Surgisphere: governments and WHO changed Covid-19 policy based on suspect data from tiny US company

Surgisphere, whose employees appear to include a sci-fi writer and adult content model, provided database behind Lancet and New England Journal of Medicine hydroxychloroquine studies The World Health Organization and a number of national governments have changed their Covid-19 policies and treatments on the basis of flawed data from a little-known US healthcare analytics company, also calling…

NHS coronavirus app: memo discussed giving ministers power to ‘de-anonymise’ users

Exclusive: draft plans for contact-tracing app said device IDs could be used to identify users A draft government memo explaining how the NHS contact-tracing app could stem the spread of the coronavirus said ministers might be given the ability to order “de-anonymisation” to identify people from their smartphones, the Guardian can reveal. The health secretary, Matt Hancock, announced on…

More from this series UK government using confidential patient data in coronavirus response

Exclusive: Documents seen by Guardian show tech firms using information to build ‘Covid-19 datastore’ Technology firms are processing large volumes of confidential UK patient information in a data-mining operation that is part of the government’s response to the coronavirus outbreak, according to documents seen by the Guardian. Palantir, the US big data firm founded by…