How to kill a lot of people

Or: the UK's contact-tracing app.

If Google, a company whose entire business model is based on surveillance, are not supporting the model you want to use because it's too privacy-invasive, then you kind of know you're making a bad decision. If you find yourselves dealing with Palantir as part of providing the app, then you kind of know you're making a bad decision. (Dealing with Palantir is like that meeting where you realise that the chief sales person has eyes which glow a dull red and horns: if you find yourself dealing with the devil, walk away unless, possibly, you have met him at a crossroads and he is offering you the ability to play the guitar really well.)

But of course, they didn't walk away, because they're being driven by Cummings and his idiot minions: when you're a data 'scientist' all you understand is that gathering really large amount of data is the solution to all problems. Want to steal a referendum? gather a lot of data and use it in illegal ways. Want to deal with a virus which is killing thousands of people? gather a lot of data. Want to deal with climate change? gather a lot of data and then lie that it's not happening. Because that's all you know how to do: all you understand.

How many people will die because of the reduced uptake of this idiot solution?