European Union countries and the Commission have agreed on a technical framework to enable regional coronavirus contacts tracing apps to work across national borders.
A number of European countries have launched contacts tracing apps at this point, with the aim of leveraging smartphone technologies in the fight against COVID-19, but none of these apps can yet work across national borders.
Last month, EU Member States agreed to a set of interoperability guidelines for tracing apps. Now they’ve settled on a technical spec for achieving cross-border working of apps. The approach has been detailed in a specification document published today by the eHealth Network.
The Commission has called the agreement on a tech spec an important step in the fight against COVID-19, while emphasizing tracing apps are only a supplement to manual contacts tracing methods.
Once the technical solution is deployed, national apps will work even when users travel to other EU countries. This is especially important as countries begin to lift their travel restrictions in preparation for summer tourism. Thanks to the new interoperability specifications, users won’t need to download a new app for every country they enter.
“As we approach the travel season, it is important to ensure that Europeans can use the app from their own country wherever they are travelling in the EU,” Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton said in a press release.
According to the EU Commission, the information will be shared in a way that prevents individuals from being identified. Geolocation data will not be used, and the Commission will set up a gateway service to efficiently pass relevant information between the apps and servers to minimize the amount of data exchanged and reduce users’ data consumption.
According to the Commission, most member states have launched contact tracing apps and the “great majority” are decentralized, meaning the contact tracing matches happen on a users’ device not in a centralized server. The decentralized approach is meant to better protect users’ identities, and it has been adopted by countries like Italy, Germany and Switzerland. The Apple-Google API is also decentralized. The UK and France have taken a centralized approach, so those apps will not be eligible for this interoperability standard.
