Information Privacy

The Effectiveness of Contact Tracing Apps: What, Why, and How? The COVID-19 pandemic sparked the rapid development and deployment of contact tracing apps across the globe. The NHS COVID-19 app, in particular, became one of the most widely discussed examples due to its large user base and adoption of evolving global technologies. But how effective […]

Designing mobile applications that handle sensitive data—such as health status or location—requires a careful balance between usability, privacy, and security. The UK COVID-19 Contact Tracing App provides a valuable case study in privacy-conscious app development. This article highlights the critical design features developers should consider when creating applications for public health or any sensitive-data environment.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, NHSX—the digital innovation unit of the UK’s National Health Service—developed a mobile contact tracing app to support the nation’s public health strategy. Ensuring user privacy and system security was foundational to the app’s design, and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) played a key role in shaping the technical

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the UK launched a national contact tracing app to help slow the virus’s spread. While several countries took different approaches—some relying on GPS, others on manual tracing—the UK opted for a decentralized, privacy-preserving model that used Bluetooth technology rather than location data. This article explains how the NHS COVID-19 app worked,

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed both the potential and the limitations of digital contact tracing. The UK’s NHS COVID-19 app, launched as part of the public health response, became a widely discussed case study in how technology, policy, and privacy intersect during a crisis. In her 2022 blog post for the Ada Lovelace Institute, Mevsimler M.

Contact tracing emerged as one of the most critical public health tools during the COVID-19 pandemic. It helped authorities and healthcare systems interrupt chains of transmission, identify outbreaks early, and provide timely care to those at risk. But alongside its importance came growing concerns around data privacy, especially with the introduction of digital contact tracing

The fields of Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs) and Secure Multiparty Computation (MPC) are often studied separately—but what if one could be built from the other? In the foundational paper “Zero-Knowledge from Secure Multiparty Computation” by Ishai, Kushilevitz, Ostrovsky, and Sahai (SIAM Journal of Computing, Special Issue for STOC 2007), the authors demonstrate that general zero-knowledge proofs

In the evolving landscape of privacy-enhancing technologies, Multiparty Computation (MPC) and Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs) stand out as two foundational cryptographic tools. While often seen as addressing distinct privacy goals, they are increasingly being combined to achieve stronger guarantees of privacy, integrity, and trust in secure data processing. This article explores the differences, complementarities, and combined

Multiparty Computation (MPC) is a cornerstone of modern cryptography, enabling collaborative data analysis without compromising privacy. As outlined in the IEEE Digital Privacy article (2024), MPC is no longer just a theoretical construct—it’s an increasingly deployed method for secure, decentralized computation, now even leveraging techniques from somewhat homomorphic encryption (SHE). This article summarizes three key