Coding error in the NHS Covid app

News broke at the beginning of November about a coding error in the new NHS Covid app. This ‘oversight', as stated in the Guardian, meant that thousands of people hadn’t been asked to quarantine. The error was discovered by accident and since rectified.

At JAAG we think that auditing software should be compulsory before its release, and more so when it is a matter of public health.

Two of our members wrote to the editor of the Guardian in reply to their article:

"Dear Editor,

I read with concern your recent report that a software bug in the Covid-19 app has caused thousands of people not to enter quarantine after being in contact with an infected person. You also revealed the amateurish approach taken by those responsible for ordering, specifying, developing, and modifying the software. This app should have been treated as a mission-critical / safety-related application, for which software standards have been in use for years. Almost certainly, a bug like this one would have been prevented if these standards had been followed.

The report itself is mistaken in dignifying the perpetrators of the bug with the title "software engineer": on the basis of this performance they do not merit that title. It also refers, incorrectly, to "the root of the error". It is likely that the root of the error lies deeper than the report states: in the absence of effective technical management, in the failure to follow standards, and in glaring weaknesses in the software life cycle used by the development team. There should be an independent root cause analysis of this debacle. Such an investigation should then lead to proper standards and methods being used in all such critical software applications. Similarly, competent, professional engineers need to be appointed to projects of this importance."

"Dear Editor,
Alex Hern’s article (published on 02-11-2020) about the coding error in the NHS Covid-app states that an “oversight” from the programmers is at the source of thousands put at risk. Why is it considered acceptable to take such risks on public health during a pandemic? Should we accept that a government approved program contains any margin for error, especially when lives are at risk? We should not accept any room for error when a tool of this importance is deployed. The direct consequence of these failings are putting us in danger. There are ways of ensuring that the maths does not go wrong by using risk assessment strategies well known and established in other sectors.

Moreover, the government declining to communicate on the number of people advised to self-isolate isn’t acceptable either. There is a clear lack of transparency from the conception of the application to its consequences. This can only lead to greater distrust from the general public, jeopardising our Covid recovery. "

Click here to read what the Guardian published