The app – aimed at tracing the spread of COVID-19 – will be voluntary, says Minister for Government Services Stuart Robert, and is a crucial step towards rolling back the nation’s coronavirus restrictions.

A tracing app intended to protect public health makes sense, but governments have had a “poor track record” when it comes to misusing surveillance laws and powers, said Australian Lawyers Alliance national president Andrew Christopoulos.

“Without clear laws in place, the risks of the data being illegally accessed, used for unintended purposes or used beyond the immediate health crisis are high. It is not the app itself that we are concerned about, but the lack of legislative safeguards in place to protect our individual privacy,” he submitted.

“Before asking the public to download the app, we would like the government to agree to have the operation of the app reviewed every three months by the Australian Information and Privacy Commissioner to ensure that there has been no breach of the Privacy Act, and that the information collected has only been used for the management of the COVD-19 virus.

“The legislation that governs the app must clearly state that its use is limited to minimising the danger of community transmission of the COVID-19 virus. A sunset clause is essential but we caution that these have previously been inserted into anti-terror laws, only for them to be later removed, proving that they do not provide adequate protection,” he said.

The ALA is also worried, Mr Christopoulos continued, that there is no form of redress for those who download the app if the data collected by the app is misused, due to the absence of a national legal right to privacy.

“The protections against abuse and misuse are weak. We need a right to privacy enshrined in a human rights law as is the case in Canada and the UK. If there is that protection in place then there is a remedy for misuse of surveillance tools, such as the tracing app, by the government,” he said.

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“We understand that public health emergencies require the government to take extraordinary measures but there must be appropriate laws in place to provide necessary protection of our rights. Surveillance measures and other restrictions can be very difficult to roll back after a crisis.”

According to EAGLEGATE Lawyers principal Nicole Murdoch, the app is a technology genie that may be very hard to put back in the bottle.

“I don’t see the government promising to scrap the app afterwards but you can be sure agencies like the police are already frothing about the ability to track everyone’s movements,” she said.

“The question is, does the greater good trump our privacy rights? Our physical locations are already being tracked by our telephone service providers and by shopping centres (so they can increase rentals for tenants in high traffic areas).”

“The difference with the government surveillance is that our identities will be directly linked and there are repercussions by not observing lockdown requirements. The human in me hopes that people would realise that temporary surveillance is necessary to keep our loved ones alive but, in the rush, to control the pandemic I’m not sure there’s been proper thought given to the ramifications of a citizen tracking app.”

Earlier this week, the Law Council of Australia expressed concern that Australians will not be able to make informed decisions about whether or not to download the app if the federal government is to hold off on its privacy impact statement.

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