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NHS Covid 19 App

LynnDoyleCooper said:
It's not a flaw to fix, it's designed to do that. I suspect there's complex tech reasons why it doesn't just stop. Maybe to let you and the data goblins in the office somewhere know the app is still working?
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It’s totally a flaw as it worries people unnecessarily and doesn’t provide further information to reassure them
 
Chilli.s said:
Turns out that everyone who had a supposedly close contact but don't do anything alert should actually have gone home and isolated. Reely controlling the virus with world beating efficiency.
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How do you know that? I've had at least 3 of those so would like to know where you're getting that information from.
 
I dropped a couple of things at my mate's house where they have covid. It was only when my husband pointed out that i really, really needed to leave my phone at home that i realised what a big mistake that could have been. :hmm:
 
Reported over the weekend in The Times. Sky News article here as it's not behind the paywall:

news.sky.com

Coronavirus: NHS COVID app failed to record potential exposures due to error

The wrong threshold had reportedly been set for the app and was not recording those who were close enough to transmit the virus.
news.sky.com news.sky.com

The app was set to a too low risk threshold so some (not all as Chilli.s says) of these exposure notifications should have meant people should self-isolate.
 
I updated the app this morning and now it crashes every time I try to open it.

The swim booking apps do the same for me after a while and the only way to fix it is to uninstall and reinstall but I really don't want to do that as it'll wipe all my history!

I have reported the problem.
 
Although if everyone had isolated at the slightest indication by the app then who knows how or if infection rates would be affected.

The block to all this is the no pay to stay at home I suppose, sick pay surely only if officially sick.
 
The sheer volume of phantom notifications should have been a tip-off about the issue.

I doubt I ever took the time to bring that up when it would have mattered, and if I had brought it up I would have had no idea about the specific app error and would instead have been making cynical noises about what level of exposure had deliberately been chosen by the authorities as a threshold.
 
Cerv said:
it's built into the Google/Apple framework that it can't report back to any central authority when it's made an exposure notification. that's kept only on the user's phone. so unfortunately they wouldn't have been able to see that there was massively fewer exposure notifications happening than expected due to the hugely incorrect variable.
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Although you'd hope in that case they'd have a particularly robust ongoing testing and monitoring program to check it's working. Perhaps with some 'mystery shopper' type control users.
 
The more I think about this the more dumbfounded I am. Did they really not check that the fundamental part of the app works as designed - it's really basic stuff. All they needed was a couple of control users, mark one as having covid and have them 'sit' with another user for the allotted time. Does the app trigger y/n.

I suppose it doesn't really surprise me any - it was more of a shock that the app did seem to be functioning OK. But it just actually disappoints me. There's been plenty of money on the table to do this properly, there are loads of decent devs/companies in this country that would have done it properly and yet the money has gone to an org that has shown time and time again it exists purely to game the system.

I'll bet more money has gone on 'contract managers' then testing.
 
salem said:
The more I think about this the more dumbfounded I am. Did they really not check that the fundamental part of the app works as designed - it's really basic stuff. All they needed was a couple of control users, mark one as having covid and have them 'sit' with another user for the allotted time. Does the app trigger y/n.

I suppose it doesn't really surprise me any - it was more of a shock that the app did seem to be functioning OK. But it just actually disappoints me. There's been plenty of money on the table to do this properly, there are loads of decent devs/companies in this country that would have done it properly and yet the money has gone to an org that has shown time and time again it exists purely to game the system.

I'll bet more money has gone on 'contract managers' then testing.
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I cannot escape the niggling idea that this could have been an attempt at a social engineering tweak that someone fucked up on. I could see how this Government might be very wary of rolling out an app that suddenly exposed their "smooth roads, fair winds" bullshit for what it was, and were keen to go for a "soft" start, only someone forgot and it stayed that way.
 
Mrs Miggins said:
Quite concerned that I've been roaming around potentially infectious.
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Captain obvious advice time... Iff you haven't got symptoms, (yeah, I know, asymptomatic infectees can spread the virus ttoo,) I'd probably try not to give those worries headspace.

This of course highlights what a massive advantage it would be, if we had widespread, affordable and accurate testing. For people's mental health apart from anything else.
 
xenon said:
Captain obvious advice time... Iff you haven't got symptoms, (yeah, I know, asymptomatic infectees can spread the virus ttoo,) I'd probably try not to give those worries headspace.

This of course highlights what a massive advantage it would be, if we had widespread, affordable and accurate testing. For people's mental health apart from anything else.
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I'm not losing sleep over it and have no symptoms but it is a little concerning.
 
Looking through the Google Play store the issue I've been having (app crashes on opening) is one of the main bugs people are reporting, after the stuff about ghost notifications (and a few people saying things like "my flatmate tested positive and the app didn't notify me" which is hopefully down to the error they've now corrected).
 
marty21 said:
I have had an alert telling me to self isolate for 10 days , at the same time my sister told me she had tested positive (I saw her on Friday) .
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She probably told them she'd been in contact with you. That's how I was contacted. I only passed on my daughter's details because she was the only one that I'd seen but my contact hadn't.

Six of us went out a couple of weeks ago, and four of us have now tested positive. The other two don't have symptoms but I've suggested they pretend they do in order to get a test, like I did.
 
scifisam said:
She probably told them she'd been in contact with you. That's how I was contacted. I only passed on my daughter's details because she was the only one that I'd seen but my contact hadn't.

Six of us went out a couple of weeks ago, and four of us have now tested positive. The other two don't have symptoms but I've suggested they pretend they do in order to get a test, like I did.
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Agreed - I have no symptoms but am getting a test given the circumstances. Why wouldn't you?
 
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