MADRID (SPAIN) – A promotional video for Spain’s contact-tracing app asks, “What does RadarCOVID not do?” The answer it gives is while navigating the decentralised healthcare system of the country, it does not get hold of the users’ personal data.
European privacy laws in countries like Spain do not employ contact-tracing tools that make use of location data. However, Bluetooth is used to generate anonymous codes assessing proximity of people’s phones.
Most of the region’s apps, a majority of which have a structure designed by Apple and Google, give importance to data protection, and hence their usefulness cannot measured effectively.
RadarCOVID’s developers also had to extensively look into Spain’s healthcare system, which passes on responsibility to 17 regions.
Carme Artigas, head of the state digital and artificial intelligence unit, told in her Madrid office, “Our system is so complex that we have to simplify as much as possible.”
“It works in the background. You forget about it and it is your protective shield,” she said.
Artigas said more than 4 million people have now downloaded the Spanish app.
She added that it is now left for the regional authorities to include the technology into their systems, Artigas said.