This does also rely on the phone being available on the network (details unknown) after the phone is stolen.
Truth be told, the average phone thief doesn’t care about stealing your drivers licence. The value is in being able to flog the phone for cash, and move on to the next theft.
NSW has had digital licences for a while now. I asked them, at the time, a few questions in order to make sure that this would be appropriately safe and secure. I didn’t get satisfactory answers so I am sticking with plastic.
However the relevant NSW government web site does contain the following notes that may also be helpful for Qlders.
It may take some time before all organisations will be ready to accept the Digital Driver Licence. In the meantime, we recommend you also carry your plastic card to avoid inconvenience.
In NSW, failure to present your driver licence to NSW Police officers is an offence. Using the Digital Driver Licence is no different. It is your responsibility to ensure your phone is charged and in working order so that your licence can be read.
(my emphasis)
Er, officer, my drivers licence is flat?
Remember, it’s illegal for motorists to access their Digital Driver Licence when driving or riding, including when stationary, unless they are asked to do so by police or an authorised officer.
This is rather silly. There should be a change to the law, rather than relying on the discretion of the officer not to book you for reaching for your “licence” before you are asked to do so. In any case, before you would typically be asked to present your real licence, you would have pulled out of the line of traffic, become stationary and switched off the engine. So there is no justification for the officer to complain either way about what you do with your “digital licence”.
I would love to help medical staff, but - I don’t trust this Federal Government one iota… Why will data be uploaded from the app, and stored with Amazon???
From this morning’s ABC Online news:
" Shortly after Australia launched COVIDSafe — which is based on Singapore’s TraceTogether app — it was revealed Germany was preparing its own contact-tracing software.
However, the German app is expected to store data on users’ phones rather than on a central database."
The government already has all the information which is recorded by the App…with exception of possibly the MAC address which it is likely that they could have a list anyway. And by the way, the MAC is NOT collected in the database and is only collected by the app and used within the app to identify potential viral infection contacts.
If one doesn’t trust the government when using this app or through data it may store within the app to allow coronavirus contact to be back-traced, I hope that the same individuals also don’t have mobile phones, an online presence (use social media or any other online services), tax file number, medicare card, passport, drivers licence and the list goes on. The data associated with these other government services is stored electronically and often shared (such as that for passports which is shared with other countries immigration services) and would be far more valuable to a criminal that the limited data used for the app (much of which is already publicly available).
mobile phone number – government already has this if one has an Australian registered mobile
name – government also has this if one has a birth certificate or has requested any services from the government.
age range – this is also available to the govenrment, and rather an age range, they know your exact date of birth.
postcode again the government knows this as well. Not only do they know your postal address, they also know your home address.
In relation to online ‘criminals’ getting the information, if one has a online presence, this information will already be available to them. Also, if they wanted to, they could check publicly available databases (e.g. phone book, electoral role etc) to get the information.
To try to argue that one doesn’t trust the government is a misnomer and is about fear-mongering rather than based on fact.
The above is why I have no issue with installing the app and my privacy.
I read the privacy stuff fully and I think they have it sorted. Its encrypted and stored on amazon servers in Australia… Amazon servers are reliable, and thats probably why they have been chosen as the host. Even Apple uses amazon servers. Meh. No need for paranoia there.
I was bored/curious (and a tinkerer) so I captured the data the COVIDSafe app sends. It checks in with an Amazon server every 5 minutes (3-4 packets). However those are empty packets, so either it detects I’m listening and holds back comms… or more likely it doesn’t send anything.
Given people have discovered they receive notifications (likely SMS) if the app isn’t running on their device, I expect the polling of an Amazon server is nothing more than a kind of heartbeat, so it knows who to remind to restart the app if it’s died.
Indeed, even after introducing my phone to some new bluetooth devices, no data is sent to Amazon. So I’d suggest it is only doing what is says and no more.
Other curious tech tinkerers pulled apart and documented what the app does within hours of it going live ( the government was supposed to release the source code of the app but hasn’t yet - I suspect that’s been less a priority than getting it out the door).
As to a minimum version, they may be banking on the version of each device that’s likely new enough to support the newer Bluetooth Low Energy protocol needed for it to listen for nearby bluetooth (without sucking your phone battery dry)
Really? I closed it on my phone a while ago and have not received any messages…
After I got my Apple Watch (a series 1, not series 0) a couple or so of years back, BT has had to be running on the phone or the watch is useless (unless you have the cellular version… I don’t) and apart from the first couple of months when battery life seemed really dodgy, itss been fine, and thats with BT running 24/7. No issues at all with my later model Watch v5… I doubt that this app will cause any real issues unless its constantly accessing the Amazon servers. That will kill the battery PDQ, methinks. I think I’ll be carrying the external battery pack with me when I go out. Just in case.
I’m very concerned about the strength of privacy in these Apps especially the Australian Govt one. It seems at a glance that it’s ok and the best choice as it’s screened by our Health Dept once we give permission however I’m not a legal nor technically minded person and there could be a whole lot I’m not seeing re potential privacy violations.
Please advise
Well of the screenshot of apps you’re showing, the government’s COVIDSafe one is at the top right. It itself appears above board, no idea of the rest of them though.
It’s a time of heightened paranoia, which dodgy people can use to serve legitimate looking scam apps serving false suggestions or scraping your data.
As @benhelps has pointed out the App tagged as COVIDsafe is the App supported by the CMO (Chief Medical Officer) and provided by the Australian Govt. The purpose of the App is to log, on each users mobile phone an encrypted record of near contacts over a 21 day period. It needs as many of us who can to install the App to give the maximum benefit to the community.
There are further details on the government web site and current ABC news articles.
Downloads of the App hit 2 million Monday afternoon. There are comments that some users were having issues with registration or downloads. We had no problem Monday morning.
Mobile phones with older versions of Android or IOS are Not compatible with the App. It is probably a good thing as older versions may be insecure across a wide range of apps or uses.
On security, the logged data is encrypted and kept on each mobile. The App is not purposed to track location, or report your position. Other than registration the logged contact data Is only uploaded with the mobile users permission.
Personally the benefit is the Government Health officers being able to contact me more reliably and quickly if I have potentially been in near contact with someone who has also used the app and has COVID-19. It minimises the risk I might pass it on unwittingly to others in my family, most of whom are well passed 60.
The background noise over government trust or security risks, is inconsequential in my opinion. That’s compared to the potential benefits of reducing the risk of loss of life of others in the community.
Thank you for your welcome Mark.
I appreciate your reply and will certainly take your valid points onboard.
What I’m thinking and seeing it that it basically boils down to a benefit verses risk scenario.
The app uses Bluetooth to “see” other phones nearby. They all have to have Bluetooth on and the app installed (and some types of phones have to have the app open in the phone’s screen).
Question 1 is about location data - people getting SMS asking why they are more than 20km from home (based on their home postcode). Bluetooth doesn’t do this so how is the app determining this - using the phone’s GPS data or using the telecommunication provider’s cell ID?
Question 2 is about the 20km limit - come 2 May 2020 at least one state will be allowing people to make non-essential trips up to 50km from home provided they maintain social distancing (and don’t expect public toilets in National Parks etc to be open). Will the national app still be sending SMS asking why you are more than 20km from home when in your state you can be 50km?
Question 3 is about battery usage - if the app has to be running continually in background mode (for most phones, foreground mode for some phones) and also needs Bluetooth turned on, is it a battery flattener?
Question 4 comes back to the Bluetooth proximity - how does the app know that person A and person B are family who live together and therefore ‘allowed to be near each other’?
Question 5 - How does the app know that person B and person C are ‘allowed to be near each other’ because their residential units are adjacent (horizontally or vertically) and their phones detect each other over the short inter-unit distance?
This is a hoax…fake texts possibly by those who want to derail the apps success. The government has indicated they will be investigating and taking action against those involved in the hoax.
Therefore Q2 is unanswerable.
Q3. The more phone resources on, the quicker the battery drain. Many are likely to have Bluetooth on anyway, so any increase in drain is only due to internal app processes. Any increase is not a reason not to use the app as the phone can easily be recharged.
Q4 The app does not time how long people are together, only if another person with a smart phone with app installed has been in proximity at some time within a 21 day period.
Q5 See Q4. The app doesn’t monitor who one should be in proximity to and whether they are allowed to be there.
I have heard similar rumors or fake information/disinformation about the app. There are some who anti-government, conspiracy theorist etc who are actively attempting to derail the apps success. Ignore these mischief makers, and only read official information.
I started this topic for those doing the right thing.
Have you installed the App?
Have you done the right thing?
How many of the issues you noted can you or I relate first hand?
Does the App work?
I trust the Chief Medical Officers are saying and will do my best to help. It installed on my phone and runs happily with the lock screen on. I’ve seen none of the operating issues you noted, although not all phones support the App. That’s just how it is.
It’s your choice if you do not install the App.
There are consequences of choosing not to join in and give the App a go. Putting it off hoping there will not be secondary outbreaks is high risk. Installing the App after an outbreak will be too late.
Unfortunately governments are always targets, and there is plenty of opportunity for those not on board to chase headlines or create mischief.
If you disagree with the approach the government has taken or doubt their veracity, taking your concerns to State and Federal members might be more fruitful. The government members are always one key place to take your concerns and questions. Thank you for sharing them.
P.S.
The App does have the option to turn on reminders, and receive general notifications. Staying at home might be one. I have not seen any re 20km etc. All the reports from those who have looked into the App functionality have confirmed it does not use GPS nor does it track your location.
On the issue of logging neighbours through walls or family members. Is that an issue? It’s simply a possible contact easily clarified if your log is needed.
The app doesn’t send warning SMS about proximity to home. The purported SMS showing such are just faked up images (probably not so much scams as just to foment discord/distrust).
My android phone asks for permission for GPS access upon install - because on Android the same permission is needed to access either GPS or Bluetooth. Curious app developers have decompiled the app and scoured the source code, and confirm it doesn’t use GPS at all.
See 1)
It’s not too bad (at least on my Android 8.1 phone). Bluetooth BLE by design isn’t as hungry as older Bluetooth protocols. My phone runs it 24/7 and I’ve only noticed a 5-10% hit on battery over a day. Of course if it can install on phones that only support older Bluetooth (no idea) it would have to use older Bluetooth protocols, which while likely able to do what is needed, would also likely be much hungrier doing so.
Short answer - it doesn’t know. It just locally on the phone collects MAC addresses of bluetooth devices it observes in proximity for a while. It would come down to if the app is called upon to give up its logs of bluetooth devices in proximity (because you or someone you interacted with tests positive), then systems is the backend would contact those it finds in those logs.
I’ll admit I’m a bit fuzzy on how it knows who to request data of, and how it (reputedly) asks for permission to do so - I suspect it matches app IDs from registration during install, to the bluetooth data off a COVID positive person using the app’s phone, and goes from there.
Again, it wouldn’t know, and it would be up to contact tracing people to verify which bluetooth contacts are irrelevant for such reasons.
In my case not at all. Not a big user and do not stream and use lots of data, but I tend to plug it in every 3rd morning and with and without COVIDSafe running there is still 20-35% battery remaining. (Moto G6+)
