After a pilot test that started on 29 June on the Canary island of La Gomera and several weeks of development with fictitious outbreaks until 31 July, the mobile application ‘Radar COVID’, designed and run by the Secretary of State for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence of the Government of Spain, has passed its testing phase and is ready for download.
The official application for tracking positive contacts for coronavirus is available to the health authorities of the Autonomous Communities who “will be able to connect the tool to their health warning management systems” to help stop the transmission of Covid-19, as indicated in a statement by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation.
During the testing phase, four waves of coronavirus outbreaks were simulated and, although it only worked on La Gomera, “more than 60,000 people downloaded the app throughout Spain”. One of the main objectives was to check the number of people who would download it and their commitment to report fictitious positives.
After measuring contact tracing, the pilot test managed to trace “an average of 6.4 close contacts of risk detected per confirmed dummy positive”. This figure, they say, is “almost double the current efficiency of manual tracers”.
What is ‘Radar COVID’?
This application sends alerts to users anonymously about the risk of exposure to a possible contact in the last 14 days with a person who has subsequently confirmed being positive for coronavirus. In this way, it uses the Bluetooth technology of the mobile device, detects the risk of possible infection and provides instructions on how to proceed.
This is a similar application to those developed in other European countries such as Germany or Italy, and the government anticipates that “given the current situation, a first functional version of the tool could be available for a specific launch in mid-August”. Deployment throughout the national territory could take place around 15 September.
How does this application work?
The operation is quite simple and intuitive and is now available to download on iOS or Android and start seeing how it works. The contact tracking system has been developed jointly by Apple and Google and has two main functions: to anonymously report your positive diagnosis and to anonymously communicate the exposure to the people you have been in contact with.
It keeps track of the people you’ve been in contact with in the last 14 days, from less than two meters away and for more than 15 minutes. Based on this information, the app assesses the level of risk exposure.
In this sense, since it does not provide personal data, “the application uses the terminal’s Bluetooth connection, through which mobile phones emit and observe anonymous identifiers from other phones that change periodically,” they explain. Thus, if two handsets have been in close proximity for 15 minutes or more, “both devices save the anonymous identifier issued by the other”.
In the event that a user is diagnosed positive by Covid-19 after testing, the user can decide whether to give consent for “anonymous notification to be sent.
Once notified of the positive, mobile phones that have been in contact with this person will receive a health alert about the risk of contagion and the steps to be taken. These communications do not indicate when or where the possible exposure occurred, nor the identity of the person who has confirmed their diagnosis.
What do you need to use it?
COVID Radar’ helps the user to know whether or not he or she is being exposed to the coronavirus in order to take the necessary measures. To use it you only need to follow three simple steps:
- Activate the Bluetooth.
- In the case of a positive diagnosis, enter the code provided by the health authorities anonymously.
- If you have been exposed or have reported a positive diagnosis, just follow the instructions sent to you by the application.
If a person is positive for coronavirus and does not yet know it, they can cross paths with other people in supermarkets or restaurants and all possible contacts need to be traced in view of the risk of resurgence.
The app is capable of storing the identifiers of each person. In this way, if the person confirms his positive when collecting the results by entering the code previously provided by the health authorities, the other person who has been crossed will receive the anonymous alert.
The official application of the Spanish Government to prevent the spread of the coronavirus is now available. By installing it, in a totally anonymous way, it will analyze and warn you if you have been in close contact with the virus. You can install it here for Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=es.gob.radarcovid
And here for iPhone: https://apps.apple.com/es/app/radar-covid/id1520443509.
With the collaboration of all of us we will manage to control the pandemic
