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Article

17 Jun 2020

Author:
Rosie Garthwaite & Ian Anderson, BBC

Bahrain & Kuwait: COVID-19 "invasive surveillance" apps breach users' privacy & security, say Amnesty Intl.

"Coronavirus: Alarm over 'invasive' Kuwait and Bahrain contact-tracing apps," 16 June 2020

Kuwait and Bahrain have rolled out some of the most invasive Covid-19 contact-tracing apps in the world, putting the privacy and security of their users at risk...

It urged the Gulf states to stop using them in their current forms...

Bahrain ["BeAware Bahrain" app] and Kuwait's ["Shlonik"] capture location data through GPS and upload this to a central database, tracking the movements of users in real time...

authorities would easily be able to link this sensitive personal information to an individual...

Claudio Guarnieri, head of Amnesty's Security Lab, said the apps were "running roughshod over people's privacy, with highly invasive surveillance tools which go far beyond what is justified".