Use of LINE for vaccination reservations Depending on the municipality

Vaccination of the new coronavirus vaccine for the elderly began this week, but some local governments that were supposed to use LINE to book vaccinations said that LINE was not fully explained. Due to problems such as making personal information accessible from China, there is a move to suspend the start of operation of the service, and the response is divided.

Regarding reservations for vaccination of the new coronavirus vaccine for the elderly, in addition to telephone and homepage reception, LINE is also accepted, and according to LINE, about 200 local governments nationwide initially use LINE. I was planning to do it.

However, last month, it became clear that LINE had made it possible to access user's personal information from China without sufficient explanation, and there was a move to postpone the start of operation of the service, NHK investigated. We are not accepting services in Kofu City, Chichibu City, Saitama Prefecture, and Samukawa Town, Kanagawa Prefecture.

On the other hand, in Kiyama Town, Saga Prefecture, Nose Town, Osaka Prefecture, etc., LINE explained that the vaccine reservation service handles data only in Japan, so we decided that there was no problem and started operation. It is divided.

Local governments that have stopped using LINE for vaccination reservations

Kofu City was planning to accept vaccination reservations on LINE in addition to telephone and homepage from April 5, but it was canceled on March 29.

Kofu City has confirmed that the company responsible for system development has no problem in protecting personal information, but the safety has not been confirmed directly from the national government or LINE side, which may promote public anxiety. Therefore, it is said that the use has been postponed.

Tsuyoshi Horiuchi, Chief of the Medical Infectious Diseases Division, said, "Citizens' feelings and anxieties are still a problem." Is it really okay to use LINE?

Unless the anxiety of "is resolved, personal information will be involved, so we have to be careful."

On the application screen of the city's homepage, there is also a button to switch to LINE reservation, but it is not available even if you click it.

The reception of vaccination reservations, which began on the 5th of this month for the elderly in some districts, was flooded with calls to a dedicated call center, filling all reservations for 500 people in just five hours.

There were a series of complaints from the citizens that "the call center could not be reached", and Mr. Horiuchi said, "If I could use LINE, I would have been able to accept it more smoothly without having to wait on the phone." I was talking.

LINE has conveniences that are not available by phone or on the homepage, such as a mechanism to notify you when the day of vaccination is approaching.

Horiuchi said, "For vaccinations for the general public, a considerable number of people will apply, and I think that LINE is absolutely necessary. It is like a national safety declaration that there is no problem. If you announce it at, I think you can start using LINE. First of all, it is best to ask the government and LINE to explain concretely how to manage information and get the peace of mind of the citizens. " I am.

Some local governments accept reservations through LINE

Kiyama Town, Saga Prefecture, started accepting reservations through LINE from the 8th of this month for vaccinations for the elderly.

Reservations are made by registering for a dedicated LINE account operated by Kiyama Town.

After answering the gender, age, occupation, etc. on the LINE talk screen, access the dedicated website and enter the number and date of birth written on the vaccination ticket delivered in advance from the town, and the vaccination venue You can make a reservation by choosing or by date.

Reservations via LINE are accepted 24 hours a day, and a notification is sent to the user the day before the day of inoculation.

Reservations are accepted at the call center from 9 am to 5 pm on weekdays, but on the 8th of the first day, about 70% of the reservations were made through LINE or a dedicated website.

Fumiaki Nakamuta, director of the Kiyama-cho New Corona Vaccination Promotion Office, said, "Now, elderly people also have smartphones, and grandchildren and children can input them, so I think it's easy to use. I think the line was punctured and couldn't handle it. "

In Kiyama Town, LINE was originally used to send information to the townspeople, but in response to this issue regarding LINE data management, as a result of inquiring directly to the company developing the reservation system, the data was released. Since it was confirmed that it was stored in Japan, it was decided to continue using LINE.

Mr. Nakamuta said, "LINE is necessary to deliver information from the government in a push-type manner, but I did not think that there was a risk of data leaking to the outside. In the future, when using a private server, the data will be I think we will sign the contract after confirming how it is stored. "

What is the problem with LINE?

Regarding LINE, it became clear that the personal information of users on Japanese servers could be accessed from China, and the videos and images exchanged by users were managed in South Korea. The problem is whether or not the explanation to the person was insufficient and there was no leakage or misuse of personal information.

LINE has revised its "Privacy Policy", a guideline for the protection of personal information that requires the consent of users in advance, to specify the names of countries and regions where data may be transferred.

The explanation on the LINE side is

LINE has stated that data related to the vaccine reservation system for local governments will be stored only in domestic data centers from the beginning of development, and access will be limited to domestic data only. It is said that a briefing session was held online for the person in charge and the explanation was given again.

On the other hand, for official accounts for governments and local governments other than the vaccine reservation system, access to data including text is restricted to Japan only, assuming that data such as images and videos other than text are stored in Korean data centers. After that, we will transfer the data to Japan by August this year.

In response to this issue, LINE will report the details of the issue and security measures to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications on the 19th of this month, and the parent company Z Holdings is also conducting a detailed investigation by a committee of experts.

Regarding this issue, LINE explained that the explanation and consideration to users were insufficient, but for details such as the current state of utilization of the vaccine reservation system by local governments, "Focusing on the items surveyed by the Personal Information Protection Commission, We are in a position to be verified by a third party, so we will refrain from answering. "

Expert "The country should give certain guidelines"

Yoichiro Itakura, a lawyer who is familiar with the issue of personal information protection, said, "LINE is an important infrastructure that is already used by many people and is also used by ministries and local governments, and although it is a private service, it is part of the national cyber security strategy. , Should be regarded as a target to be protected from foreign attacks and intelligence. At present, each local government individually decides the handling of personal information in the services of local governments using LINE according to their respective personal information protection regulations. However, regarding the services of local governments that use LINE, I think that the national government should provide certain guidelines regarding the handling of personal information in each field. "