PocketCare S

PocketCare S uses Bluetooth to enable smartphones to send and receive beacon signals. It checks the distance between a smartphone and another beacon (or smartphone running the same app) to see if they are within 2 meters from each other, and if so, the smartphone records the duration of such a close encounter with another beacon. It provides each user with social distance information such as the number of other users who have been in close proximity with the user on a hourly and daily basis. It also reports to the user the duration of the close encounter sessions the user was involved, and alerts the user if the duration of the current session exceeds a certain threshold. For administrators of an organization (whose members adopt PocketCare S), social distance information aggregated over all of its member users such as the total number and duration of close encounters in the workplace will be made available through an analytics dashboard, which responds to queries such as “what is the number (or the percentage) of the users who have had more (or less) than “x” number (or minutes) of close encounters?”. Such information will empower both users and employers to practice and encourage good social distancing in the workplace. PocketCare S is built upon a previous application, called PocketCare, developed five years ago by University at Buffalo (UB) faculty and students track the flu/virus propagation, and used by many volunteers. The new PocketCare S is the second generation of PocketCare, where “S” also stands for “Social distance”. For more information visit PocketCare S website.

Data Collection and Privacy Policy

The App does not collect any specific information about you. In other words, all the data collected is anonymous and will not reveal any private personal information. The app collects anonymous ids of the beacons encountered, and estimates the duration of each close encounter session. Each smartphone randomly generates and frequently changes its anonymous id to be advertised to other smartphones to further protect privacy. Although the app requires the GPS to be turned on in order to determine if a close encounter with another beacon occurs on a campus or not, no GPS information is collected. Users are encouraged, but are not required, to provide a daily, anonymous health monitoring report, and other anonymous profile information such as age groups, zip code, gender and ethnicity. Some anonymized data collected will be stored in a secure server. Based on the anonymous data, the server will aggregate the information on the number and duration of close encounters on campus from all users, and make such aggregated information (instead of information about any particular individual) available to the public. PocketCare S strictly adheres to the privacy policies reviewed and approved by University at Buffalo Human Research Protection Program (IRB). More information about the data collection, usage, and Privacy Policy and FAQs can be found on our website.