Views and Needs of Students, Parents, and Teachers on Closed-Circuit Television, Proximity Trackers, and Access Cards to Facilitate COVID-19 Contact Tracing in Schools: Thematic Analysis of Focus Groups and Interviews.

BACKGROUND: Contact tracing is considered a key measure in preventing the spread of infectious diseases. Governments around the world adopted contact tracing to limit the spread of COVID-19 in schools. Contact tracing tools utilizing digital technology (eg, GPS chips, Bluetooth radios) can increase efficiency compared to manual methods. However, these technologies can introduce certain privacy challenges in relation to retention, tracking, and the using and sharing of personal data, and little is known about their applicability in schools. OBJECTIVE: This is the second of two studies exploring the potential of digital tools and systems to help schools deal with the practical challenges of preventing and coping with an outbreak of COVID-19. The aim was to explore the views, needs, and concerns among secondary school stakeholders (parents, teachers, pupils) regarding the implementation of three digital tools for contact tracing: access cards, proximity tracking, and closed-circuit television (CCTV). METHODS: Focus groups and interviews were conducted with secondary school students, parents, and teachers. The topic guide was informed by the Unified Theory of Technology and Acceptance. Data-driven and theory-driven approaches were combined to identify themes and subthemes. RESULTS: We recruited 22 participants. Findings showed that there is no single solution that is suitable for all schools, with each technology option having advantages and limitations. Existing school infrastructure (eg, CCTV and smart/access cards technology) and the geography of each school would determine which tools would be optimal for a particular school. Concerns regarding the cost of installing and maintaining equipment were prominent among all groups. Parents and teachers worried about how the application of these solutions will affect students' right to privacy. Parents also appeared not to have adequate knowledge of the surveillance technologies already available in schools (eg, CCTV). Students, who were mostly aware of the presence of surveillance technologies, were less concerned about any potential threats to their privacy, while they wanted reassurances that any solutions would be used for their intended purposes. CONCLUSIONS: Findings revealed that there is not one tool that would be suitable for every school and the context will determine which tool would be appropriate. This study highlights important ethical issues such as privacy concerns, balancing invasions of privacy against potential benefits, transparency of communication around surveillance technology and data use, and processes of consent. These issues need to be carefully considered when implementing contact tracing technologies in school settings. Communication, transparency, and consent within the school community could lead to acceptance and engagement with the new tools.

How Mass surveillance Crowds Out Installations of COVID-19 Contact Tracing Applications

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries have developed contact tracing technologies to curb the spread of the disease by locating and isolating people who have been in contact with coronavirus carriers. Subsequently, understanding why people install and use contact tracing applications is becoming central to their effectiveness and impact. However, involuntary systems can crowd out the use of voluntary applications when several contact tracing initiatives are employed simultaneously. To investigate this hypothesis, we analyze the concurrent deployment of two contact tracing technologies in Israel: centralized mass surveillance technologies and a voluntary contact tracing mobile app. Based on a representative survey of Israelis (n=519), our findings show that positive attitudes toward mass surveillance were related to a reduced likelihood of installing contact tracing apps and an increased likelihood of uninstalling them. These results also hold when controlling for privacy concerns, attitudes toward the app, trust in authorities, and demographic properties. We conclude the paper by suggesting a broader framework for analyzing crowding out effects in ecosystems that combine involuntary surveillance and voluntary participation. © 2023 ACM.

Health, privacy and liberty: a call for digital governance during (and after) the pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has boosted the development and use of technology by increasing the use of previously existing technological resources, such as maps identifying population movements;assigning new uses to previously existing technological mechanisms, such as the use of facial recognition for monitoring infected people;and encouraging the development of new technologies, such as apps that ascribe risk codes to citizens. Without these digital measures, the pandemic would probably continue to expand, or, alternatively, entire populations would have to be quarantined for months (or even years), with significant consequences arising from either scenario. Technologies provide tools to avoid those scenarios. However, digital measures come at a price to our rights, namely our rights to privacy and liberty. Precautions and limitations ought to be imposed on the use of these technologies, forming a code of digital governance for COVID-19. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of International Journal of Human Rights is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Does User Satisfaction Play a Role in the Sustainability of Contact Tracing Application Intention?

Various countries have developed contact tracing applications to prevent the spread of COVID-19 outbreaks. For example, Indonesia launched a government surveillance technology named PeduliLindungi as a contact tracing application for COVID-19. This empirical paper aims to assess the explanatory power of the Expectation-Confirmation Model (ECM) by adding three new constructs, perceived security, perceived privacy, and effort expectancy, concerning the users' continuance usage of contact tracing applications. A survey instrument was developed for PeduliLindungi application users, with survey participants (N=535) recruited from Indonesia. The study tested the model using partial least squares structural equation modeling. The results showed that effort expectancy is the most significant factor in continuance intention mediated by satisfaction. Meanwhile, perceived privacy does not affect continuance intention mediated by satisfaction. © 2022 IEEE.

Safe return to the workplace: Perceived opportunities and threats in the use of health surveillance technologies in public administrations

The digitalization in public administrations has seen, through the COVID-19 pandemic, the appearance of health surveillance technologies at the workplace. Wearable health devices, such as physiolytics, may then have an increasing role in the management of public agents. Still, little is known about the use of these systems in work settings, as research is mainly oriented towards ethical debates or legal considerations. Accordingly, we propose to consider a concrete case of implementation of physiolytics in a Swiss public administration. We particularly investigate employees' use rates as well as the perceived opportunities and threats that are linked to physiolytics and health surveillance technologies. This is done through an action design research perspective, where we search to extract from the field guidelines and knowledge for practitioners. We especially highlight that physiolytics' use steadily decline after the first weeks, due to the design of such devices, the fear of surveillance, and the impression of competition that these systems bring into the workplace. It is therefore vital for public managers to introduce interventions, such as regular feedback, gamification, or nudging to support the engagement of public agents and ensure the viability of such novel health initiatives. © 2022 ACM.