Showing 20 posts tagged location
Study warns on mobile location data privacy
Individuals can be uniquely identified with just four points of location data, a study of mobile phone records shows.
Countless mobile applications make use of location data, and such information is increasingly used to tailor both services for users and advertisements.
But a study in Scientific Reports warns that human mobility patterns are unique identifiers, even when data are scarce.
It presents a formula to describe the trade-off between genuine anonymity and the “resolution” of location data.
» via BBC
“It is no longer valid to assume that the cell sector recorded by the network will give only an approximate indication of a user’s location,” Blaze writes in his testimony. “The gap between the locational precision in today’s cellular call detail records and that of a GPS tracker is closing, especially as carriers incorporate the latest technologies into their networks. As the precision provided by cellular network-based location techniques approaches that of GPS-based tracking technology, cellular location tracking can have significant advantages for law enforcement surveillance operations over traditional GPS trackers.”
iPavement Puts a World of Knowledge Beneath Your Feet
Constructed of a calcium carbonate stone, iPavement looks like your average piece of square tile. But one should never judge a tile by its cover. At iPavement’s core is a 5GB microprocessor that can support both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Each tile will also come with its own suite of apps, offering users features like coupons to local businesses and maps to nearby places of interest. Via Inteligente’s ultimate goal is to make cities more accessible and interesting by linking iPavement squares to people’s increasing number of handheld devices.
» via GOOD
On Facebook, Recalling Neighborhoods as They Once Were
New York City neighborhoods have always been in nonstop flux, but many are now being frozen in time on Facebook, where current and former residents have banded together to post photographs, documents and other memorabilia of their neighborhoods as they used to be. These virtual sections of the city have drawn thousands of contributors, particularly in parts of Brooklyn like Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Flatbush and Carroll Gardens, where zoning laws, gentrification and shifting demographics have rapidly transformed the streets.
Facebook, of course, is already famous for bringing together former classmates and friends. These pages, however, are being used not only to share memories, but also to vent about change. “The point about the old New York City neighborhoods is that they provided real social cohesion,” said Mitchell Moss, a professor of urban policy and planning at New York University. “People shared responsibilities for watching each others’ children, or for keeping an eye on the property. And though new trends in urbanism try to recapture those old communal feelings, you can never recreate what emerged organically.”
» via The New York Times (Subscription may be required for some content)
“It is by now an old idea in futurology, originating with Alvin Toffler, that modern man exists in a state of constant shock at the changing landscape of the technological world — akin to “culture shock,” but as ceaseless as the progress of technology. But we quickly become accustomed to, and adjust ourselves to, the technologies that increasingly form the fabric of our interaction with the world — and so their novelty rapidly fades. And then we find our experience of moving through the world is not one of perpetual awe and wonderment, but of boredom and restlessness.”
(via curiositycounts)
A new GPS-like system can track your location to within inches
Locata’s technique is based on adding ground-based “LocataLites”—about the size of hardback books—across a given area. Each device contains a clock and communicates with other nearby LocataLites to ensure that its time is in perfect sync with the others. When a handheld device within the coverage area wants to determine its location, it polls all the nearby LocataLites for its time-based signal. The handheld determines how far away it is from each LocataLite by determining the time differences—mere nanoseconds—of each signal it receives. Using such time differences, the handheld can triangulate its position within the grid of LocataLites.
» via Consumer Reports
High-res
62% of Information Workers Already Work Remotely
According to a new report from Forrester, 62% of information workers in North America and Europe work remotely. The report says that many clients are approaching the firm for insight on creating best practices for remote, mobile workplaces assuming these changes are part of the remote future when in reality the change is already well underway.
» via ReadWriteWeb
E.U. Panel to Propose Tighter Data Protection
The European Commission’s advisory panel on data protection plans this week to urge governments in the European Union to treat the geographic location of cellphone users as personal data, deserving of the highest level of privacy protection.
» via The New York Times (Subscription may be required for some content)
Technology Aside, Most People Still Decline to Be Located
But for all the attention and money these apps and Web sites are getting, adoption has so far been largely confined to pockets of young, technically adept urbanites. Just 4 percent of Americans have tried location-based services, and 1 percent use them weekly, according to Forrester Research. Eighty percent of those who have tried them are men, and 70 percent are between 19 and 35.
» via The New York Times
Who, What, When, and Now…Where
If you’re like me, when you find a place you really like, you want to tell your friends you’re there. Maybe it’s a new restaurant, a beautiful hiking trail or an amazing live show.
Starting today, you can immediately tell people about that favorite spot with Facebook Places. You can share where you are and the friends you’re with in real time from your mobile device.
» via The Facebook Blog
