The defendant Ng Man-yi was among five government-contracted workers arrested and charged with trespassing in a tenement under the control of the public department for using the fake version of the Covid-19 contact tracing app on November 1, 2021.

Ng had earlier pleaded guilty and appeared before principal magistrate Ivy Chui Yee-mei today in the Eastern Court.

Passing down the sentence, Chui said the LeaveHomeSafe app was introduced to record patients' visit records and to cut off the transmission chains, but Ng using the fake app prevented the government from helping citizens combat Covid.

Still, Chui referred to Ng's mitigation letter in which she showed remorse and admitted she treated unverified rumors – that the authentic app would collect and leak people's personal information – as facts.

Chui noted Ng pleaded guilty very soon and was willing to shoulder her legal consequences. Chui also accepted that Ng committed the crime out of foolishness and pointed to a positive background report.

The judge recalled Ng's clean criminal record and her active participation in volunteering to serve elderly and stray animals and believed the community service order carried a sufficient deterrent effect.