Apple and Google Team up against COVID-19.

Apple and Google Team up.

In light of this current situation of maintaining a social distancing to stay safe from this global pandemic, where our governments and health workers are our frontline fighters doing their best to make us stay safe, these two tech giants have not been idle.

Besides staying at home, a few necessities of living must be fulfilled like going out to buy some groceries or other essentials for our survival, so in order to keep us safe, technology has jumped in to make it easier and safer to trace close contact between two individuals.

In this modern era, where everyone has a smartphone in the pocket, Apple and Google team up to develop a technology that alerts the people if they recently had close contact with a person tested positive.

How will this work?

There are two operating systems widely used by smartphones, either it is IOS or Android. Even though it looks challenging to pair the device with a different operating system, Apple and Google decided to develop a Bluetooth based connection to determine when an owner had close contact with a person tested positive in order to minimize the risk.

Moreover, the developers will be developing an app which will work via Bluetooth connection; a smartphone owner must keep his Bluetooth connected to use this feature. 

When a person comes in contact with another person, the pairing of devices will take place, and the data will be uploaded on cloud-based software, but no need to worry because they will not record any personal information or GPS data of an individual.

"Privacy, Transparency, and Consent are of great importance in this effort, and we will publish the information regarding our work for others to analyze as well.", Apple and Google said in a joint statement. 

Technologies are helping to limit the spread of coronavirus.

Besides a mega collaboration between Apple and Google, multiple technologies are helping us to manage different businesses, address various services, allowing individuals to stay home to limit this viral spread.

Online Shopping and Robot deliveries:

Online shopping was introduced a long time ago, and now during this COVID-19 period, many goods are being delivered by these bots, and even some bars in Beijing are still offering happy hours to the customers via online orders and robotic deliveries.

Digital Payment Methods:

Digital payment methods are used; instead of currency notes that might carry the virus, Chinese, American, and South Korean central banks are ensuring that the currency notes must be cleaned before they go into circulation.

Different restaurants and services offering home deliveries are advised to receive digital payments via Cards or E-Wallets. 

Drones and Robotics:

COVID-19 provided an excellent push start to the usage of drones and robotics. In recent times robots are widely used to deliver the food to those in quarantine and while drones have walked dogs and delivered safety kits publicly.

While it is seen that many manufacturing and automation jobs will soon be replaced by robots in the near future, new jobs will be created for humans too.

This was a short article reminding you how much technologies are advanced and affecting our lives, allowing us to stay home, providing great comfort to us even in this pandemic period.

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