The Samoa Tourism Authority (STA) in partnership with the Ministry of Health (MOH) held an event this morning at the tourism Fale-Samoa for the official launch of the Samoa Travel Tracer App.
Chief Executive Officer of STA Faamatuaina Lenata’i Suifua formally welcomed guests and handed over for a word of encouragement by Rev. Mariota Siaea of the Methodist Church at Matafele.
The Reverend encouraged all who participated to obey the laws of God faithfully and blessings shall follow.
“Usitai ma faalogo i le finagalo o Le Atua ma le faamaoni ona oo mai lea o faamanuiga..”
During the Honourable Prime Minister’s keynote address she gave a brief introduction of the app, with special mention that it was developed in Samoa by local IT specialists.
“The Samoa Travel Tracer is based on privacy, preserving blue trace protocols developed in Singapore and I am pleased to share that the app was developed locally in partnership with the Sky-Eye and the Samoan Information Technology Association..”
“Our own mobile application [Samoa Travel Tracer App] is a vital component of the Samoa Travel Ready Toolkit…additional components of the toolkit includes vaccinations, tourism business operating training and maintenance, and of course sales and marketing initiatives.”
The Prime Minister assured the protection of individual privacy with the Samoa Travel Tracer app.
It is designed to be used by the Ministry of Health for tracing purposes as a way to keep the community safe. The Prime Minister said it can only be accessed by the MOH after permission by users has been given, and does not access any other information.
“This app uses Bluetooth to trace a close contact between users. Data collected will be anonymous and encrypted and used solely by the MOH for contact tracing purposes to help keep our community safe.”
“As an app user, only you can give consent to the MOH to access your close contact information and only after you granted your consent with health officials, only then will they have access to information collected by the app on your phone,” the Prime Minister assured.
Fiame has encouraged the community to download the app onto their devices to help ensure that Samoa is well placed to respond to any spread of Covid-19.
The Minister of Health Valasi Luapitofanua Selesele congratulated his CEO Leausa Take Naseri and the whole Ministry as well as the CEO of STA and his team for their successful partnership, trusting that this app will help to ensure the safety of Samoans and stop the spread of Covid-19 if it should ever hit the shores of Samoa.
The Samoa Travel Tracer App is now available on Google Play and Apple Store.
