Comment from Varonis: Security and privacy concerns around NHSX contact-tracing app
May 2020 by Matt Lock, Technical Director UK at Varonis
Following the news around NHS officials racing to improve the COVID-19 contact-tracing app’s privacy safeguards, Matt Lock, Technical Director UK at Varonis coffers the following comment:
“Unprecedented times lead to unprecedented measures. Chances are, you would be willing to bend your digital privacy rights during the current crises if it meant you could keep you and your family safer. We can’t keep our eyes off the long-term consequences after enabling this kind of technology and bending privacy rules. Once lifted, privacy restrictions aren’t guaranteed to be put back in place. That the data is anonymized shouldn’t really help people rest easy - researchers have found that anonymous information can be traced back to individuals. It’s one thing to know health officials are keeping tabs on your location to keep you safer.
Beyond governments using this technology for questionable motives in the future, it must be assumed that this tracking will fall into the wrong hands. The idea that anyone, including a cybercriminal, could use this technology to track your movements and keep tabs on the people you meet would be a no-go for many individuals – despite the promised short-term gains.”