13. Digital transformations and their design – renewal of the socio-technical approach

Digital transformations and their design
individuals. The idea behind the app seems legitimate and useful, but it can
create adverse threats to the privacy of individuals (i.e., have social impacts)
if it is wrongly implemented. Therefore, we characterize the CoronaMelder app
as a typical socio-technical system as described in section 2.
7.3 Addressing weakly-structured aspects
There is a wide range of stakeholders involved in the CoronaMelder. At first
glance, the governmental organisation in charge of managing the pandemic
(like the RIVM) and the citizens are the primary parties being affected by the
app. In addition, the app is surrounded by many parties that can influence the
SDLC process of the app. Examples of stakeholders are citizens acting as data
subjects, the central government organisations (such as VWS, RIVM, and GGD
GHOR), civil rights public organizations (such as the Netherlands Institute for
Human Rights and the AP), national security organizations, civil rights activists
(such as individuals associated with Bits of Freedom), independent legal
experts (such as privacy lawyers) and system developers (such as software
engineers, system architects and cyber security experts). Involving all these
stakeholders in the design process has been at the core of the VWS’s attention.
To this end, the VWS has established an advisory board to supervise the
development of the app. There are 15 board members who have knowledge
of, for example, epidemiology, virology, technology, privacy, and security, to
supervise adherence to the app requirements (Begeleidingscommissie, 2020).
Identifying all stakeholders and involving them in the design process at a
right level and as early as possible are typical challenges within the design
process for which a designerly approach can be used. The setup of the
stakeholders can influence the design options considered and the solution
direction adopted. Two parties that can be added to the list mentioned above
are citizens and local government organizations. Let us investigate the role of
the local GGDs which may be interested in implementing local measures (e.g.,
regional lockdowns). Fulfilling such needs of local GGDs might have required
collecting citizens’ location information in order to devise regional policies
accordingly. Collecting location information is not pursued in the current
implementation of the CoronaMelder app due to its extensive (currently
unacceptable) violation of privacy. This design option (i.e., not collecting
location information) should be a deliberate choice when making trade-offs
among contending values and should not be an outcome of negligence (i.e.,
not involving local authorities as stakeholders).
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