TraceTogether has been adopted by approximately 78% of the city-state’s nearly 5.7 million residents.
Photographer: Catherine Lai / AFP / Getty Images
Photographer: Catherine Lai / AFP / Getty Images
Singapore police may use data obtained through its widely accepted contact tracking program for criminal investigations, a senior official said Monday.
In response to a question about the city-state’s TraceTogether program in parliament, Desmond Tan, Secretary of State in the Interior Ministry, said that the police “had the power under the criminal procedure code to obtain data, including TraceTogether data, for criminal investigation. “
“The government is the custodian of TT data submitted by individuals, and strict measures have been taken to protect this personal information,” Tan said. “Examples of these measures include giving only authorized officers access to the data, using such data only for authorized purposes, and storing the data on a secure data platform.”
With one of the highest take-up rates in the world, TraceTogether has been adopted by about 78% of the city-state’s nearly 5.7 million residents, Education Secretary Lawrence Wong said in a parliamentary speech on Monday. Use of TraceTogether via the mobile application or a wearable token will be required to access public locations in early 2021, the Ministry of Health said. stated in December.
Follow Tan’s comments privacy concerns raised by citizens about the contact tracking program last year. According to the TraceTogether website, the program does not collect data about individual GPS locations, Wi-Fi or mobile networks used. It also states that data “should be used only for the purpose of tracing contacts of individuals who may have been exposed to Covid-19.”
According to Tan, government officials who recklessly or knowingly disclose the data without permission or misuse the data could be fined. until S $ 5,000, approximately $ 3,800, or imprisonment until two years, or both.