By Herbie Gomez
Editor-in-Chief
EVEN eateries will soon be required to collect data from their patrons in Cagayan de Oro where the local government began implementing an ordinance that bars anyone without a QR code from entering establishments.
Cagayan de Oro residents or not, everyone’s required to secure QR codes from city hall via https://higala.cagayandeoro.gov.ph beginning Wesnesday, May 5.
Initially, more than 3,000 establishments in city hall’s list have been compelled to scan and keep copies of QR codes on behalf of the local government.
Based on the city law, they are required to transmit the encrypted data to city hall within 24 hours or risk the prospects of getting fined, suspended, and shut down for good.
Officials proceeded with the implementation of the “Higala app” ordinance amid concerns about its repercussions on local businesses and public convenience, and a clear distrust on city hall’s ability to keep citizens’ personal data private and protected from hackers.
City hall said 3,431 establishments in the city registered, and 1,149,539 individuals secured QR codes through the Higala app. But some 20% of the people who registered are from the neighboring provinces of Misamis Oriental, Bukidnon, and Lanao del Norte.
The first phase of the implementation this week affects malls and their tenants, banks, hospitals, convenience stores, pawnshops and couriers, and just about any establishment with “heavy foot traffic.” Even people going to cemeteries and churches are required to present their QR codes for scanning.
The ordinance applies to eateries, too, said Chedillyn Dulquilme, spokesperson of city hall’s technical working group that developed the Higala app system.
“We will be lenient during the first week as we ask the establishments to comply with the ordinance. The carenderias would be asked to comply, too, in the next phase of the implementation,” Dulquilme said.
The eateries, she said, would soon need to scan their patrons’ QR codes only at certain times of the day.
Dulquilme said citizens need not worry about their data being compromised because the establishments can only access the report feature of the Higala system.
“All they would see are the number of people entering, and if (they are) male or female,” she said.
Dulquilme said the data are accessible to the City Management Information System Office, and would be made available to city hall’s Health Emergency Management Service only when Covid-19 frontline workers need information for contact-tracing.
City hall requires consent from people registering in the Higala app for their QR codes so it could process their “personal and/or sensitive personal information.”
Mayor Oscar Moreno earlier said city hall would also use the Higala app data to speed up the local Covid-19 vaccination work.
Councilor Edgar Cabanlas said data collection “is something we cannot do away and have to live with in this age of technological advancement when even financial transactions are being done online.”
The Cagayan de Oro Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Oro Chamber) has asked city hall to rid the ordinance of its punitive provisions and make it business-friendly. Mayor Moreno rejected the group’s petition, and decided to implement the ordinance as is.
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