Italy develops contact tracing app for COVID-19

According to a report, the Italian government is developing a smartphone app that enables health services to trace the contacts of people who have tested positive for COVID-19, as authorities hope to gradually lift a lockdown imposed across the country. The Minister of Innovation Paola Pisano explained that the app would function on a voluntary basis and that it would have to ensure that data is anonymised. The app would record when it came into proximity with another smartphone using the app. This would allow authorities to know  if the app user was in long or close contact with a person who tested positive for the Coronavirus, and alert them.