'Don't worry, I don't know where you are' - Khairy Jamaluddin

"Don't worry, I don't know where you are," assured the Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Khairy Jamaluddin.

He made the assurance when asked about the privacy of the MyTrace app, which is used to monitor public movements for contact tracking purposes in an effort to curb the transmission of COVID-19.

The Rembau MP said this when he was a guest of the “Cerita” programme run by Astro AWANI news anchor and producer Essan Yahya here on Monday.

Khairy explained that the Ministry of Health (MOH) was only able to obtain important information such as the phone number, distance and time an individual had contact with COVID-19 patients stored on a user's phone instead of a central server, within 21 days.

In fact, he said this could only be done by MOH officials after obtaining user consent during contact tracking interviews for data access purposes.

In the meantime, Khairy said the government would also release source code or program code for the MyTrace app soon to address concerns about privacy.

He said the source code could be referenced by technology experts to see that the government did not detect information about the location.

"Later, experts can see whether or not KJ (Khairy Jamaluddin) says, that the government does not save the location," he added.

While proving the effectiveness of the application, he said the government would not force any individual to upload it.

He said it had to be done voluntarily to break the COVID-19 chain.

"In terms of technology freedom, we cannot force any individual (to upload the application)," he added.

Despite this, he said MOH could still make contact detection manually.