Yahoo News UK Covid live: Britons ‘unwittingly tracked’ by phone after getting vaccinated to see if movements changed
Millions of Britons have been "unwittingly tracked" using their mobile phones to see if vaccinated people moved about more after receiving their jabs.
A report from the SPI-B committee of Government scientists revealed that data from one in ten peoples’ phones were tracked in February without their owners’ awareness, the Telegraph reports.
The figures obtained were used by researchers at Oxford University, who carried out studies for the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviours (SPI-B), which advises Sage.
The Oxford University experts found 4,254 individuals were vaccinated using “cell phone mobility data for 10 per cent of the British population”.
Campaigners against greater state surveillance in the UK said Britons would be “disturbed to discover they were unwittingly tracked and subjected to behavioural analysis via their phones”.
Silkie Carlo, a spokesman for Big Brother Watch, told the paper: "No one expects that by going to get a vaccine they will be tracked and monitored by their own Government.
“This is deeply chilling and could be extremely damaging to public trust in medical confidentiality.”
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