NHS COVID-19 app is trying to tell Android users something but buggy notification appears stuck on 'Loading...' screen NHS England's COVID-19 app developed a case of the borks overnight as Android users were presented with mystery notifications that never seemed to finish loading. The app had a troubled start in life last year as homegrown efforts initially foundered before a second crack at contact chasing emerged towards the end of summer. A …
Me too. My battery was draining way quicker than usual, notification wouldn't go away until I did a force stop - was back again a bit later so I just uninstalled it.
To be frank I have very little faith that the Bluetooth technique being used stands very much chance of accurately determining if I've been at risk of exposure anyway. Neither does the venue check in but no check out fill me with much confidence.
Next time I go to a venue and they ask me to check in with the app (or if I have to go to a crowded place/office) then out of respect for others I will reinstall it and do that despite my personal beliefs about the efficacy of this thing.
But for now I'm enjoying a longer battery life whilst I'm stuck at home going nowhere
(and we know what assumption is) that the 'check-in' feature was just to provide a degree of partitioning between bluetooth signals.
i.e. If you check into your barber, you can probably pick up BT from the cafe next door.
If somebody later tests positive who'd checked into the cafe, you wouldn't get an alert. If the person in the cafe hadn't checked in in, or had and you hadn't - then you would - as app doesn't know you were close, but in separate shops
Checkout time isn't too important, as the proximity covers that.
So it's looking most likely that it's a change in Google Play Services, given that there was an update to that overnight. Now, what's the betting that Google forewarned NHSx (and Denmark's equivalent, based on LosD's comment) but no-one took any action?
For now, the message has gone from my phone without any intervention, but the Google back-end confirms there have been no syncs since yesterday evening so the lack of any further messages is only a placebo of workingness.
Thank you, Steve, I had a look at 'My Data' as suggested, but it had no data except my home post code. This was not a surprise as it has never pinged up anything, and I have not been anywhere requiring or even provided with, a check in QR code. Does the software require a specific manual intervention every time you enter or leave a location? My mobile lives in a shirt pocket and at this time of year is buried beneath clothing. It takes an impractically long time to dig the darned thing out. Perhaps I misunderstood that this was an automated system, not a quill pen era throwback, did the OS makers really make it so useless?
The message indicates we will be entering level 5 lockdown.
You must not leave your bedroom except to go to the WC or eat but you must complete these tasks within 15 minutes before returning to your bedroom.
The armed services will be deployed to patrol houses and confirm all households are complying. They will be issued with stopwatches for ad hoc checks where necessary.
In the event of any violations, offenders will be shot. Survivors will be shot again.
This is expected to quickly reduce the number of patients dying of COVID-19.
Message ends.
I remember this app. Prematurely launched with great fanfare and the real working one with none. Now forgotten by the PM who has moved on to extolling his next 'not quite there' covid-killer and infant.
Reminded every time I saw a "Get ready for Brexit" ad on telly. As if no one knew or believed the information they needed was available in good time (or any time). Why no similar big campaign for this rather more important app if you think living or not killing is a good idea? My son-in-law got an overnight alert and is know self-isolating. He uses an iPhone so it worked there.
Come on, give it some love.
The German Corona-Warn-App (https://www.coronawarn.app/en/) was also affected until yesterday evening (Jan 13, 2021) as was reported by various users in https://github.com/corona-warn-app/cwa-app-android/issues/2081, including comments that Denmark and Norway were also affected.
There is a copy of a detailed Google statement in that thread https://github.com/corona-warn-app/cwa-app-android/issues/2081#issuecomment-759964666
Short version said:
We are aware of an issue with the provideDiagnosisKeys() method of the Exposure Notifications API which affects all apps using the API. The issue became widespread around 12 Jan 22:00 UTC, and it causes the provideDiagnosisKeys() to appear to hang.
We have determined the root cause, and a fix is already rolling out to users’ devices. Once the fix is installed in the device, calls to provideDiagnosisKeys() will have the expected behavior again. The rollout of the fix will reach over 90% of your users within 24 hrs.
Since last night I'm no longer seeing any error on my mobile phone.
I had wondered if there was an update being installed, to take account of the new 'community' testing services being set up by local authorities <https://www.gov.uk/government/news/asymptomatic-testing-to-be-rolled-out-across-the-country-starting-this-week> but I can't see anything about that in the app.
Is there any integration between the NHS Covid-19 app and these new tests? I had one the other day and got a negative result (Phew!) but there doesn't seem to be any way to log this in the app - unlike the tests for people with suspected symptoms that have been available by appointment for some months, for which the result notification includes a code number to be entered into the app. (The community testing centre didn't even have an NHS Covid-19 QR login code available).
I decided to check my phone and realised contact tracing has been turned off. Who knows how that happened. Upon turning it on my entire phone froze and needed rebooting. I suppose I cannot blame the app for that, an app should not be able to crash the OS. If only I was not stuck on Android 7.0, I am not throwing away a functioning phone because no manufacturer will update it.
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