Last Updated: 1 May 2020
This policy is available online at beatcovid19now.org/privacy
The privacy and protection of your information is very important to us and we have taken steps to guarantee that your information is handled carefully and kept anonymous. We do not collect any information that could identify you (no personally identifiable information, PII).
- For the purpose of this document, website refers to the website at https://beatcovid19now.org and app refers to the apps available on the Apple Store and Google Play Stores for iOS and Android Devices.
- The Symptom Tracker is the survey and report page within the website and apps that provide the user with a view of their symptoms over multiple surveys.
- The Token is a unique identifier that help us to link multiple survey completions across visits or app opens. The Symptom Tracker is unable to work without a unique token identifier.
This app is part of the #BeatCovid19Now research led by researchers at the Centre for Global Health and Equity with help from data scientists at Swinburne University of Technology in partnership with Arq Group, Australia, the COVID-19 Hackathon and marketing volunteers.
This Symptom Tracker collects information for research purposes. Any advice or findings are general only and not a substitute for medical advice. If concerned, please close the Symptom Tracker and contact your local health authority or practitioner.
The Symptom Tracker does not diagnose COVID-19 and it does not provide medical advice. Please seek urgent medical help if you have difficulty breathing. Contact your relevant local health authority or medical practitioner for health advice about COVID-19 and to find out what to do if you think you have symptoms.
Influenza intensity and impact questionnaire (Flu-iiQ™) ©RH Osborne (2006). No part of the flu-iiQ™ may be copied or reproduced in any form without written permission from the author. Used under license to Swinburne University of Technology.
We only collect anonymous information. The information you provide cannot personally identify you.
The app links any information you provide with a unique, identifier so that multiple responses from the same person can be easily matched and progress can be tracked over time.
All data are transferred over encrypted channels and stored on secure servers.
- We collect your answers to the questions in the Symptom Tracker. This information is collected anonymously. We do not collect information that could personally identify you.
- When you visit the website or the survey within the app, our servers will log your IP address. Your IP address is not associated with the survey you complete and is purely used for systems administrative purposes — such as blocking denial of service or malware attempts.
- We run an analytics platform that combines visitor information to report the number of visitors to our survey, which country or region they are visiting from and any website they may have visited from. We use this information to improve our survey.
- When you start a survey, our website will set a unique identifier for your visit that is not associated with your IP address or any other information. We store this unique identifier so that your multiple responses can be easily matched and you can track your progress over time.
- In the website and apps, you will be asked to provide your location information. We do not collect your exact location, but rather we fuzz this information to your nearest locality — typically a suburb or postcode. We need this geographic information to monitor the spread of symptoms and to provide crucial data to health authorities.
- To improve the survey, we may track the time you take to fill in the survey or how many questions you completed before leaving the site. Currently the average time of completion is around 3 minutes for first time users and less than 2 minutes for returning users.
- The duration of the data collection is dependent of the progress of COVID-19, which is unpredictable. The research project itself has a duration of five years and the data will be used for this and future pandemic research.
- We may collect information about the type of device and browser you are using when visiting the website and completing a survey on either the website or app, to make sure we can quickly fix bugs.
- If you experience an error while using the app or website, we may send details of that error back to our error log monitoring services provided by subprocessors. The information included in those error logs includes the originating IP address.
- We only collect anonymous information. Your information will be combined with others before sharing with researchers and organisations approved by the Human Research Ethics Committee at the Swinburne University of Technology for the purposes of research.
- Any Researcher or Organisation that is granted access to the dataset agrees to and are bound by this privacy policy and the ethical standards of Swinburne University of Technology.
- We share some data with the subprocessors listed in this document, including cloud computing hosting providers, analytics services and error monitoring services.
- We will never share your information with any other party unless explicitly stated in this document.
- To remove the identifier/token you can clear the cookies in your browser or uninstall the app on your device(s). We will be unable to link you with your completed survey form and provided information unless you set the token again.
- If you email us to ask for your information to be deleted, we won’t be able to because we do not know the identity of anyone who answers the survey questions.
- We will keep information we collect from the survey for research about this and future pandemics.
As part of the services we provide, and only as much as we need to, we may use certain third-party subprocessors to process some or all of your information. These subprocessors include cloud computing providers, data analysis tools and error monitoring services.
Subprocessors located in Australia and the United States:
- Amazon Web Services — cloud services provider
- Google Analytics — analytics service provider
- Sentry — error reporting service software
All data is encrypted via SSL/TLS when transmitted from our servers to your browser. The database backups are also encrypted. Data aren't encrypted while they are live in our database (since we need to have this ready to send to you when you access the survey of Symptom Tracker), but we go to great lengths to keep your information secure as required by the Human Research Ethics Committee at Swinburne University of Technology.
This website and apps are operated from Australia. If you are located in the European Union or elsewhere outside of Australia please be aware that any information you provide to us will be transferred to Australia. By using our Site, participating in any of our services and/or providing us with your information, you agree to this transfer.
This project has been approved by an independent human research ethics committee at Swinburne University of Technology. The Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) at is registered with the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council. It operates in accordance with National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research 2007. Approval number 20202892-4014.
A copy of the ethics approval is available to view online.
This research project is being undertaken for a period of five years, however you may discontinue at any time.
Participation in research is open to anyone 18 years and older.
If you have questions about this privacy policy, how the information is collected and handled, or the protection and privacy of your information, please contact us:
Research Ethics Officer, Swinburne Research (H68) Swinburne University of Technology PO Box 218 Hawthorn VIC 3122 Australia
Australia Telephone: +61 3 9214 3845
Email: [email protected]