Comparison of COVID Tracking Apps

This report compares the features, applications, and suitability of two COVID tracking apps - COVID Symptom Study and NHS COVID-19 app - NHSX. It discusses the functionality of each app and analyzes their effectiveness in tracking and managing the spread of COVID-19.

Individual report

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Distinct positive and negative aspects of selling products and services online and offline........1
Explain tools and techniques for successful management of online account's passwords.........3
Discuss about the two tracking apps and how they function and compare their features,
applications and suitability..........................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Information technology is defined as the implementation of technology in problem
solving process of business enterprises on a wide platform (Lloyd, 2020). It helps in effective
and efficient sharing of informations, contacting and collaborating with customers and business
partners, protecting business risk through effective system of storage data, protracting data from
theft and hacking etc. IT is most used and extensive techniques in this techno era. Computer is
essential approach used in business operations and for personal uses like entertainment (Baller,
Dutta and Lanvin, 2016).
This report containing the distinction between positive and negative impact of online and
offline selling of goods and services with respect to customer and organisation. Further effective
password management techniques are discussed to protect user's data on online accounts. Track
and trace apps developed by UK government are also compared in terms of their features,
application and suitability with respect to added social values.
Distinct positive and negative aspects of selling products and services online and offline.
Online selling :- E-commerce is the terms which allows users to directly buy the product
and services from a seller through the medium of internet (Marchewka, 2016). Payment is also
done by electronic mode such as- credit card, debit card. It saves the time and cost of business
entities. This is only possible with the use of IT. Method of buying things on internet includes
selecting items from list of merchandise, placing order for preferred item, making payment and
then order is shipped to buyer's address.
Offline selling :- Physical stores refers exchange of products and services from seller to
buyer or from manufacturer to other business user on a offline platform (Bessen, 2017). All the
tasks are performed manually. Payment mode includes cash, cheque etc. it helps in increasing the
sale of company and enhancing customer base through satisfying their needs.
Both have some positive and negative impacts on business explained below :
Basis of
comparison
Online Offline
Positive 1. Saving cost is one of the major
positive impact of selling goods and
products via online platform for
1. Direct contact with users is significant
affect of selling goods and services
through offline stores (Avgerou and
1

business enterprises. E-commerce
makes it very favourable for
organisations to sale their items on a
broader platform through medium of
internet (Theis and Wong, 2017). This
creates cost benefits for firm required
for purchasing land and building
needed to build sales stores.
Informations technology also helps in
saving money invested on wide
advertisements, promoting & marketing
of goods and services. Social media
marketing is more effective tool given
by IT. It saves the time and cost of
business and added a value toward
profit maximisation.
2. Availability of different brands
creates significant impact in terms of
customers. A variety of products are
available on online shopping sites
(Mikalef and Pateli, 2017). For
consumer it is very easy to get
expected goods from any company or
brand. This makes it possible to choose
best product by comparing it from
different other brands. For instance e-
commerce companies like Tesco,
Marks & Spencer etc. provides a huge
variety in their products to fulfil the
diverse needs and demands of end
users. Availability of range of items
Walsham, 2017). In terms of business
organisations it is an advantage to sale
items offline. This builds brand loyalty
and image in industry. Direct selling
make it trouble free for manufacturer to
generates good impressions on
customers through effective and creative
ways of treating them. For instance
offline selling allows vendors to ensures
reliable and durable products and
services, proper sitting arrangement for
consumers, unique interiors etc. this
makes first sight impression on
customers when entering into stores.
Brand loyalty pulling people towards
goods and services of a particular seller.
2. Go and buy things from shopping
malls gives satisfaction to people. It is
an opportunity for customers to touch,
feel and check comfort of ordinary
features of a product. Trial facilities
given by sales person release doubts,
confusions in selecting or purchasing
items by users (Xiang, 2018). Thus,
buying goods from shopping stores
creates a positive impact on mankind.
This leads for growth opportunities for
firms to expand and explore their
business more.
2

makes a company capable of satisfying
the unique desires of individuals.
Negative 1. The major negative aspect of being
sold goods and services online is delay
in delivery of items. Placing order may
not take more than 12-15 minutes and
receiving items late may frustrate the
consumer. This affects reputation of
vendor in negative ways. Late delivery
happened because of lack in effective
management of inventory. Thus, it
states for huge negative impact which
affects the sales and profit of the
business.
2. In customers point of views lack of
close examination stand for demerit.
Electronic purchase may results in
misleading buying. It is not possible to
recognise quality, durability, fit, exact
colour, and comfort of products
through just viewing images on
internet. People like to buy some things
from physical stores. Theses goods may
include- clothing, auto-mobile items .
For instance it impossible to acquire a
car without having test drive.
1. In case of physical sales it is and big
negative impact on business users that
they have to invest huge amount of
money on building distribution places
for exchanging goods and services with
customers & business partners. Unlike
online websites there is a requirement of
wide monetary resources for marketing
and promoting of materials. This is
because of expensive tools of promotion
such as- advertisement, newspapers,
hoardings, publicity etc. needed for
communicating the message with end
users. This increases the cost of the
company.
2. Another important point to be
considered negative with respect to
customers is wasting time in visiting
sales stores and reducing energy in
parking hassle. Today's consumer is
more busy & techno advanced. This
creates the desire of getting things at
home in minimum efforts. Visiting in
physical stores may take the precious
time and energy of people invested in
facing crowed.
3

Explain tools and techniques for successful management of online account's passwords.
In this age of technology everything is doing on internet. Increment in IT uses leads to
chances of fraud, theft and hacking personal and professional data of user's online accounts
(Soto-Acosta, Popa and Martinez-Conesa, 2018). Thus, due to rising risks and challenges it is
needed to use effective and powerful techniques to protect passwords. There are some significant
tools used for the purpose are as under :
Use of biometric password :- First and crucial tool of making password safe from
hackers and being theft if using biometric passwords. It is an accurate and authentic techniques
which recording specific physical feature of a user such as- thumb, eyes, face etc. this is an
successful method of getting data secure without giving less efforts. User should also have
unique id and password to set biometric. This eliminates chances of login with someone else's id.
It is considered as a segment of defence in depth approach for security management system.
Biometric method needed high investment on purchasing of hardware and software and it is also
hard to apply. It is more authentic but, expensive at the same time. Following are the points
stands for the importance of this method :
 Biometric features are different from person to person. So, it is more authentic
approach of password management and control.
 To use this tool specific user ID and password is essential which added the value
in safety and security of login info.
Make lengthy password :- Another better option to manage and control user's password
is to make it lengthy. There are 52 alpha-bates in a keyboard with addition 10 numbers and 10
special characters. Setting a password of 15-20 letters with combination of some letters, numbers
and lower case upper & case letters characters makes it strong and powerful (Passey and
Samways, 2016). Longer password is more effectual as compared to complex one. It is very easy
to found a password created with use of special characters like +,+,&,@,#,_ etc. thus, length
matters more than complexity. It is an important method more explained by below points :
 Through the use of variety of letters , special character and no.'s in password, this
performs a vital role in keeping user's account safe.
 Lengthy password is more effective then setting difficult of complex unlock key.
It shows the importance of it is more as compared to other tools.
4

Use of a good password manager :- It is an digital program that allows users to create a
master password over several accounts in order to minimise the risk of stolen and being hacked.
This supreme password used to access and login different accounts. It facilitate for user not need
to remember each and every accounts login key. Password manager provides a electric vault to
store login info and unlock key to access and open accounts. Password manager also helps users
in alerting when someone accessing their accounts and give instructions for not to use same key
to unlock other accounts. This plays important role in effective password control discussed
below:
 This performs significant role in managing password with setting super login key
for all accounts and protecting them from risk of hacked from simple passwords.
 It separately storing the information of login and accessing electronic accounts of
a user. Thus, it is very important tool in terms of data safety and security.
constant changing :- In terms of securing and protecting password from numerous risks
of being hacked and stolen regular changes in password also a effective way.
Because electronic devices storing the personal and sensitive data of a user so keeping it safe is
major challenge. Regular changes in old unlock keys of computers, mobile phones and other
electronic devices is very important for protecting login info. This is another significant way to
safe user's online accounts from loosing data and information. Importance of this method in
purposeful password management are considered as follows:
 It helps in reducing the risk of password hacking and login info leaking.
 This easy and simple to set and use. It also added a value in successful password
management of digital account of user.
As per the above explanation of effective and impressive tools & approaches of password
control to protect sensitive data and login information for access digital accounts. Regular
changes in unlock and login key is recommended as a best and most effective method of
password manage. Personal informations like name, age, address, date of birth should not be
considered in password making. It is really easy to access personal info of a user. This method is
less expensive than biometric password. Due to use of master password for several accounts in
good password manager tool, there is huge risk of data leaking from different accounts if this
master key is hacked. Thus, constant changes in regular password is more effective approach
than others.
5

Discuss about the two tracking apps and how they function and compare their features,
applications and suitability
Features
COVID symptom study NHS COVID-19 app - NHSX
This app is developed by health science
company and also tends to endorse the Welsh
Government, NHS Wales, NHS Scotland and
Scottish Government. For this, data collection
is shared and also analysed by the research
team. Along with this, the aim of this app is to
deliver insight of some people to get the
disease more severely instead of others.
This application tends to use Bluetooth energy
at the time of handshake among people and
depict the occasions among mobile phone
customers including various elements and
separation among the gadgets to take care of
NHS clinical calculation which is being
conscious to analyse the harmful effects of
disease which is being noticed by people
(Melián-González and Bulchand-Gidumal,
2016). It is also important for the inquires over
compelling the device to specifically consider
the structure that leads to raise the prominent
move which is connected in various stages of
work.
Applications
COVID symptom study NHS COVID-19 app - NHSX
Considering the effective application of this
app, researchers tend to explore the harmful
factors that has the major impact on COVID-
19 and the well-being factor of patients.
Moreover, by considering the significant
model people tends to join team for their
testing rates undertaking the huge number of
clients who undertake detailed manifestations
without any information of testing. For this, the
It depict the different thought in which people
committed to cover the application in terms of
clearing the company from any lawful limit
regarding the effective use. It also stand for the
effective application of being accelerate to
discharge without depending for the current
authoritative system. For this, the prominent
data use the effective calculation to analyse the
transferred information of telephone and other
6

researchers conduct effective survey that relies
on the self reported symptoms in terms of
measuring the prevalence of COVID-19
(Stover, 2019). Therefore, this app is quite
amazing in terms of demonstrating the
effective power of large scale science and use
of machine learning.
harmful connection. Along with this, various
clients had the chance to linked with the unwell
people regarding the application which focus
for the NHS counsel considering the side
effects.
Suitability
COVID symptom study NHS COVID-19 app - NHSX
Scientists get agree for the information in
terms of effective examination that tends to
uncover the prominent data regarding the
appearance and progress of COVID-19 for the
several individuals. Along with this, they also
tends to proceed in terms of developing the
more extreme and deadly complaint while
others as they just ripe the other side effects.
Along with this, it is helpful in terms of critical
requirements of clinical that leads to make
effective difference among the indications of
coronavirus from the cold, cough and fever
that might be driving factors of the self isolate
as when people are not go out and spread
infection.
The considered application is significant when
people use this application in their mobile
phones and also effectively used with the help
of Bluetooth innovation to make prominent
difference within the telephones and nearby
running application (Madon and Krishna,
2018). This app consider the quality for the
Bluetooth signal and also decide how to close
the telephones from each other. For this, clients
also select the prominent investigation in order
to encounter the side effects of COVID-19.
Along with this, people also tends to confirm
the use of this app by showing that individual
has the prominent side effect of coronavirus
and set alert to healthcare institutions with the
help of significant notification which is
gathered for the NHS database.
CONCLUSION
By considering preceding information it is identified that digital technology has an major
impact on informing consumers, collaborating with business partners, protecting & securing user
7

password and many more. Information technology has some significant and negative impacts on
selling of goods and services via digital platform of through physical stores. Various password
control approaches are necessary to use for protecting electric accounts of users. In above study
use of timely passwords changes is suggested as most effective and appropriate method. UK
government planned and implemented track and trace apps to record data of corona suspects.
This helps the nation in dealing with pandemic situation.
8

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Avgerou, C. and Walsham, G. eds., 2017. Information technology in context: Studies from the
perspective of developing countries: Studies from the perspective of developing
countries. Routledge.
Baller, S., Dutta, S. and Lanvin, B., 2016. Global information technology report 2016. Geneva:
Ouranos.
Bessen, J., 2017. Information technology and industry concentration.
Lloyd, I., 2020. Information technology law. Oxford University Press.
Madon, S. and Krishna, S. eds., 2018. The digital challenge: information technology in the
development context: Information technology in the development context. Routledge.
Marchewka, J.T., 2016. Information technology project management: Providing measurable
organizational value. John Wiley & Sons.
Melián-González, S. and Bulchand-Gidumal, J., 2016. A model that connects information
technology and hotel performance. Tourism Management, 53, pp.30-37.
Mikalef, P. and Pateli, A., 2017. Information technology-enabled dynamic capabilities and their
indirect effect on competitive performance: Findings from PLS-SEM and
fsQCA. Journal of Business Research, 70, pp.1-16.
Passey, D. and Samways, B. eds., 2016. Information Technology: supporting change through
teacher education. Springer.
Soto-Acosta, P., Popa, S. and Martinez-Conesa, I., 2018. Information technology, knowledge
management and environmental dynamism as drivers of innovation ambidexterity: a
study in SMEs. Journal of Knowledge Management.
Stover, W.J., 2019. Information technology in the third world: Can IT lead to humane national
development?. Routledge.
Theis, T.N. and Wong, H.S.P., 2017. The end of moore's law: A new beginning for information
technology. Computing in Science & Engineering, 19(2), pp.41-50.
Xiang, Z., 2018. From digitization to the age of acceleration: On information technology and
tourism. Tourism management perspectives, 25, pp.147-150.
9

10

11