People wait to take coronavirus tests at a makeshift testing center near Seoul Station in Seoul on Jan. 20, 2022. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Jan. 25 (Korea Bizwire) — A South Korean research team has developed new technology that can detect close contacts with individuals infected with coronavirus without using personal location information.
Lee Taik-jin, a senior researcher of the Korea Institute of Science and Technology, unveiled the digital contact tracing system (CTS) at a recently held seminar.
At present, health authorities use the personal data of virus patients such as GPS data, CCTV footage of the places they have visited, QR code access history, and their credit card usage records to identify who has come into close contact with them.
The research team focused on detecting patients and their close contacts by comparing radio frequency (RF) reception signals.
The strength of RF reception signals reflects the characteristics of the space, enabling the identification of those who have had close contact with individuals testing positive for COVID-19 by analyzing the composition of reception signals.
“As a result of tests with about 300,000 data records, the CTS technology showed a high accuracy level of about 92 percent. This allows public health officials to have a list of close contacts with COVID-19 patients in less than 10 minutes,” Lee said.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
