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Government admits its Covid-19 tracing app has broken data-protection law in letter to privacy campaigners
Two phones with the official Irish health service executive ‘Covid Tracker’ contact tracing app installed on them as the government prepares to launch the app

THE government has admitted that England’s Covid-19 test-and-trace programme has broken a data-protection law in a letter sent to privacy campaigners.

The Department of Health & Social Care (DHSC) acknowledged it had failed to carry out a risk assessment on how the system would affect privacy.

It follows the threat of legal action from the Open Rights Group (Org), which claims that the programme to trace contacts of those infected with Covid-19 has been operating unlawfully since its launch on May 28.

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