{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,26]],"date-time":"2026-03-26T12:34:06Z","timestamp":1774528446543,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":15,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"10","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,10,8]],"date-time":"2021-10-08T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1633651200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Data"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The COVID-19 pandemic led to a multi-faceted global crisis, which triggered the diverse and quickly emerging use of old and new digital tools. We have developed a multi-channel approach for the monitoring and analysis of a subset of such tools, the COVID-19 related mobile applications (apps). Our approach builds on the information available in the two most prominent app stores (i.e., Google Play for Android-powered devices and Apple\u2019s App Store for iOS-powered devices), as well as on relevant tweets and digital media outlets. The dataset presented here is one of the outcomes of this approach, uses the content of the app stores and enriches it, providing aggregated information about 837 mobile apps published across the world to fight the COVID-19 crisis. This information includes: (a) information available in the mobile app stores between 20 April 2020 and 2 August 2020; (b) complementary information obtained from manual analysis performed until mid-September 2020; and (c) status information about app availability on 28 February 2021, when we last collected data from the mobile app stores. We highlight our findings with a series of descriptives, which depict both the activities in the app stores and the qualitative information that was revealed by the manual analysis.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/data6100106","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,10,9]],"date-time":"2021-10-09T23:37:08Z","timestamp":1633822628000},"page":"106","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":15,"title":["Mobile Apps to Fight the COVID-19 Crisis"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"6","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-6012-0835","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Chrisa","family":"Tsinaraki","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Irena","family":"Mitton","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"MITGIS, 52210 Rovinj, Croatia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9993-1072","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Marco","family":"Minghini","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7004-6480","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Marina","family":"Micheli","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-0411-741X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Alexander","family":"Kotsev","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7804-0158","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Lorena","family":"Hernandez Quiros","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Fabiano-Antonio","family":"Spinelli","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"GFT Italia SRL, 20139 Milano, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Alessandro","family":"Dalla Benetta","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Piksel SRL, 20126 Milano, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5677-5209","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Sven","family":"Schade","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, 21027 Ispra, Italy"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,10,8]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"Ada Lovelace Institute (2021, August 09). Exit through the App Store?. Available online: https:\/\/www.adalovelaceinstitute.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Ada-Lovelace-Institute-Rapid-Evidence-Review-Exit-through-the-App-Store-April-2020-2.pdf."},{"key":"ref_2","unstructured":"O\u2019Neill Howell, P., Ryan-Mosley, T., and Johnson, B. (2021, August 09). A Flood of Coronavirus Apps Are Tracking Us. Now It\u2019s Time to Keep Track of Them. MIT Technology Review. Available online: https:\/\/www.technologyreview.com\/2020\/05\/07\/1000961\/launching-mittr-covid-tracing-tracker\/."},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Floridi, L. (2021, August 09). Mind the App. Considerations on the Ethical Risks of COVID-19 Apps. Blog Post. Onlife. Published 18 April 2020. Available online: https:\/\/thephilosophyofinformation.blogspot.com\/2020\/04\/mind-app-considerations-on-ethical.html.","DOI":"10.2139\/ssrn.3830426"},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Poom, A., J\u00e4rv, O., Zook, M., and Toivonen, T. (2020). COVID-19 is spatial: Ensuring that mobile Big Data is used for social good. Big Data Soc., 7.","DOI":"10.1177\/2053951720952088"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"8851429","DOI":"10.1155\/2020\/8851429","article-title":"Demystifying COVID-19 Digital Contact Tracing: A Survey on Frameworks and Mobile Apps","volume":"2020","author":"Martin","year":"2020","journal-title":"Wirel. Commun. Mob. Comput."},{"key":"ref_6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"425","DOI":"10.1016\/S2589-7500(20)30137-0","article-title":"Digital tools against COVID-19: Taxonomy, ethical challenges, and navigation aid","volume":"2","author":"Gasser","year":"2020","journal-title":"Lancet Digit. Health"},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Tsinaraki, C., Mitton, I., Dalla Benetta, A., Micheli, M., Kotsev, A., Minghini, M., Hernandez, L., Spinelli, F., and Schade, S. (2021, August 09). Analysing Mobile Apps That Emerged to Fight the COVID-19 Crisis. EU Technical Report. Available online: https:\/\/ec.europa.eu\/jrc\/communities\/en\/community\/citizensdata\/document\/analysing-mobile-apps-emerged-fight-covid-19-crisis.","DOI":"10.3390\/data6100106"},{"key":"ref_8","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016\/679. Available online: https:\/\/eur-lex.europa.eu\/eli\/reg\/2016\/679\/oj."},{"key":"ref_9","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). iTunes Search API. Available online: https:\/\/developer.apple.com\/library\/archive\/documentation\/AudioVideo\/Conceptual\/iTuneSearchAPI\/index.html."},{"key":"ref_10","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). Node.js. Available online: https:\/\/nodejs.org\/en\/."},{"key":"ref_11","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). Google-Play-Scraper. Available online: https:\/\/github.com\/facundoolano\/google-play-scraper."},{"key":"ref_12","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). Safe Software FME\u2014The Simple Solution for Complex Integration. Available online: https:\/\/www.safe.com\/."},{"key":"ref_13","unstructured":"(2021, June 09). Mobile Apps to Fight the COVID-19 Crisis. Available online: https:\/\/data.jrc.ec.europa.eu\/dataset\/c14cb1db-c31b-4bb9-95d2-ec7148708931."},{"key":"ref_14","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). Statistics of the COVID-19 Related Mobile Apps on Google Play and Apple App Store. Available online: https:\/\/ec-jrc.github.io\/covid-19-mobile-apps\/statistics.html."},{"key":"ref_15","unstructured":"(2021, August 09). 2019-nCoV Outbreak Is an Emergency of International Concern. Available online: https:\/\/www.euro.who.int\/en\/health-topics\/health-emergencies\/international-health-regulations\/news\/news\/2020\/2\/2019-ncov-outbreak-is-an-emergency-of-international-concern."}],"container-title":["Data"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2306-5729\/6\/10\/106\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T07:10:25Z","timestamp":1760166625000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2306-5729\/6\/10\/106"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2021,10,8]]},"references-count":15,"journal-issue":{"issue":"10","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,10]]}},"alternative-id":["data6100106"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/data6100106","relation":{},"ISSN":["2306-5729"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2306-5729","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2021,10,8]]}}}