Big Brother is watching, but only to make sure you don’t spread the virus

New digital surveillance technology implemented to trace and track the spread of Covid-19 is government’s latest development in the fight to curb the pandemic.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has already announced the imminent deployment of 10,000 field workers, and Telkom has stepped up to assist in the fight the virus.

The telecommunications provider has teamed up with the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to develop “a novel track and trace solution”, to identify those infected with Covid-19, and who they may have come into contact with.

Telkom said in a statement on Thursday that the system adheres to “global best practice promoted by the World Health Organisation”, as well as accounting for poverty. Despite assurances, within hours of Telkom’s announcement, more than 100 civil society groups signed a joint statement with Amnesty International calling for citizens to be surveyed under strict conditions.

These include government transparency, to prevent the pandemic “to serve as an excuse for indiscriminate mass surveillance”.

The statement also calls surveillance to be strictly time-bound, that data collected only be used to respond to the novel coronavirus, and that a citizen’s right to privacy, dignity and legal rights are not gutted in the process.

Although Telkom did state that it would make use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data, the “multiple data sources” cited are not elaborated on.

An extract from the Government Gazette of 26 March and 2 April indicates the following Disaster Management Act regulations when implementing surveillance to monitor Covid-19 patients.

The National department of health plans to develop and maintain a national database to enable tracing people “who are known or reasonably suspected” to have come into contact with a Covid-19 patient.

The tracing database includes a person’s name and surname, ID or passport numbers, a photograph, residential address and cellphone numbers. It will also document the Covid-19 test results, and details of known or suspected contacts of any person who tested positive for Covid-19.

It stresses that information in the database is confidential and may not be disclosed, unless it is imperative to help curb the spread of the virus.

Laboratories must submit all samples to the director-general for health, as well as any information obtained by the NICD.

The director-general also has the power to summon a licenced electronic communications provider to provide them with any information required, including the suspected movements of the person in question from 5 March until the end of the national state of disaster.

So, where does the information go at the end of lockdown?

According to the Gazette, information will be destroyed six weeks after being obtained, and no one is allowed to intercept the content of any electronic communication. Weekly reports will be filed by a designated judge, yet to be announced, known as the Covid-19 designated judge, along with the director-general for health.

The judge is also privy to information in the director-general’s possession, and can make recommendations to government to protect the right to privacy, “while ensuring the ability of the department of health to engage in urgent and effective contact tracing”.

Those on government’s radar will only find out “within six weeks” of the national state of disaster ending, and the “de-identified information” on the database will be kept for academic purposes.

And those who fail to comply will be liable to a fine or jail time for up to six months, or both.

Communications, Telecommunications and Postal Services Minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams assured South Africans on Thursday that the track and trace solution “will not be used to spy on citizens”.

Ndabeni-Abrahams said the health department would also be seeking permission from the Electronic Communications Network Service (ECNS) to access the geolocation of citizens.

ECNS is one of the main service licenses issued by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa.

“We do respect that everyone has the right to privacy, but in a situation like this, our individual rights do not supersede the country’s rights. It is in our interest as government as well as South Africans to ensure that we minimise the spread of the virus,” she explained.

She added that phone calls would not be intercepted and that those who were being tracked and traced would be notified.

Ndabeni-Abrahams’ explanation differs slightly from the Government Gazette, but the general notion from the government is that the solution will only be used to flatten the virus curve, and will not be looking closer than geolocations of suspected Covid-19 patients.

Paranoia and concern expressed by a number of citizens are understandable, to an extent – living through a lockdown is already a new, unprecedented way of dealing with a potentially catastrophic issue, and being told that government will now monitor citizens feeds into the fear of the unknown.

But, speaking to Telkom communications director Nomalungelo Faku about exactly how people are going to be monitored should put people at ease.

Faku explained that unlike other countries monitoring everything from phone calls to credit card histories, Telkom’s track and trace system will only be using geospatial information. GIS data will be used because Telkom has the largest fibre network in the country, and this is an efficient way of knowing where people are.

Covid-19 has also been declared a notifiable disease by the NICD. This means that government must be notified in order to check on people Covid-19 patients have come into contact with, as part of set-out protocols associated with the notifiable disease, Faku explained.

For some, monitoring one’s location may seem an unnecessary protocol. However, for those living in high-density, impoverished areas, this may well be the lifeline they need to survive the pandemic.

Faku said the partnership with the NICD and the CSIR aids tracking and tracing efforts by being able to dispense the correct amount of field workers and equipment required to test those that may have come into contact with infected citizens.

“At the moment, the system is about helping the NICD, mostly in high-density areas, and on that basis, they can say the CSIR needs to deploy so many people, equipment, and so on.”

This saves countless hours that would have been spent manually filling out paperwork and submitting it to the NICD and government, and in turn, helps flatten the curve to curb the virus. It also alleviates pressures felt by healthcare facilities in impoverished areas, by having the CSIR send out equipment to assist healthcare workers and field workers.

Telkom has automated what is in the handsets donated to field workers by Samsung, in real-time, using an application, to make collecting data easier and faster. Faku also reiterated that the data belongs to government, and only certain people will be able to access patient records on the database.

This data, Faku said, also adheres to international data protection ISO protocols.

Faku pointed out how the technology used to assist the healthcare sector is an important step in the right direction regarding moving away from physical forms to electronic data.

This, she said, is not only essential in curbing Covid-19 infections, but has also helped government realise how technology can play a role in the healthcare industry post-lockdown, most notably, the planned rollout of National Health Insurance.

“The system has moved us away from physical, towards electronic, which means we can keep patient records better, and ensure that interventions come earlier. A doctor can now see more than one set of records, because it is all electronic.”

South Africa’s long-term battle with tuberculosis (TB) is one example of how manual patient medical history inputs have significantly slowed down the process of rolling out immunisation programmes, as much of this data was manually inputted, and doctors often did not have access to the country’s medical records.

In short, technology will do wonders to improve the efficiency of the country’s healthcare department.

How you will be tracked, even if you don’t own a smartphone:

Monitoring citizen movements is not so much for those that are currently comfortable during lockdown, but those whose lives have been adversely affected by being forced to stay indoors. Cold weather and rain may keep suburban residents cosied up indoors, but for those living in makeshift shacks, this only adds to their current woes.

In addition, informal settlements are often far away from medical centres, and with the current lockdown, those seeking assistance are even more inconvenienced.

This is why it is essential that those living in densely populated rural areas are monitored, as these residents find it difficult to practice social distancing, and are therefore more likely to have come into contact with those infected with Covid-19.

Telkom had low-income sectors in mind when it helped create the track and trace solution, and took into account that most people from low-income households do not own smartphones.

Those who do venture outside for an occasional shop visit are also in luck – Faku explained that if a person tests positive for the novel coronavirus, they are not likely to remember each time they visited a shopping centre, and exactly who they came into contact with.

Tellers and shoppers potentially at risk will now know if anyone that was in a mall with them on the same day and has tested positive for the virus, further preventing the spread of Covid-19. Before surveillance, it would have been impossible to track down each shopper and teller that may have interacted with a Covid-19 patient.

A national debate on using more intricate technology to ascertain each person’s whereabouts and interactions may ensure at a later stage, Faku said, but at the moment, geospatial surveillance is the most least-invasive way to curb the Covid-19 pandemic.

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