Apple-Google Virus Combat Plan Hinges on Still-Scarce Testing

  • The unprecedented partnership wants to help track Covid-19
  • Privacy concerns, government squabbling are other obstacles

Digital contact tracing is a way of using technology to supplement existing virus tracking systems.

Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
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Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google earlier this month unveiled an ambitious plan to jury-rig billions of smartphones into coronavirus-tracking beacons, hoping to help public-health authorities fight the disease and pave the way to end lockdowns that have crippled the global economy.