Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the federal government is working with Shopify, Blackberry, Government of Ontario and the Canadian Digital Service on a national contact tracing mobile application.
Testing of the app will begin in Ontario and will be available across the country in early July.
Anyone who tests positive for COVID-19 can have their status uploaded to the network through an anonymous randomized code, associate with their phone.
When someone has been in proximity with a positive case, they will be alerted and can then call public health for next steps.
Trudeau said there are three different sections of this plan:
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There is the national app that can be used even if someone travels to another part of Canada.
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The second part is the national database of randomized codes
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The third part are the local health services, which will ensure anyone who could have been exposed to COVID-19 can get guidance on how to keep themselves, and others, safe.
“It’s an extra tool that helps people move forward with confidence that we’re going to be able to track and trace more of the exposure or the potential sharing of the COVID-19 virus around the country,” Trudeau said.
The prime minister recognized that uptake of a contact tracing app has impacted effectiveness in other countries. He said some of the challenges of other versions include the need for the app to stay open on someone’s phone, but updates on Google and Apple’s operational systems allows these apps to work in the background.
“Any amount of people that download it will be useful for that person and for our society,” Trudeau said. “It’s certain that if we can talk about a 50 per cent uptake, for example, or more, then it becomes extraordinarily useful.”
“It’ll actually allow us to have a better sense of when there are spikes or resurgences of the virus in a particular area or not, because more people will be getting that notification and contacting their local public health authorities.”
The prime minister said the privacy commissioner has been consulted for this app, which is why it functions “entirely on an anonymized basis,” not storing any phone numbers and location data.
“It’s super simple, it’s super secure,” Trudeau said.
The prime minister said the federal government is working on integration into the local public health services and “a number of provinces” have moved forward on that.
