Taking a close look at the source code of Germany’s contact tracing app, which was recently published by SAP and associated developers.

On this extra episode of The Private Citizen, I take a look at the published source code of SAP’s coronavirus tracing app for Germany. This open source app was produced by order of the German government.

A Look at the German Contact Tracing App

The source code of all components of the German contact tracing app, known as the Corona-Warn-App, can be found on GitHub. I wrote a detailed article with an analysis of the source code of the app for heise online .

Please also refer to previous episodes of the podcast that covered contact tracing, which include in-depth episodes on Apple’s and Google’s API and other parts of the SAP app.

Feedback

Martin sends the first audio feedback to the show in reference to my reply (on episode 20) to a previous email of his:

Thank you for featuring my feedback in Episode 20 of The Private Citizen. I think two points got lost in translation:

  1. The point was that your workflow “push hugo files → website update” can be implemented with any plain hoster not just with Netlify. So you can either configure Netlify to scrape the data from your GitLab, compile it, and deploy it to the webspace, or you can configure GitHub (or -Lab) to compile it on their infrastructure, and deploy it to the webspace.
  2. I didn’t want to tell you which way you have to do it. I wanted to learn something from your note that you use Netlify now. That’s why I asked what’s the advantage of using Netlify over GitHub / GitLab actions and any other hoster.

Most importantly: Thank you for the quote at 1:21 – “Martin is not a dickhead.” I will put that on my CV.

Jonathan M. H. wants me to “read some of the quotes in this article on one of his shows” and because he has been a long time producer of the show and it’s a very funny article, and even a bit topical, I will comply.

If you also have thoughts on the topics discussed in this episode, please feel free to contact me.

Toss a Coin to Your Podcaster

I am a freelance journalist and writer, volunteering my free time because I love digging into stories and because I love podcasting. If you want to help keep The Private Citizen on the air, consider becoming one of my Patreon supporters.

You can also support the show by sending money to via PayPal, if you prefer.

This is entirely optional. This show operates under the value-for-value model, meaning I want you to give back only what you feel this show is worth to you. If that comes down to nothing, that’s OK with me, pard. But if you help out, it’s more likely that I’ll be able to keep doing this indefinitely.

Thanks and Credits

I like to credit everyone who’s helped with any aspect of this production and thus became a part of the show.

Aside from the people who have provided feedback and research and are credited as such above, I’m thankful to Raúl Cabezalí, who composed and recorded the show’s theme, a song called Acoustic Routes. I am also thankful to Bytemark, who are providing the hosting for this episode’s audio file.

But above all, I’d like to thank the following people, who have supported this episode through Patreon or PayPal and thus keep this show on the air: Michael Mullan-Jensen, Jonathan M. Hethey, Georges Walther, Dave, Niall Donegan, Rasheed Alhimianee, Butterbeans, Kai Siers, Mark Holland, Shelby Cruver, Vlad, Steve Hoos, Fadi Mansour, Joe Poser, 1i11g, Matt Jelliman, ikn, Philip Klostermann, Jackie Plage, Dave Umrysh, Dirk Dede, David Potter, Vytautas Sadauskas, RikyM, drivezero, Mika, Jonathan Edwards, Barry Williams, Silviu Vulcan, S.J. and Martin.