Can AI Make Bluetooth Contract Tracing Better?

During the COVID-19 pandemic, digital contact tracing apps based on the Bluetooth technology found in smartphones have been deployed by various countries despite the fact that Bluetooth’s baseline performance as a proximity detector remains mostly a mystery.

That is why the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology organized a months-long event that leveraged the talents of AI researchers around the world to help evaluate and potentially improve upon that baseline Bluetooth performance for helping detect when smartphone users are standing too close to one another.