Coronavirus: People-tracking Wristbands Tested to Enforce Lockdown

Posted on the 24 April 2020 by Thiruvenkatam Chinnagounder @tipsclear

Bulgaria is the last country to test a bracelet that can track people during the coronavirus pandemic.

Up to 50 Sofia residents will receive a device capable of recording their movements using GPS satellite location data.

Several nations are testing similar bracelets to make sure people obey orders to stay home.

South Korea and Hong Kong have also used electronic trackers to help enforce quarantine.

The trial in Bulgaria will use Comarch LifeWristbands, developed in Poland.

In addition to confirming that a person is at home, the device can monitor the wearer's heart rate and be used to call emergency services.

In South Korea, people who violate the quarantine rules can be ordered to wear a tracking band.

The device was introduced after people were caught leaving their smartphone at home to avoid detection.

The band can notify the authorities if the wearer leaves the house or tries to remove the device.

Campaign groups, including Privacy International, have warned that the coronavirus pandemic could be used as a "takeover" by some governments.

He said that the new measures should be "temporary, necessary and proportionate".

"At the end of the pandemic, these extraordinary measures must be put to an end and taken into consideration" Privacy International said in a blog post.

Other places to test wearable gadgets include:

  • Belgium, where residents are testing a distance social bracelet that vibrates if it is within 3 m (9.8 feet) of another band
  • Lichtenstein, where one in 10 residents will be assigned a band to track "temperature, breath and heart rate and pass it on to a laboratory in Switzerland for further investigation". By the end of the year, another 38,000 residents will receive a band
  • India, which announced plans to produce thousands of location and temperature monitoring bands for quarantined people
  • Hong Kong, in which the police can be alerted if people who wear an electronic band leave the house while in quarantine

Wearable devices may also assist in the adoption of the contact track.

Contact tracking is meant to keep track of who has been close to a person long enough to catch the coronavirus, so you can send a cascade of alarms if they test positive for Covid-19.

Apple and Google have proposed a privacy-focused method via Bluetooth to automate the process, which the UK's NHSX is also exploring.

However, around 12% of smartphones in the UK do not have the Bluetooth Low Energy (BTLE) functionality required for its operation.

Some researchers suggest that simple Bluetooth bracelets could be used by people who don't own a smartphone.

"It would be an option to increase coverage and there are also cheaper Bluetooth devices that could have basic functionality without being a full smartphone," said Christophe Fraser of the Oxford Big Data Institute.

"Wearable Bluetooth devices could indicate very simply if contact has been made."