam Avatar
58 months ago
The UK Government’s whole dealing of this pandemic has been a disaster and a disgrace.
Score: 29 Votes (Like | Disagree)
SaxPlayer Avatar
58 months ago
I think we all knew this was going to happen. I wonder who'll draw the short straw and have to host the government briefing this evening? ?
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
CausticSoda Avatar
58 months ago
The second our morons in charge announced they would do their own app, I knew this was coming. What a total waste of time and money yet again. You couldn't make it up.
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jjdodders Avatar
58 months ago
Pathetic government.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
GadgetBen Avatar
58 months ago
We’d have the ability to trace and alert more individuals by now if the government had just left the tech to the tech firms who know what they are doing.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
wordsworth Avatar
58 months ago
British governments have a rather poor record when it comes to tech implementation. (That sentence is what is known as 'understatement.)
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)