Many of the strategies used to fight the spread of COVID-19 are pretty low-tech. We wear DIY face masks, obsessively wash our hands, stand on duct-taped lines spaced six feet apart in the grocery store and outside the post office.

As the pandemic drags on, however, companies are hawking more high-tech solutions, some of which are opening the door to an unsettling future of surveillance and worker control.

The Guangzhou Gosuncn Robot Company has developed a corona-bot, upgrading its 5G-powered police patrol robot to include new features to combat COVID-19. The corona-bot, which has been deployed in public places such as shopping malls and airports in large Chinese cities like Guangzhou and Shanghai, uses infrared thermometers and high-resolution cameras to scan the space around it. Anyone within five meters of the bot who has a fever or is not wearing a mask is reported to the police.