The Council of Europe Office in Ukraine in terms of the Project “European Union and Council of Europe working together to strengthen the Ombudsperson’s capacity to protect human rights” funded the translation of the “Joint Statement on Digital Contact Tracing by Alessandra Pierucci, Chair of the Committee of Convention 108 and Jean-Philippe Walter, Data Protection Commissioner of the Council of Europe” (April 28, 2020) into Ukrainian. 

“Regarding the use of mobile data and technology in the fight against COVID-19, specific measures are being deployed or otherwise proposed and include: use of mobile location data to evaluate movements of population or to enforce confinement measures, use of devices as digital proof of immunity, symptoms’ detection, self-testing, or finally digital tracing of the contacts of an infected person,” mentioned in the Statement.

The authors of the Statement emphasized, that digital contact tracing systems should be subject to independent and effective oversight and audits to ensure respect of the rights to privacy and data protection. Data protection authorities should be involved from the outset in the development of those systems, and use their powers of intervention and investigation to ensure that data protection requirements are enforced.