NHS App

[Mike4]

Have you got a BT receiver in the car?

- sd

Yes. I think this must be it.

When someone kindly drove into my van the other day and the AA transported it 10 miles to my home in the night, and then a different transporter picked it up next day and took it 40 miles to the garage for repair and I drove a hired van for a week, my phone realised it no longer knew where my vehicle was. It knew something was up though and it stopped showing me my 'parked vehicle' on Apple Maps. That was curious too.

[stevensfo]

Well, I guess someone could just download one of those little apps to fool the GPS. A colleague showed me one yesterday - GPS Emulator, and I spent a happy ten minutes putting myself in the centre of the Amazon jungle. Easy to use and it certainly fools Google maps.

I'm thinking of putting myself somewhere in downtown Lagos, then try all my banking apps and see what happens.


Steve

[scotia]

I notice a slightly increased drain on my phone with the scottish version. I have bluetooth on as a default, but I normally have GPS switched off to maximise battery life. I guess the NHS app needs location and that is the cause of the increased drain. Noticeable, but nothing too drastic

--kiloran

I thought I read in the FAQs that the app does not use the GPS. It's only looking at close contact details via bluetooth and doesn't care where you are. If there's a contact, presumably it logs the other phone's number but not location - it wouldn't be required. You could be on Mars for all it cares.
If it came to contact tracing that would be different, but that is done by interview.

PS. I'm deducing this rather than quoting holy writ
Arb.

I'm confused!
I'm sure when I installed it (android version), the app stated that it need to use location information, which I assumed meant GPS.
The FAQ states

The way the Android system handles exposure notifications means that both Bluetooth and location need to be turned on, and the Android system itself notifies you when you turn one or both off, rather than the Protect Scotland app. The onboarding process for Android users includes information about the use of location (it doesn’t use GPS), and the Android version of the app doesn’t have the same ‘tracing inactive’ feature that Apple phones does.

I've no idea what the jargon "onboarding process" means, but I don't understand how it can know location without GPS, although I guess the cell network can provide a relatively crude guide

--kiloran

I'm also confused as to why it required location on Android - whereas all of the associated information on how it worked seemed to indicate that location was not stored.
I already had location switched on - for my mapping software. So there was no additional drain on my battery from the (Scottish) NHS app from that source - which is possibly why I didn't notice any additional drain

[swill453]

I'm also confused as to why it required location on Android - whereas all of the associated information on how it worked seemed to indicate that location was not stored.
I already had location switched on - for my mapping software. So there was no additional drain on my battery from the (Scottish) NHS app from that source - which is possibly why I didn't notice any additional drain

The NHS app doesn't get access to the location. As explained earlier (not by me) it needs the location permission switched on so that the Bluetooth proximity monitoring works. But it can't access the physical location of the device, using GPS or otherwise.

It might have been nice if the permissions had separate categories, but we are where we are and they don't.

Scott.

[scotia]

I'm also confused as to why it required location on Android - whereas all of the associated information on how it worked seemed to indicate that location was not stored.
I already had location switched on - for my mapping software. So there was no additional drain on my battery from the (Scottish) NHS app from that source - which is possibly why I didn't notice any additional drain

The NHS app doesn't get access to the location. As explained earlier (not by me) it needs the location permission switched on so that the Bluetooth proximity monitoring works. But it can't access the physical location of the device, using GPS or otherwise.

It might have been nice if the permissions had separate categories, but we are where we are and they don't.

Scott.

Many thanks for the clarification - the earlier explanation still left me somewhat confused (its an age thing!) It would have been helpful if the official description of how it works (https://protect.scot/how-it-works) had included such a clarification. Instead it stated "The way the Android system handles exposure notifications means that both Bluetooth and location need to be turned on" it then follows with "The onboarding process" - which as kiloran has noted is meaningless jargon (to us oldies). Anyway - thanks to all who have finally got the explanation through to me.

[Lanark]

I just looked through the log of checks in settings, there are dozens of checks happening during the day when I'm at home - presumably connecting to a neighbour through the wall. When I visited the supermarket: nothing