Mandatory for employees to download app

The government is planning to launch a similar initiative like the Aarogya Setu app for feature phones, according to a report by ET. This will help the government reach out to people using a feature phone. Consumers will be able to select the language they want to communicate in using the IVRS.

With the call, the IVRS will check the users for symptoms. If they are suspected, the IVRS will inform the local health authorities about the situation. This partnership will also allow authorities to send notifications to users who have not downloaded the Aarogya Setu app on their smartphones.

Due to the app recording user data, many people have stated that they have a lot of privacy issues with it. To put all of these privacy concerns to rest, Niti Aayog CEO, Amitabh Kant in an interview with Aaj Tak recently, stated that the servers only keep the data of a safe user for 30 days while data of users at high-risk are stored for 60 days. The following is an edited transcript of our conversation. First and foremost, so that we could solve an issue that we ran into at the beginning of the pandemic, which is: how could we, as a firm, better identify and more quickly identify those employees who came in contact with someone with COVID?

We quickly determined that this is something that we could take out to our clients. Molly Wood: Does it seem likely, though, that companies will just mandate it?

Sapin: The tracing is only happening within the building itself. The other thing is, if you and I are in the office together and we both have downloaded the app, all the app is seeing is the ad ID on your phone and the ad ID on my phone. If I [were] the employee that notified HR that I had COVID, it would associate my name, with the ad ID on my phone, and it would identify all the other phones that I came in contact with over the past 14 days or 45 days.

HR would then take that data and notify those folks. The minute that HR clicks out of that screen, the association of the name with a phone and with the ad ID in the proximity data is completely erased. Like I said, this is not a prophylactic, in terms of keeping people out.

The use case here is how can HR, when someone has notified them that they have come down with COVID, how can [HR] more quickly and more precisely identify those employees who came in contact with that individual?

Even the issue right now with some of the thermal recognition sensors as people walk into a building is, people could be completely asymptomatic when they come in, and then still be spreading the virus around. We just feel like there needs to be some mechanism in place to identify those folks that came in touch with someone who has, down the road, let them know that they contracted COVID Wood: How sensitive is the Bluetooth technology? Adverse action includes for example, dismissing an employee from their employment, taking disciplinary action against an employee, refusing to employ a prospective employee or discriminating against an employee or prospective employee.

In addition to penalties imposed under the Biosecurity Act, any direction by an employer that an employee download or use COVIDSafe may be open to legal challenge on the basis that it is not a lawful and reasonable direction. If an employer were to dismiss an employee for their failure to comply with such direction, the employer could be exposed to a successful unfair dismissal claim by an eligible employee, on the basis that there was no valid reason for the dismissal.

Given the strict requirements in the Biosecurity Determination, employers should act cautiously to ensure the download or use of COVIDSafe by employees is voluntary.

While employers may encourage their employees to download or use the app, they must not direct or otherwise require employees or any other person to do so. Today, 8 May , the Federal Government released its highly anticipated plan to ease restrictions that have been in place to stop the spread of COVID Our Employment team covers everything employers need to know. In our recent webinar with the Diversity Council Australia and Page Group, Employment Partner Fay Calderone discussed how embracing flexible working means employers not only reap the benefits of business continuity during times of crisis but create the foundation of a more engaged and inclusive future workforce.

A brief overview of COVIDSafe COVIDSafe was established by the Australian Government in partnership with the medical community as a public health initiative to allow state and territory health officials to automate and improve manual contact tracing processes currently being undertaken by public health authorities. Here is the Complaint. The app was Xora, now Clicksoftware. The company makes software to help with scheduling, route efficiency, and communications between mobile employees.

You also get the ability to drill down into the map and see specifically what is happening at each stop. People who live and work in California have a Constitutional right to privacy. California law also protects employees against discipline or termination for their off-duty conduct.

This law is based on the idea that when employees are not at work, they should have freedom from the employer. Privacy is fundamentally a right to be left alone. Ten states have constitutional rights of privacy.

Other states have specific privacy laws that apply to off-duty conduct. Also, federal government employees are generally protected against monitoring of off-duty conduct under privacy rights.