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In recent days, Professor Crisanti, during an interview with Corriere della Sera, said that now, with 40,000 cases, it is impossible to manage contact tracing. His proposal sparked discussion: “We need to monitor the flows, the movements of people between regions and a monitoring of the meeting places and times. These data should be requested from those who have them. Especially Google but to a certain extent also Apple, Facebook, Instagram and even WhatsApp”.
Crisanti did not mean, as someone immediately thought, that Google should be used to spy on people, but simply that the aggregated and anonymous data of the web giants could help you know if people move too much, where they are moving and what are the points where they could improve.
However, this data already exists: since February / March Apple and Google have made available a series of mobility data to help understand if the blockade or containment measures were effective.
Apple, but especially Google, sthey are able to tell us if people are at home, at work, if they are going on transport, shopping or in stores. This is because almost all smartphones, for services such as traffic on Google Maps, broadcast their position anonymously. This feature can be disabled, but on 95% of Android phones it is active today – owners have no idea that it exists, how it works, and how to avoid giving geolocation data to Google.
Therefore real data, which photograph the movements in Italy in recent months. We take them, process them, and generate all the graphs for the individual regions. Here is the Italian situation photographed by Google.
How to read the charts
Charts based on Google data show the change in travel volume in a given community.
Google’s data is very precise, because it also manages to differentiate generic purchases, which we have indicated as shops, food and basic needs, transportation, trips to work areas and trips to residential areas. The data obviously have to be seen with an eye on weekends and national holidays: the first of June and mid-August you can notice a negative peak at work, it is a holiday.
The effects of the first national blockade are very evident: the “house” is growing and all other segments are falling. A net reduction, close to 100%. However, the situation is very different from what is happening today, even in the red zones.
The situation in Italy, region by region
Red zones
Orange areas
Yellow areas
As can be seen from the graphs, the current situation is very different from that of the first national closure. A few days have passed since the entry into force of the DPCM and a trend can be seen, however in many places mobility and the different indices are not different from those of this summer, or June. Walter Ricciardi, consultant to the Minister of Health Roberto Speranza and professor of Hygiene at Cattolica, said in recent days what many think: “I see a lot of people still walking the streets.”
The situation photographed by Google confirms it: there are so many people around.
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