The application programming interface has a set of functions and procedures for others to build on - rather than a fully-fledged app a Google spokeswoman. said “We have developed an Exposure Notification API, based on consultation with public health experts around the world, including the UK, to ensure that our efforts are useful to authorities as they build their own apps to limit the spread of Covid-19, while ensuring privacy and security are central to the design,"
Google have added the app to our phone with a automatic update, you can see in Settings and Google Services titled “COVID-19 exposure notifications”
The latest developments come a day after the BBC revealed that a former Apple executive, Simon Thompson, was taking charge of the late-running project as part of Baroness Harding's team.
The government now intends to launch an app in the autumn, the software may be limited to enabling users to report their symptoms and order a test.
Baroness Dido Harding - who heads up the wider Test and Trace programme - will only give the green light to actually deploying the Apple-Google technology if she judges it to be fit for purpose, which she does not believe is the case at present. It is possible this may never happen.
Germany, Italy and Denmark are among other countries to have switched from a so-called "centralised" approach to a "decentralised" one.
