After Code Exposé, Hong Kong Officials Insist COVID App Was Not Meant to Include Face Detection

Hong Kong officials are playing down the presence of face biometrics capabilities in the state's contact tracing app after they were exposed by FactWire , a Hong Kong-based investigative journalism agency. After digging into the code underlying Hong Kong's LeaveHomeSafe app, FactWire reported that the source code of the Android version of the app revealed that is had a face detection feature that could be used to detect the positions of a user's mouth, nose, cheeks, eyes, and ears, as well as their head tilt. Responding to the publication, Deputy Government Chief Information Officer Tony Wong admitted that the code…