[FRIAM] Google, GPS and "We know where you are."

[Don Begley]

Speaking primarily from ignorance, it seems Google is using the  
infrastructure available for 911 calls today. A cell phone call to 911  
currently identifies only the quadrant of the call. The next  
generation 911 will use the phone's GPS coordinates but it is in  
rollout today. All of which makes me wonder whether the Google  
announcement isn't more marketing than substance for the moment-- 
although Google may be able to access the GPS info sooner than the 911  
centers since it has more resources. Based on the video in your link,  
I'm inclined to believe they're using the quadrant info and some  
guessing software. In a city, the guesses would be more accurate as  
there are more towers. In NM, they're not likely ti ID you w/i 1000  
feet as the Flash flic says.

-d-



On Dec 3, 2007, at 1:10 AM, Tom Johnson wrote:

> Colleagues:
>
> In recent days, Google announced the beta of some software for a GPS- 
> equipped mobile phones.  See http://tinyurl.com/yrvfo3
> The way it works is by picking up a signal from cell towers, it  
> indicates the phone's location with a blue dot on Google's Mobil  
> Maps.  (For what it's worth, I have Google Mobile Maps on my Treo  
> 650, but I have yet to get this version to work.)
>
> Here's my question:
>
> Would it be possible for the Google mothership to do the equivalent  
> of "pinging" my phone number, not to make a call but to see if (a)  
> the phone is on and if so (b) where is that phone?  The phone  
> wouldn't ring, so the user would have no idea he/she is being geo- 
> located.  I assume that if Google could do that, those phone numbers  
> and geocodes could easily become a data base appropriate for some  
> interesting data mining, both as a static bit of insight and if  
> done, say, every hour, whew.  What a rich pile of insight for all  
> sorts of people, businesses and survey agencies.  Putting aside  
> issues of a person's privacy, just the collective data about where  
> that particular phone is going -- forget who owns it -- would be  
> rather amazing and useful to some.
>
> So, back to the questions:
>
> 1) Would those pings of a phone be possible?
> 2) Would the results reflect location and movement of that phone  
> down to what degree of distance today?  Are we talking meters or  
> kilometers or ????
> 3) And if Google wasn't doing the pinging, could anyone who had my  
> phone number track my location and/or distance from any originating  
> dialing point/server?
>
> Thanks,
> Tom Johnson
>
> -- 
> ==========================================
> J. T. Johnson
> Institute for Analytic Journalism -- Santa Fe, NM USA
> www.analyticjournalism.com
> 505.577.6482(c)                                 505.473.9646(h)
> http://www.jtjohnson.com                 tom at jtjohnson.com
>
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> existing model obsolete."
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> Fuller
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