You're reading it here first: "It [Aarogya Setu] is based on a consent[-based] framework. Ideally, in my own opinion, it [Aarogya Setu] should not be [mandatory], it should not have been made mandatory, and this is under review presently with the government because, per se, if we are taking consent, it actually contradicts with it being made mandatory," Rakesh Maheswhari, Senior Director and Group Coordinator, Cyber Law and e-Security at the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) said during an online event organised by UN Women on "Cyber Crime Trends and Digital Safety amidst COVID-19 Pandemic". Shweta Reddy, from the Centre for Internet and Society, had highlighted a similar concern about futility of consent in an asymmetrical power relation during MediaNama's discussion on privacy in the time of COVID-19: "Especially in the case of the pandemic, consent cannot be freely given. Central government employees have been told to download Aarogya Setu, so consent is gone there. ... It’s not a fair choice to make between livelihood and privacy." Having said that, Maheshwari pointed out that if more people download the app, "the effectiveness of this app will substantially improve" and improve to the government's ability to identify hotspots, to track people who could be potentially at risk "because of their historic data with the actual location [sic]". 'Data of less than 0.01% Aarogya Setu users uploaded to the server,' says MyGov CEO Thus far, of the 100.2 million downloads that Aarogya Setu has had, "the data of only 15,000,…
