Global approach to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Team Leader

Giancarlo Pozzo

Solution Overview

Solution Name:

One-line solution summary:

I propose the development of a mobile app that can tackle the problem of a pandemic, be accepted, and used at world scale.

Pitch your solution.

Problem: tracing a pandemic across national borders.

Solution: develop a mobile app which can be accepted and adopted worldwide, respecting specific cultural ideas regarding privacy and bypassing national institutions.

Impact: save lives avoiding the spread of a pandemic.

Film your elevator pitch.

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What specific problem are you solving?

Current scale of the problem in Australia: requires attention.

Global scale of the problem: severe.

Number of people affected: 6.29 millions.

Factors contributing to the problem: difficulty in tracking the virus.

What is your solution?

What is it? a mobile app

What does it do? trace interactions between users

What processes and technology does it use? it uses bluetooth.

In particular it automatically collects and locally stores encrypted contact information of other users in its proximity. If a user is confirmed to be SARS-CoV-2 positive, App can enter to “infected mode” and transmit an automatic “virus notification” message to all past, present and future contacts (within designed time limit in which the user can be contagious).

The collection of contact information, thus the code to implement it, is common to many other similar apps, see for example the PEPP-PT or the DP-3T or the Google and Apple frameworks. The anonymous virus-notification message can be transmitted using the “sealed sender messages” technology developed by the open-source app Signal messenger.

Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?

target population: people with a mobile

To understand their needs, and to engage them I interviewed people asking what they don't like in the current Australian tracing app and if they prefer my app over the current Australian tracing app.

From the interview I realised that the need of users is the peace of mind that s/he has not and is currently not in close proximity of any declared infected user. With my app, users are immediately notified if they get in close proximity of a declared infected user. This means that in the absence
of warnings from my app, a user knows s/he is in a safe place

Explain how the problem, your solution, and your solution’s target population relate to the Challenge.

Can all countries accept that personal data from their citizens is
stored in a server that does not belong to them? Can future tensions
between countries threaten the trust and the correct use of these
servers?

These questions prevent a world-scale solution to the problem, and countries close their borders. To solve this problem I propose an app that only send data from user to user, similarly to other messaging apps,

bypassing every national institution.

In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?

Melbourne VIC, Australia

What is your solution’s stage of development?

Concept: An idea being explored for its feasibility to build a product, service, or business model based on that idea

Who is the primary delegate for your solution?

Giancarlo Pozzo

Solution Team:

Giancarlo Pozzo