Contact-tracing app Aarogya Setu available for all JioPhones

COVID-19 contact-tracing application, Aarogya Setu, has been made available for all JioPhones and about 11 crore users of the 4G-feature phone will now be able to download it.

Last week, the app was rolled out on the first JioPhone model for about five million users. Aarogya Setu has been available on both iOS and Android, and sources said nearly 10.85 crore users have so far downloaded the app, as part of nationwide efforts to combat the spread of coronavirus.

"Aarogya Setu App is now available on KaiOS platform for all Jio phone. Around 110 million users on Jio phones can now download the App and join the fight against COVID-19," Aarogya Setu said in a tweet on Tuesday.

The number of Aarogya Setu downloads on JioPhone was not immediately known and an e-mail sent to Reliance Jio seeking details did not elicit a response.

The mobile application, Aarogya Setu, is used by the government for contact-tracing and disseminating medical advisories to users in order to contain the spread of COVID-19.

IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has said that Aarogya Setu is "secure" and there was no privacy breach in it, rejecting charges that it was a "sophisticated surveillance system" that was leveraged to track citizens without their consent.

The 'Aarogya Setu Interactive Voice Response System' has now also been implemented to include citizens with feature phones and landline connections under the ambit of the 'Aarogya Setu' mobile application.

In India, economic and business activities are slowly restarting outside containment zones, in the fourth phase of lockdown. As on Wednesday, the death toll due to the coronavirus pandemic stood at 3,303, while the cases climbed to 1,06,750 in the country.