The government is preparing to utilize user information held by mobile carriers and information-technology companies to help control the spread of the new coronavirus.

We have no objection to using state-of-the-art technology, but this could lead to serious human rights violations if carried out inappropriately.

The government needs to build a broad public consensus by ensuring a careful approach and offering detailed explanations about how the system will work.

The government plans to use personal information of smartphone users, such as their location data and search and purchase histories.

The government says it will use such user information to grasp people’s movements and behavior; assess the effectiveness of its official requests for citizens to stay home and certain businesses to close; and improve the accuracy of its policy efforts to prevent clusters of infections.

The personal information will be made anonymous and used only as statistical data.

Various businesses are already using location data gathered from smartphones to estimate the size of crowds at shopping areas and major train stations.

This is undoubtedly a useful method of using IT to track infections and alert people who are at risk. But it also entails the risk of privacy violations.

It is essential to ensure that users will fully understand how their personal information will be used for this new purpose.

The government has promised to take steps to safeguard privacy based on the personal information protection law. But a recent series of scandals about sloppy handling of data in both the public and private sectors is a cause for concern. Close monitoring will be required to ensure that there will be no misuse or lapses.

The government is also considering introducing a smartphone application for contact tracing to identify people who have had close contact with infected patients and alert them to their potential exposure to the virus.

The application will be modeled on the one developed and used by Singapore’s government.

Phones installed with the app exchange short-distance wireless signals when their users come close to one another and stay in proximity for a certain period of time and record such encounters for contact tracing.

The government says there will be no legal issue as the app will only be installed with the consent of the user.

But the consent may not prevent all privacy-related problems.

There will be no way for users to ascertain how the data will be used. It is vital to introduce a layer of safeguards, including steps to ensure the transparency of the development and operation of the system and the termination of the program as soon as the outbreak is brought under control, along with the elimination of all collected data.

It is also crucial to implement fail-safe measures to prevent leaks of information.

South Korea has also used location data and purchase histories of individuals to track and publish location histories of infected people for its successful efforts to contain infections. But there is no denying that South Korea’s coronavirus alerts have included too much information about infected individuals’ behavior at the cost of privacy.

There is strong public pressure on individuals to accept policy measures designed for public health.

In deciding on and executing such policy measures, however, the government should stick to weighing carefully both the expected benefits and potential negative impacts on people's rights.

If people’s rights for privacy are compromised by desperate efforts to defend society from a virus, that can sow the seeds of serious problems for the future of society.

Such contact-tracing efforts will be futile unless they lead to more testing of high-risk people and better treatment of patients.

That means it is urgently needed to bolster the nation’s capacity to test people for the virus and deal with patients.

--The Asahi Shimbun, April 21