1

Introduction

In several countries, contact tracing apps have been introduced as a way to prevent the

spread of COVID-19. These apps work by identifying the people who have tested positive

from the COVID-19, prompting the people to share the information, locating the individuals

who have been in close contact with them and then notifying the people. In this report the

brief about the ethical issue related to uses of contact tracing apps is discussed. Also, some of

the case studies relevant to clauses of ACS Code of Professional conduct are provided which

are summarizes the values related to professional work by the members. The report discusses

the virtue ethics as well to resolve the ethical problems in ICT.

Ethical Issues regarding contact tracing Apps

Monitoring of the people by the contact tracing apps compromises with the privacy of

the people because the personal data of the people can fall into the wrong hands and can used

for maleficent activities. These apps use GPS or Bluetooth to detect the proximity of an

individual with another. Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) enables the mobile of a person to

broadcasts the information with unique ID. Different apps works in different ways but all of

them follow the same basic steps (Ahmed, et al., 2020).

However, this process sounds so feasible and doable but the case is not that simple as

it looks because being monitored by these apps for 24 hours raises the question of privacy of

people and potential abuse. These apps stores log of the ongoing locations and timestamps of

a person with the help of GPS in the devices, hence compromising with the privacy of

peopleby revealing their whereabouts and travels over a period of time. A balance should be

maintained between privacy and security because poor implementation of standards of

 2

security can put the private data of the people at risk. Some of apps which uses GPS are

SafePaths ,Hamgen and AarogyaSetu app (Trang, Trenz, Weiger, Tarafdar, & Cheung, 2020).

There are two different type of approaches used by these apps. In centralized

approach, public health authorities are able to analyse the information of the people by

checking the log of their devices which is uploaded to a central server. However, through this

process the privacy of the people is invaded because their location and the information of the

other people with whom they have met is stored in the servers. NHS COVID-19,

TraceTogether and COVIDSafe are some of the apps which uses this centralized approach.

In decentralized approach, minimum amount of information of a person is uploaded on the

servers and the log remains on the mobile device. Users who have tested positive, their IDs

are downloaded anonymously by the apps and the same information is matched with the logs

stored on their devices. PrivateTracer is one of the apps which uses decentralized approach

(Rowe, 2020).

There are four types of challenges that people face related to the privacy and security

of these apps:

1. If the process which uses the Bluetooth Low Energy by the apps in

broadcasting the data packets in order to identify other devices is not set

properly, the device of a person can get hacked by interlinking various devices

and their respective identification packets (Chan & Saqib, 2021).

2. Sensitive information like contacts logs and encryptions keys which are stored

by contact tracing apps should be kept encrypted and stored in an application

called sandbox rather connecting them with shared locations. Still with the

sandbox approach, a hacker can hack the device if the hacker gets physical

access (Bengio, et al., 2021).

 3

3. Devicesofpeople can be targeted with the attacks like “man-in-the-middle” at

the intercept of the trafficif the communication with the backend of the server

of an application is not encrypted properly (Yasaka, Lehrich, & Sahyouni,

2020).

4. When the information, such as diagnoses of the user and contacts logs, is

submitted to the servers, authentication must be performedbecause if the

proper authorization is not done, servers can receive fake health reports which

undermines the reliability of the system (Wen, Zhao, Lin, Xuan, & Shroff,

2020).

Tracing apps should be downloaded from the official stores only, as there are many

fake apps has been reported during the pandemic because these fake apps are made by the

mischievous people which can gain access to the devices of the people and apps related to

security solution should also be installed by the users to scan the applications and protect the

device from the malware.

Codes Guide in Ethical Choices

To abide by codes of ethics is an essential characteristic of professionfor the

members. These codes are established as the Code of Professional Conduct and is the part of

the regulations of the society which are applicable to every member of ACS working in the

field of information and communications technology. The ACS code of ethics agree with the

argument that “Codes guide the members of a profession in ethical choices” because these

codes are relevant to standards of professional legislation and if the codes are not abided then

the failure can be used as grounds for a claim of professional negligence.

 4

For example, An ACS member, Katherina has provided an extensive and voluntary

aid to many infirmities supports groups. These groups use ICT to benefit the clients and

provide an efficient working of the organisation. The clauses related to professional conduct

in this ASC code includes a) Public Interest: To consider other professions and social systems

and organizations to be traversed by the profession of a member. b) Quality of Life: To

recognize the role of ICT in people’s life particularly for disadvantaged. c) Professional

Development: To increase the awareness regarding issues which affects profession and the

professional public relationship. d) Professionalism: To extend the knowledge and

understanding of public towards ICT.

Another example is that the ASC Disciplinary Committee decided to do the meeting

on Camera and avoid making results of the determinations to their complainants or general

membership to protect the reputation and status of the members. In this aspect the ASC

conduct clauses related to professionalism to take appropriate actions against the breaking of

the codes and to promote trustworthiness and professionalism in ICT.

Conclusion

To conclude the report, the contact tracing apps may have playing a significant role in

the technological sectors or aspects but the risks related to these apps cannot be avoided and

keeping in mind the security and privacy concerns strict rules should be taken into

consideration. The ASC Code guides the public effectively regarding their ethical choices

and to improve quality of life of individuals. In this attribute, the Virtue ethics also play a

essential part to resolve the ICT ethical issues as these traits can be acquired by one’s own

choice and are necessary to maintain ethnicity in the ICT area.

5