China’s Covid-19 tracking app has been ditched by Beijing
Chinese officials have confirmed the end of the state-mandated Covid-19 tracking app.
The national Communications Itinerary Card app had been in use for three years.
But officials took the app offline on Monday as part of Beijing’s latest attempt to loosen Covid-19 restrictions.
The app had used phone signals to track whether individuals were travelling travelled to an area considered to be ‘high-risk’.
Chinese citizens were required to submit their phone numbers in the smartphone application, which then shared an itinerary of where they could travel to.
“Bye bye,” wrote one user on the Weibo platform, who hailed the decision as “the end of an era.”
Others wrote “goodbye itinerary card, concerts here I come.”
China’s four telecom groups have confirmed they will delete any data linked to the app.
The app’s disbandment is the latest shift from Beijing after anti-lockdown protests gripped the nation’s top universities.
Other changes include mandatory testing before some public activities being ditched, and some quarantine rules.
