Movement of visitors from high-risk areas to be tracked with mandatory sim and app

By THE NATION

 

Thakorn Tanthasit

 

The National Broadcasting and Telecommunication Commission (NBTC) will provide a free sim card worth Bt49 to every Thai and foreigner who had travelled from countries announced as having high risk of Covid-19 infection, such as China, Macau, Hong Kong, South Korea, Italy and Iran.

 

“The sim card will be used together with the AOT Airports application, which will help track the position of users for 14 days to verify that they remain in quarantine,” NBTC secretary-general Thakorn Tanthasit said.

 

“We have coordinated with Immigration Bureau to ask all arrivals from high-risk countries to download this app on their phone. Those who refuse to comply will be denied access to the Kingdom, according to Section 12 (7) of Immigration Act.”

 

The AOT Airports application has had more than 7,000 downloads since it went live on March 12.

 

“As for those who had entered Thailand before March 12 and have not downloaded the app yet, the Department of Disease Control will submit their names to the NBTC so that we can notify them to download the app as soon as possible,” said Thakorn. “The app will track the position of the phone for 14 days and will alert the authority if it leaves designated quarantine areas. After 14 days have passed, it will stop tracking and the system will delete the data immediately.”

 

Meanwhile, Dr Khajornsak Kaewjarat, Department of Disease Control deputy director-general, said that the application will be a great help in tracking and monitoring those who have come from high-risk infection areas.

 

“Currently we are monitoring about 1,300 Thais who have returned from South Korea and tested negative for Covid-19,” he said. “They still have to remain in self-quarantine at home until the incubation period of 14 days have passed, and this app can tell us exactly where they are at all times.”

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/news/30384226

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2020-03-17

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So how to track those that just leave their phones at home during the quarantine period and still go out? 

Another great and well thought through idea... 

 

seems they are not willing to close the place down - I have news for them, nobody is travelling to Thailand based on advice from their home countries

Of course people without mobile phones will be subjected to an ankle tracker????

11 minutes ago, smedly said:

seems they are not willing to close the place down - I have news for them, nobody is travelling to Thailand based on advice from their home countries

nobody is travelling    anywhere      if they listen to their governments..

31 minutes ago, Virt said:

So how to track those that just leave their phones at home during the quarantine period and still go out? 

Who don't have their phone at all time? ????

11 minutes ago, Maejo Man said:

Of course people without mobile phones will be subjected to an ankle tracker????

They will be chained to their domicile. Up to you! 

My first thought was that this may be a beta test for more widespread tracking of visitors in the future. Phew! Then I remembered that beta testing is an almost unknown concept for most people here.

Just now, bangkokfrog said:

My first thought was that this may be a beta test for more widespread tracking of visitors in the future. Then I remembered that beta testing is an almost unknown concept for most people here.

No their website is always at the alpha version phase. 

1 hour ago, Swiss1960 said:

Another great and well thought through idea... 

 

 

These people are a shambles. This is just another hare-brained scheme someone thought up while sitting on the po during their morning constitutional. Give it 2 or 3 days and it will disappear back where it came from.

 

3 out of 10 for bright idea, 1 out of 10 for practicality and usefulness, just another half-assed scheme thought up by a 3rd-world mentality trying hard to make a name for himself.

 

 

Maybe a tattoo in the forehead will do. "Quarantined until......"

1 hour ago, smedly said:

seems they are not willing to close the place down - I have news for them, nobody is travelling to Thailand based on advice from their home countries

 

"My tolerance for idiots is extremely low but evidently there is a new strain emerging - I'm off to take a shower"

 

Congratulations on the signature line Sir, it also sums up my thoughts pretty well.

Deep seated feelings about falang come out when there's a crisis and looking for scapegoat

They need to have a tracker inserted under the skin. It's really the only way to be sure.

6 minutes ago, Tayaout said:

They will be chained to their domicile. Up to you! 

 

i do not travel with a mobile.... and my iPad is a mini, so no sim. Does “up to me?” Mean that you believe I should buy an mobile phone, such that Thailand can implement the tracking of foreigners, that the government has been talking about for some time now?

1 minute ago, jany123 said:

 

i do not travel with a mobile.... and my iPad is a mini, so no sim. Does “up to me?” Mean that you believe I should buy an mobile phone, such that Thailand can implement the tracking of foreigners, that the government has been talking about for some time now?

I was joking. It's not my job to track you! 

How do these impractical IT Projects get so far?

 

Is no one sitting around the table brave enough to put their hand up and point out why it's a non-starter?

 

Worked in IT all my life and am so grateful none of it was in Asia.

Don't they realize? Dirty foreigners don't have cellphones.

33 minutes ago, smedly said:

seems they are not willing to close the place down - I have news for them, nobody is travelling to Thailand based on advice from their home countries

I don't know about other countries but there is currently no advice from the UK government saying that their citizens shouldn't come here. I just got a GOV.UK email giving an update on Travel to Thailand. All it says, is that travellers from the UK should be aware of the restrictions in place here, it even mentions this new app.

51 minutes ago, Maejo Man said:

Of course people without mobile phones will be subjected to an ankle tracker????

or suppository ????

Are they tracking the sim or the app ?

Finally they got their digital ankle bracelets. Must be happy now. Next up, it will be mandatory for everyone, Thais included. Good job, CCP.

He seems to only being talking about the category 1 nations here, but anyway there are reports on twitter that the attempt to have people install this app at immigration for category 2 visitors (ongoing transmission) too, is predictably an unworkable disaster anyway and that they're letting people through the standard way.

 

Nevertheless, the confusion around this issue is partly why a family member from the UK cancelled their holiday here which was going to start today. They weren't sure about how fun it was going to be, being viewed as a walking disease on the move, while in this country.

 

I didn't tell then about that plank health minister's various comments. They probably would have thrown in the towel that day, if they read it.

 

We had established that there was a high likelihood they would just slip through without additional measures (prepared them anyway with the app already downloaded and a filled out T8 form to help stay one step ahead if need be) from what I was hearing, but the nail in the coffin came at the 11th hour when my own flight home from here in early April was cancelled by my airline yesterday, due to events.

 

This combination of my family members not wanting to risk a change in policy here and finding themselves quarantined here in a concrete jungle for three weeks, along with the risk they may not be able to leave the country, killed it.

 

Those of us who are already in, are getting by, but I wouldn't advise anyone to come here because airlines are cancelling flights to Europe, now it is seen as the new epicentre to avoid at all costs.

 

You may get in here, but not get back, and until there is clarity as to how immigration will view those staying well over their time when there are now no neighbouring nations open for visa runs, then people will cancel for this year. 

 

The disconnect between official announcements and reality on the ground, will dissuade people from going. It is just going to be deemed as too much hassle. I don't wish Thailand ill, but the tourism boom is probably in its last year right now, while they continue to build and build and build as if nothing is happening. Strange phenomenon. 

1 hour ago, Tayaout said:

Who don't have their phone at all time? ????

Those who are determined to break the quarantine or have a spare phone. 

Will dissolve all the tm30 stuff for them? 

We are cancelling our trip as well, it's not the thought of infection, it's the potential that Thailand could actually start testing and reveal an underlying time bomb that limits our freedom.

 

Re-booking for Loi Krathong.

2 hours ago, Maejo Man said:

Of course people without mobile phones will be subjected to an ankle tracker????

No, if they're from the designated countries they'll be denied entry.

6 minutes ago, damo said:

Re-booking for Loi Krathong.

I do love an optimist

1 hour ago, pixelaoffy said:

Deep seated feelings about falang come out when there's a crisis and looking for scapegoat

What are you talking about? 

 

How does your comment correlate with the countries that are actually affected, i.e. China, Macau, Hong Kong, South Korea, Iran and Italy, then?  There's more Asian/eastern than "falang" [sic] countries in that list!