Coronavirus Outbreak: Rahul Gandhi terms Aarogya Setu app 'a sophisticated surveillance system', says fear must not be used to 'track citizens'

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New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said Aarogya Setu mobile application is a "sophisticated surveillance system" outsourced to a private operator, raising serious data security and privacy concerns.

File image of Rahul Gandhi. PTI

File image of Rahul Gandhi. PTI

Technology can help keep us safe, but fear must not be used to track citizens without their consent, he said.

The mobile application helps users identify whether or not they are at risk of the COVID-19 infection. It also provides people with important information, including ways to avoid coronavirus and its symptoms.

"The Aarogya Setu app, is a sophisticated surveillance system, outsourced to a private operator, with no institutional oversight — raising serious data security and privacy concerns. Technology can help keep us safe; but fear must not be leveraged to track citizens without their consent," he said on Twitter.

The Central Government has made it compulsory for all its employees to download the app and urged private entitles to also ask their employees to use it.

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said various experts have raised multiple issues of privacy regarding the Aarogya Setu app.

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"We are looking at the privacy issues, as also the compulsory deduction of amount and hopefully within next 24 hours we will come with a more comprehensive and a calibrated response on the issue. But, these are areas of concern, we have noted," he said at a press conference.



from Firstpost India Latest News https://ift.tt/2z84C2b
Press Trust of India

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