Experts gave suggested technology could help Australian reinforce its COVID-19 hotel quarantines.

A number of nations are using tracking bracelets and other technologies to support their pandemic response.

Hong Kong currently requires people arriving from other countries to wear a wristband while self-isolating for two weeks.

The wristbands come with a compulsory phone app that can detect if a person has left their hotel room or house, while South Korea is working on plans to force people to wear wristbands if they breach quarantine orders.

Dr Marietta Martinovic, an expert in electronic monitoring at RMIT University, has told ABC reporters that tracking devices could be considered in Australia.

“This is a very serious health issue, and we have to get people to care,” she said.

“One way of getting people to care is by imposing financial penalties … but also thinking about what could be some more stringent measures, and electronic monitoring is certainly an option.”

The WA Government has given its police force $3 million to buy 200 GPS tracking ankle bracelets and even passed laws for them to be used to monitor people in quarantine, but there is no sign that they have been used for this purpose.

Dr Martinovic says there would be some benefit to using tracking technologies in Australia, but there are some serious downsides as well.

“I think there could be backlash by people who are mandated to use the technology,” she said.

There is a significant cost too.

“These are expensive devices … and then there's all the manpower behind it all,” Dr Martinovic says.

“There's somebody that's got to be tracking people, when an alert happens, there's got to be a very strict process.

“There's quite a lot that needs to go on in the background … the process of monitoring is quite substantial.”

She also said that there are risks whenever personal information is collected.

“That's always something we've got to keep at the back of our mind if we as a society, as a country, as a jurisdiction, go down the track of using technology for this purpose,” she said.

“Yes, right now it's for the right reasons, one can argue, but in the future, we can never be so sure what those reasons are going to be.

“They could potentially be used by governments to control our movements.”