A COMPUTER expert has criticised the Scottish Government’s “worrying” response to a “potential large-scale bug” in its flagship Covid exposure app.
Data scientist Maria Gorinova – who highlighted the problem – warned Protect Scotland could have failed to alert more than 1,000 potentially infected people last week alone.
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The Scottish Sun previously told how the Edinburgh University expert flagged up a bug in the app that “may be costing lives”.
The glitch means the program – which was meant to help avoid lockdowns – has not been updating its list of infected users on some phones.
The result is that users may have been coming into close contact with positive cases, but have not been warned to self-isolate.
The Scottish Government responded last week by saying the problem “affects only a select number of Android phones” and urged people to switch off “battery optimisation” for the app.
But Ms Gorinova said in a Twitter thread that the battery optimisation fix did not work on her phone.
And she warned the issue was a “potential large-scale bug” – and users needed to regularly open the app to make Protect Scotland update.
Ms Gorinova said that based on her “very rough” calculations, “there could be, potentially 1,432 people in Scotland who were *not* notified they should self-isolate in the week leading to New Year”.
She added: “Hopefully it puts things into perspective. There could be 1000+ people who should self-isolate but don’t know it.
“With cases raising like mad, we can’t afford this, and I hope #TestandProtect, @scotgov, and the developer nearform.com are taking this seriously.
“I’m writing all of this, because of @scotgov’s statement that they believe this is affecting only a select number of users: this statement is worrying.
“It is clear that there is a problem. I’m not aware of a single positive example of the app working as expected on Android.
“Please @scotgov, @scotgovhealth, @NicolaSturgeon, push the developer to fix this ASAP.
“And tell people to open their app so that it syncs! If only 10% of 1432 exposed ppl develop COVID, and the R-rate is 1, notifying them to self-isolate means ~143 direct cases prevented!”
Ms Gorinova, a PhD student specialising in programming languages, machine learning and human-computer interaction, added: “Oh and btw… Disabling the battery optimization as the gov’s statement suggests, didn’t do anything for me……. So everyone, just keep opening your app once daily.”
Coronavirus contact tracing app Protect Scotland has ‘potentially critical flaw’
Scottish Conservative shadow health secretary Donald Cameron said: “When this flaw was first identified, I urged the SNP government to admit it, explain it and fix it.
“However, it appears that instead they have only offered a partial explanation which falls short of providing the reassurance that is necessary.
“People need to have faith in this technology which is supposed to play a key role in protecting us from the virus.
“When credible people make valid criticism, and are motivated by improving public safety, they must be taken seriously.”
Scottish Labour health spokesperson Monica Lennon said: “The First Minister needs to take the reliability of the Protect Scotland app seriously.
“The rate of cases in Scotland is extremely worrying and errors with the Test and Protect system could prove fatal. “We need an urgent statement on this so that the public can continue to use the app with confidence.”
The Scottish Government had said the app – launched in September – “works in the background” when Bluetooth is switched on.
But reviews in the Google Play Store – where the app can be downloaded – show other users reporting a similar issue to the one flagged by Ms Gorinova.
One person said he had not had an update for 11 days, and dozens more he’d been in contact with had reported the same issue “of varying timescales with no checking” – the longest being 36 days.
The flaw emerged a fortnight after Nicola Sturgeon admitted a different error with Protect Scotland had led to hundreds of people wrongly being alerted.
The Scottish Government has been asked for comment.
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