Tech Brew Ride Home - Tue. 05/05 – UK’s Contact Tracing App Won’t Work In the Background

Episode Date: May 5, 2020

The virtual WWDC begins June 22! The UK hasn’t played by Google and Apple’s rules and it seems like their contact tracing app is failing because of that. And yet, are Google and Apple making decisions above their station? Uber might be bailing out Lime. Microsoft is reconsidering its Windows X strategy. And Sensor Tower is the interesting raise of the day. Sponsors: Tibco.com/ride DoubleUp.agency Links: Apple kicking off week of virtual WWDC on June 22, jackets and pins for Swift Challenge winners (9to5Mac) UK finds itself almost alone with centralized virus contact-tracing app that probably won't work well, asks for your location, may be illegal (The Register) The U.K.’s Coronavirus Contact Tracing App Is a Complete Mess (Vice) Apple, Google ban use of location tracking in contact tracing apps (Reuters) Uber in Talks to Lead $170 Million Lime Investment at Lower Valuation (The Information) Confirmed: Intel is buying urban mobility platform Moovit in a $900M deal (TechCrunch) Microsoft confirms Windows 10X is coming to laptops amid big jump in Windows usage (The Verge) Facebook’s Oculus Is Developing a New Quest VR Headset (Bloomberg) Google Meet starts rolling out in Gmail, continuing Google’s quest to unseat Zoom (The Verge) Sensor Tower raises $45M as demand for app data grows (TechCrunch) https://www.reddit.com/r/RideHome/comments/gdyyoh/listener_feedback_post/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech meme right home for Tuesday, May 5th, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough today. The UK hasn't played by Google and Apple's rules,

and it seems like their contact tracing app is failing because of that. And yet, are Google and Apple making decisions above their station? Uber might be bailing out Lyme. Microsoft is reconsidering its Windows X strategy and sensor tower is the interesting raise of the day. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. Apple has announced WWDC dates. which it does every year, is news every year, just not always the biggest news every year.

This year is different, of course, though, so details around this are sort of interesting. WWDC will kick off June 22nd. It will be virtual. You will be able to participate and follow along inside the Apple Developer app, as well as on the Apple website, and it will be free for anyone, quoting 9 to 5 Mac. Apple doesn't share specifics about how exactly the virtual. WWDC will work beyond accessing it through its developer app and website. Fortunately, the company still has a month and a half to figure out the logistics of converting everything to a digital format

while preserving key elements of the WWDC experience, end quote. So to sum up, virtual, free for anyone, which I should underline anyone. It's worth mentioning that this means you can participate to no more lotteries, no cap on developers. And it's going to happen a bit later. in June than usual, but that's no big deal. Now, the only thing left to be seen is how they will actually do things like demos while still social distancing on stage, because, you know, demos are demos. They sometimes require some real up-close time. According to the Register, the contact tracing app that the National Health Service of the United Kingdom has been developing on its own as a centralized app because it didn't want to use the decentralized.

framework provided by Google and Apple, does not appear to work unless the app in question is running in the foreground and the phone is kept awake and unlocked. Oh, and it will also ask users for locations, something that the Google and Apple system specifically will not allow apps to do, quoting from the register. The app will not, as it stands, work all the time on iOS nor Android, version 8. The operating systems won't allow the tracing application to broadcast its ID via Bluetooth to surrounding devices when it's running in the background and not in active use. Apple's iOS forbids it, and newer Google Android versions limit it to a few minutes after the app falls into the background. That means that unless people have the NHS app running in the

foreground and their phones awake most of the time, the fundamental principle underpinning the entire system that phones detect each other won't work. It will work if people open the app and leave it open and the phone unlocked. But if you close it and forget to reopen it or the phone falls asleep, the app will not broadcast its ID and no other phones around you will register that you've been close by. There's even a handy video of someone in Australia showing this. Australia, by the way, has gone for a similar system with its COVID-safe app, end quote. So that all seems pretty suboptimal, right? The whole point of using phones is that you don't have to actively do anything. The phone just does the proximity sensing for you. And as for the location issue,

this comes from Vice, quote, Ian Levy, technical director of the National Cyber Security Center, which developed the app, tried to reassure those worried about privacy concerns on Monday, saying the app, quote, doesn't have any personal information about you. It doesn't collect your location and the design works hard to ensure that you can't work out who has become symptomatic. And that quote, it holds only anonymous data and communicates out to other NHS systems through privacy preserving gateways, end quote. But the first thing the app asks users to do is enter their zip code before giving them a unique ID that's directly linked to their phones. It also logs the exact make and model of the phone. If a user reports symptoms of COVID-19,

they will also be asked to upload their contacts to a centralized server controlled by the government. Quote, the government has regularly been saying that the server only holds anonymous data, Ville said. This is legally untrue. The data in the server is unambiguously not anonymous under UK law, and indeed every single broadcast every phone makes can be easily decrypted to link back uniquely to a single device, end quote. On Monday, the NCSC chief executive Matthew Gold was forced to admit to lawmakers that data will not be deleted, and UK citizens will not have the right to demand it is deleted. It can also be used for, quote, research in the future, end quote. So, excellent, right? As Rupert Goodwin's tweeted, as far as I can tell, the NHSX app can't work well enough to provide useful data, and only well.

enough to break the law, end quote. By the by, Apple and Google just released some sample code as well as UI screenshots, also detailed policies for contact tracing apps looking to use these particular APIs. And yes, indeed, the system prohibits the collection of user location data. And not to zag on you intentionally here, but that is sort of opening up a whole different slew of questions. This is quoting Reuters. Both companies said privacy and preventing governments from using the system to compile data on citizens was a primary goal. The system uses Bluetooth signals from phones to detect encounters and does not use or store GPS location data. But the developers of official coronavirus-related apps in several U.S. states told Reuters last month,

it was vital they'd be allowed to use GPS location data in conjunction with the new contact tracing system to track how outbreaks move and identify hotspots. The Google Apple decision to not allow GPS data collection with their contact tracing system will require public health authorities that want to access GPS location to rely on what Apple and Google have described as unstable battery draining workarounds. Alternatives likely would miss some encounters because iPhones and Android devices turn off Bluetooth connections after some time for battery saving and other reasons unless users remember to reactivate them.

But some apps said they plan to stick to their own approaches. Software Company 20, which developed the state of Utah's Health Together contact tracing app with both GPS and Bluetooth, said on Monday the app operates effectively without the new Apple Google tool, end quote. So now what is the point of having a contact tracing app if it doesn't allow health officials to identify where new hotspots might be springing up? That defeats the entire purpose. So I'm going to sum up with the counter argument here, beginning with Dari Abasancho. Quote, Apple and Google are imposing American values on the world by limiting the usefulness of contact tracing apps.

The values aren't privacy. They're distrusting government. And the individual is more important than the health of society. See gun violence, health care, end quote. And here's Benedict Evans's summation. quote, there is a very careful discussion to be had around how Apple and Google are imposing policy decisions as opposed to technical decisions with their contact tracing project. As it stands, you need a test verified by a health authority to notify, but the health

authority will have no visibility on what contact matches come back, nor on where they are. Location data is not allowed. Unclear if they even get anonymized stats on the matches. As far as I can see, none of these are engineering. decisions. This is not the same as Silicon Valley saying, we are not able to make a secure backdoor. This is Silicon Valley saying, we do not want you to be able to do X. There are lots of ethical considerations about this, and one could argue that these choices are necessary to get adoption. But aren't these policy questions for policy people? Apple's plan entirely bans a

public health app from collecting location from the phone automatically. It does let you ask for registration, so you could ask people who get an exposure notification to let you know, but you're not allowed to require it. There are very sound engineering reasons for Apple and Google to control how apps can access location and BTLE, but the decision that public health apps cannot see any data about contact matches, even where they are, is not an engineering decision, it's a policy decision, end quote. Real quick follow-up, it did indeed happen. Intel says it is officially buying Urban Mobility Platform Move It for approximately $900 million. This is the story about the rumors I told you about yesterday, and quoting TechCrunch, this is all

happening for the reasons that we discussed yesterday. Quote, Intel has confirmed to me that all existing services will continue, but additionally, it plans to use Movit's technology to expand the services it offers via Mobile Eye, the autonomous car company that Intel acquired for $15.3 billion in 2017, which is the anchor of its efforts in the automotive sector. Specifically, Movitz tech will be used to expand and enhance mobilize mobility as a service offering, Intel said. Mobileize driver assistance technology is in some 60 million vehicles today, and while a lot of autonomous services like robotaxies are still in their most nascent phase, the opportunities are big. Intel believes that Robotaxies alone will be a $160 billion market by 2030, end quote.

The information is reporting that Uber is in talks to lead a $170 million investment in e-scooter startup Lyme at a $510 million valuation. That valuation would be down 79% from the last time Lyme raised, the way I'm reading this. This is an emergency infusion of much-needed cash to keep Lime. Lyme alive, but it also seems like Uber will sell its bike-slash-scooter division jump to Lyme in exchange for stock. This will also allow Uber the option of acquiring Lyme outright sometime between 2022 and 2024, quoting the information. Uber already owns a minority stake in Lyme, but the deal would significantly increase its share. As part of the proposed deal, Uber would transfer to

Lime, the bike and scooter business that the ride hailing company purchased in 2018 called Jump. Uber would get the option to buy Lyme between 2022 and 2024 at a specific price. And in the meantime, Uber would feature Lyme scooters more prominently in the Uber app. The deal discussions could still fall apart or go in a different direction. Two people close to Lyme said, Lyme is speaking with some existing investors about participating in the financing, but hasn't yet gathered commitments from them. Uber would invest about $85 million. The financing would give Lyme enough cash to get through a period when few people are leaving their homes.

The San Francisco-based startup has laid off about 200 people since the beginning of the year or about 30% of its staff. It has slowly started reintroducing its scooters into cities after pulling vehicles from nearly all its markets in March. In general, Uber's own scooter and bike rental efforts have struggled financially more than Lyme's and all prominent businesses in the micromobility field had significant difficulties in the pre-COVID-19 era. The move could save Uber several hundred million dollars annually in operating costs and tens of millions of dollars more if the lion's share of jumps 400 employees move to Lyme or leave the company, end quote. Microsoft says there has been a 75% year-over-year jump in the amount of time spent by users inside Windows 10 and Windows 10, which is interesting, but I guess it makes a lot of sense, less mobile usage, since a lot of us are not mobile at the moment, and more people are now tied to their laptops or desktops to

do work remotely. But the most interesting new details shared by Microsoft today is that Windows 10X, which was originally pitched as being for dual-screen devices, is actually going to come to laptops first. This is Tom Warren at the verge, quote, Microsoft is confirming today that it's planning to refocus Windows 10X on single-screen devices. Quote, the world is a very different place than it was last October when we shared our vision for a new category of dual-screen Windows devices, explains Panos-Pen-A, Microsoft's Windows and Devices chief. With Windows 10X, we designed for flexibility, and that flexibility has enabled us to pivot our focus towards single-screen Windows 10X devices that leverage the power of the cloud to help our customers work, learn, and play in new way.

Penae said, end quote. Microsoft isn't saying exactly when single-screen devices like laptops will support Windows 10x, nor when dual-screen devices will launch with the OS. However, Windows 10X will launch on single-screen devices first. Quote, we will continue to look for the right moment in conjunction with our OEM partners to bring dual-screen devices to market, says Penae, end quote. Sources are telling Mark German that Facebook's Oculus Division is developing a smaller, lighter version of the Quest VR headset,

but that the device is still facing significant potential delays due to COVID-19. Quote, the social networking giant is working on multiple potential successors to the quest. Some models in advanced testing are smaller, lighter, and have a faster refresh rate for more realistic content, according to people familiar with the matter. These headsets also have redesigned controllers, said the people who ask not to be identified,

discussing unannounced products. The company hasn't finalized which new version of the quest it will release, and the final product may have different features. Facebook originally planned to launch the new model at the end of 2020 around its annual Oculus Connect conference, but the coronavirus pandemic could delay the headset from shipping until 2021, the people said. Some versions in testing are 10% to 15% smaller than the current quest. That, in addition to being lighter, makes them more comfortable to wear one of the people said. The exact same thing, The existing model weighs about 1.25 pounds, which is too heavy for some users wearing the device for extended periods. The models in testing are closer to a pound, the person said, end quote.

I know I've already seen it in my inbox this morning. Apple is integrating its meat teleconferencing product into Gmail for non-G Suite customers. And if you're one of the lucky duckies like I've been, you might already see a link to launch meat inside your Gmail sidebar. quoting the verge. Putting meat front and center is Google's latest attempt to go head-to-head with Zoom, the ubiquitous video conferencing app that has so far ruled the stay-at-home era. Meet will have some privacy controls that Zoom has lacked, resulting in instances of Zoom bombing. You can't just click a link to join a Meet. You'll have to log into your Google account to do so. If the meeting host, or Meet host, has not invited you, you'll be sent to a waiting area until the host approves you.

And unlike Zoom, the free version of meat won't have dial-in landline numbers for meetings, end quote. Which again, right there, do not like, for reasons I've already mentioned. Finally today, an interesting raise, but unlike as per usual, this isn't some company that you likely had never heard of before. In fact, it's a company that I mention on this show all the time. Sensor Tower, the mobile app market research company, is right. raising $45 million from Riverwood Capital. And what's interesting is that Censor Tower says it has been profitable from basically

day one and had only previously raised a $1 million seed round, quoting TechCrunch. App Intelligence firms like Censor Tower and rivals, including App Annie, Apptopia, and others, aim to become one-stop shops for data and insights. Censor Tower's current offerings include insights into user acquisition strategies, ASO or App Store Optimization, competitive analysis, and app-specific data like daily ranks, installs, review analysis, and more. Its customers can also get a view of the app economy globally with top charts, publisher breakdowns, quarterly reports, ad intelligence, and other data. Among Censor Tower's client base are a number of enterprise-level customers, including

Morgan Stanley, Zinga, and Tencent. In total, the company has more than 350 enterprise users. Censor Tower has been profitable since launch and reports that 2019 saw record annual recurring revenue and 65% growth year over year. Its employee headcounts also increased 50% over the past year as Censor Tower has expanded internationally, including with the opening of a new London office aimed, end quote. I might regret this, but I put up a post in the show subreddit, which is our slash right home, by the way, asking y'all for some listener feedback. It's been over two years doing this podcast now. So I thought I'd just take the temperature of the audience in a really, really general way. I'm looking for any and all feedback, really.

So just post to the thread with whatever you'd like to tell me. But I'd be especially interested in feedback framed in one of these buckets. First of all, what has most annoyed you about the show recently? second, what has been the best thing about the show recently? What would you like to have more of on the show? And also, what have I never done or maybe never even thought of doing that you would like me to do on the show? Thanks in advance for any and all contributions. Again, you can find that at our slash ride home on Reddit.

Talk to you tomorrow.