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Finns To Use Cell Phones To Monitor Traffic Jams
Okko writes "The Finnish Road Administration announced it is going to use cellphone location data to find out about traffic jams. They say they are using the location data available from the GSM base stations
to determine the locations and speeds of vehicles carrying mobile phones. The information will be used to inform people about traffic jams and peaks in traffic trough public FM radio stations. Until now, the information about traffic has been gathered using car sensors embedded in the roads.
The spokesperson of FRA, interviewed in the evening news of MTV3 Finland, seemed very pleased they can monitor cell phones even when no calls are made, it is enough the phone has power on.
They said they are about to use the information anonymously and thought people approve it as long as it is done in an anonymous and "everyone-wins" way.
It was told they do not currently tell the police about the data they discover as the current law forbids this. So, it is not, at least yet, possible to fine people carrying mobile phones in their cars too fast on public roads (exceeding the speed limit of the road).
Unfortunately, probably because of vacations,
FRA has not updated their website accordingly yet. There does exist an annoucement about testing the technology from the summer.
"
Another slashdot story was flashed a while back (13/06/02), but that was pertaining to Scottish company.
...I can see the day where an automated system can automatically flag and/or ticket you for exceeding the speed limit. Of course, they already have camera bases systems today, that photograph your license plate. And if the preponderance of technological competition in the radar-detector-detector-adnasuam world is any indication, there would soon enough be a market for phones that subtly altered the phase or seeming doppler profile of their signals to fool a single tower. Of course, if you show up at another tower 200Km away in 35 minutes, that would still be a little suspicious. ;)
---
the pen is mightier than the sword, the sword is mightier than the court, the court is mightier than the pen.
After all, nobody is going to believe that speeding information won't be passed to the police, despite any laws currently in place, therefore, they may well switch off their bloody phones rather than weave randomly across lanes of traffic when making or answering a call the way they do at the moment.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
The trouble with relying on laws to prevent government abuse, is that it's the government which has the power to change those laws. Give them the technical capability to violate your privacy, and sooner or later they will do so, possibly in ways not to your liking...eg., the Japanese Americans who trusted the legal safeguards on census data, then got rounded up during WWII.
There shouldn't be any problems as long as the system remains anonymous - hell, they may even be able to inform the police which areas and times have the highest incidence of speeding to improve their ability to ticket people - nothing a radar gun sitting on the side of the road can't do...
At any rate, I would keep an eye on the anonymity of the whole thing - I wouldn't want a ticket showing up form my highway driving.
That what was all this school was for... to teach us how to solve our own problems. -- janeowit
The DC area traffic authorities started playing with this some time ago.
One reference
This is yet another part of the system being built up around civilian populations in the West. Perhaps you haven't noticed, but lately (as in the last 5-10 years) new technologies have emergies which on their own might not seem to affect your privacy much. Things like credit cards, email, telephone banking, THE INTERNET, satellites, and more are all capable of spying on you. Sorry for sounding like such a paranoid person, but if all these devices were coordinated we could all be watched. The Big Brother is out there, and this is just another step in the wrong direction...Does anyone actually believe that this sort of information isn't being used (or can easily be used) against you?
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This is all very interesting, but as stated before, there is a privacy risk involved with this. Not only can you actually track where a user goes, you can also track who he is with.
Another point is, who knows how many cell phones are in 1 car ? If you have several cars with 4 people in it, all having there cell phone turned on, then it might look like a traffic jam, or at least very condensed traffic, but it might not be the case.
Or the opposite. If they take an average of 2 phones per car, and it's work time and there are like only people with 1 person in the car, it might look like fluid traffic where there is a jam.
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Give me freedom or give me death!
Live free or die!
Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety^H^H^H^H^H comfort, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety^H^H^H^H comfort.
Or did I fall for a troll?
You can't get traced if you use cash - as in bills and coins - however, you can get traced, and quite easily, if you use a credit card. There's a big difference. And I think this _is_ worrying, "even if you don't have anything to hide".
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This is not a dupe (hey, not yet ;) but a similar story was reported a while back. Here is the magic link.
The linked BBC article on the story is in English too.
What happens when everyone starts getting to work? Most buildings are within a few dozen feet of a road... will they be able to tell a building full of cellphones from a road full of cellphones?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
I hear they are very warm and cosy at this time of year. Everything will be lovely and soft, no need to make any decisions or take responsibility for anything ever again.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
They measure how long it takes for a random cell phone to get from point A to point B. So they don't actually measure the cell phone density, but what's the average speed of "cell phone mass". When traffic increases close to jam levels, speeds go down..
Presumably they're looking as much at the speed of the passers-by than at the density; four cellphones zipping past at 120 km/h certainly looks a lot different than four cellphones sitting still or crawling by along with 10,000 others. Four cellphones sitting still while 10,000 other zip by at 120 km/h also isn't going to look like a jam.
I imagine they've refined this technique a little bit so that it won't be confused by a few people stopped or going slower than average, etc. I remember a number of companies doing this, so I'm sure there's commercial software out there that's already been tested.
Any way you cut it, a traffic jam's going to look a lot different from a normal, free roadway. I don't imagine that it's terribly difficult to build a system that can differentiate between the two, although it's possible that there will be some unique situations in which confusion is possible.
It's funny you mention that, considering the huge amount of corporate crimes going on; Enron, WorldCom, Adelphia, etc... So I guess your answer is 'Yes'.
You know what would be funny in that case ?
... ... That's about 10 just standing there ... That will influence the data ... :p
2 cars collide, but are able to get to the side (Let's say 6 cell phones with speed 0)
Then cops come (2 with speed 0), towing trucks (2 also)
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Will they be able to distinguish from cell phones in cars, multiple cell phones in cars, and cell phones not in cars? I wouldn't want the news to report that often the largest traffic jams occur in hotels and office buildings. However, my guess is that they'll see how fast the cell phone was ever moving, to see if it is inside a car or not.
exactly how is cash more traceable than bartering? you'd think if i used cattle from my farm rather than cash, there'd be more dna evidence in my barn linking that cow back to me than there is on that 5 dollar bill. what's your reasoning?
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Cash is easily traceable. That little metal strip in US Currency is not an anti-counterfit device, it's a homing beacon. Each bill has its own signature, picked up any time you walk through a metal detector.
"Well how can they know which bill I have?" you ask? That's not a newspaper salesman in the airport, that's a g-man waiting to give you your change. Once you're marked, the bill sends an electromagnetic signal which switches on all the other money in your wallet so they can use that to track you as well. Or that guy that bumped into you in the alley, He was a carrier, sent to activate your money. They just have to get close to you and they can tag you for surveillance.
NEVER buy anything at the airport! And if you're going anyplace public where they can get near you, keep your money wrapped up in tinfoil, and separate each bill with newsprint. This will block the g-men's activation signal, plus give the added benefit of always having crisp, clean cash.
You think that I'm crazy, you should see this guy!
I wonder what the system says when every driver throws out the mobile on a specified route at mainly the same time....
Error: Route A34 slashdotted, traffic stopped completely
Here's my problem with this:
They say they'll use the info anonymously and not share it right?
Nothing actually holds them to their word on this. They can say they'll use the info anonmyously, and then change their mind later. Nothing's stopping them, or at least nothing stops gov't officials in the US from doing things like this. "No new taxes" anyone?
I would accept a system like this, if there was actually an assurance that they would hold to their word, say fines and jail time for anyone who shares the confidential info and maybe a contract where they have to trash the whole system if X amount of data gets comprimised.
And of course they would have to be audited, by auditors whose only business is auditing.
Life is too short to proofread.
This use of our cell phones might lead to some serious privacy issues. I dont know if you watched Minority Report. But one interesting aspect of the future in that movie was how pervasive the SYSTEM monitored you (using an iris scan to identify you). Using your cell phone to monitor traffic might seem like a small thing, but it might lead to some serious deteoration of your privacy. Say we have some serious criminal act, and we want to know who might have been near the area, these people could be suspects or witnesses. We could just check who had their cell phones on in the area. This might not seem bad, unless your labeled a "person of interest". I doubt youd like to be under that much scrutiny (sp?)
anyways, just a thought
epicstruggle
"Im drowning here, and you're describing the water!"
Honest officer.. I wasnt talking and driving at the same time.
I was detecting traffic jams.. Just doing my bit!
-- If at first you don't succeed, lie!
Any sensible driver turns off his cell phone whilst driving.
David Duncan Ross Palmer, author of OverChat
Check out the date: 18.6.2002.
The press release talks about monitoring traffic jams on highways. Thus several phones in single car won't make a difference, since dozens of cars will pass checkpoints every minute.
Privacy isn't an issue here. Finland has very strict privacy laws and this system is designed with privacy in mind: System assing different (changing) codes to the each cell phone and it only tracks when code X pass through the checkpoints.
It is also illegal for operators to give information about calls to the police, unless owner is suspected of very severe crime.
MTV3 is (one of) Finnish commercial television stations. M comes from "mainos" (=commercial) and when commercial television was separated from the two national channels it was given the channel number three. Hence, MTV3 - Commercial TeleVision channel 3.
If we only lived harmoneously with nature, things like traffic jams would be unheard of.
I wonder how much of my life I have wasted sitting in the car, surrounded by idiots.
--------
Free your mind.
I seriously doubt that the information is accurate enough to convict a driver of speeding. The poster wrote that the intended use is monitoring traffic jams - this means using statistical methods that average out errors. Saying that the traffic is flowing at X km (miles) per hour is very different from saying that cellphone C is moving at speed Y.
As to privacy, the location of each cellphone is already available to law enforcement (even if powered off), so there's no real difference. If you really want to drive to your lover for an afternoon, be sure to remove the battery from your cellular...
Ubi dubium ibi libertas: Where there is doubt, there is freedom.
If some one is a speed freak, then unplug the damn battery. to get an accurate measurement of traffic, you would have to actively monitor multiple signals and average it out. Plus, giving some one a ticket based on their cell phone wouldn't stand up in court. The prescence of the phone does not constitute the owner is speeding.
Do excuse any typos / grammatical errors, I'm at work and supposed to do something meaningful instead, so no time to proof read now. :P
Tiehallinto (= FRA) has succesfully experimented the collection of traffic jam data via mobile phones in co-operation with Radiolinja. In the experiment, average travel durations are collected regularly to Tiehallinto's traffic central. Information about the duration of the traffic is relayed to the motorists via radio and other media. Information is collected from the mobile phones on the road, but the phone owner isn't identified, so there isn't any privacy issue.
In the future, motorists can get even more trustworthy and broader traffic jam information and predictions. You can plan your trips outside the worst traffic jams or to an alternative route. And you can at least predict when you'll be at your summer cottage to heat up the sauna or back at work.
The experiment started in Easter and ended in Midsummer, and it measured cars' travel times in Kehä 1 (a ring road around Helsinki) and on highway 4 between Lahti and Heinola. Already the experiment has proved its strength when compared to camera systems and road sensors. The traffic jam data is reliable information to relay for drivers. VTT evaluates the results of the experiment and checks for possible needs to improve the system for larger main roads.
In the data Radiolinja produces, there's no mention of who owns the located phones, because mobile phones are monitored with changing codes in a completely anonymous way at only certain points. The system follows when a code passes point A and when it will pass point B", product development manager Veli-Matti Kiviranta from Radiolinja's Telematiikka-liiketoimintayksikkö says. After calculating the travel time, the code is erased as useless. The system has also been evaluated by the road- and communications department's Personal Navigation Software's security experts.
In the system, all currently used GSM-phones can be measured, and phones or networks won't need any changes. It's enough that phones have their power on. Weather conditions don't affect the reliability of the measurement.
"Now the travel time measurement system offers a very promising alternative to follow traffic in [Finnish] roads on a wider scale," says traffic service lead Jorma Helin from Tiehallinto. The system is scalable without expemsive investments in the roads and is also more reliable than current systems. The product might have demand in countries which are regularly affected by traffic jams.
There is little hope of changing speed limits
Uh... riiiight. Which is why, I suppose, the speed limits haven't changed in the last decade in the US.
Oh wait. They have. The National Highway System Designation Act of 1995 repealed the 55 mph limit in all areas (a 1987 act allowed speed limits to increase to 65 in rural areas on interstates). The limits are now set by the states. In Montana, for instance, there is no enforced speed limit during daylight hours on much of the highways.
Bah! Or am I just bitter?!
Both bitter and clueless. But I guess that's why you're an AC.
I was encouraged in high school to use calculators since my H.S. was trying to go "high tech". In fact, we were REQUIRED to use them on tests .... if you didn't, you were going to fail due to a lack of time to complete the exam.
...
... English was another issue ... and why I didn't get into a good school), so this is a good example in my opinion.
... and I finished WAY before the other students in the course. HOWEVER, when I got my exam back, I got a 54%!!! Every answer was correct, but in big, red letters at the top of the paper, the prof wrote "This is what you get for looking at your calculator so much!" ... then he wrote "I need to see a few more steps and where you got some of these answers".
:)
... kids today need to learn to think for themselves BEFORE they begin to use technology as a crutch ....
.... but at the same time, we live in a technology laced society ... so which is more evil ... to force kids to learn, but not teach them technology, or to teach then technology, but make them helpless without it ....
....
... can't live with it, can't live without it ...
...
Then I got to college
Now keep in mind, I was a pretty good math student (scored perfect on the SATs in Math
I took my first college Calc II exam, and of course, used my calculator for it. In all fairness, it was a difficult exam, but a fair exam. I thought I would be "joe slick" and finish quickly by using the latest and greatest graphing calc. available
Needless to say, that was the last time I used that calculator for anything but to check answers (or to get answers and reverse engineer them)
My prof was right though
It is an evil world we live in
It looks like technology is like women
Just my 2 cents
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Did anyone else reading the title of the story post immediately think of the finliaths in Dark Age of Camelot, and was confused?
If you take a defeatist attitude to a task, there will never be much hope in completing it. It's like giving up the race before you come out of the gate.
;)
Let my throw a little example in here. My grilf's daughter is a short-track speed skater (olympic class), so I actually kind of pay attention to speed skating in the olympics. Some of you may recall that the Australian men actually won a speed skating event in the winter olympics. Now, since my grilf is Australian, I know well of the shitty state of Australian speed skating. In general, the country has as much hope of winning in this event at the olympics as you do of not seeing an "in soviet russia" post when you browse at -1.
However, by various luck and effort, in one of the races, someone from the Australian team actually.. well.. won. A lot of it had to do with the bad luck of other competitors, but still, he wouldn't have won if he hadn't actually been trying the whole way through. It is totally reasonable for these skaters to believe they have no real shot at winning, but they don't give up before the race anyways.
If you're going to give up before you start, I hope you simply keep away from the voting/legislation system. People with defeatist/it-doesn't-matter-anyways attitudes should not vote "just because." Like I said in another post, I am glad the US does not legally require voting. It lets only the people interested enough to vote control the system. This is as it should be. If you aren't interested enough in change to commit to it, then stay the hell away from the system. Please.
Now that I'm done being tangential, I can go to bed.
you can take the road that takes you to the stars...
Right you are - the speed limit is 75 for cars on interstates in non-urban areas during daylight.
And it looks like it may have been federal funding that did it, although I'm not bothering to look into it in depth. One site claims that it was actually safer during the no limit time than it was after limits were imposed. Dunno.
US Wireless has been experimenting with this for a while now, helped out by a few Universities:
r 47 .htm
http://www.uswcorp.com/USWCMainPages/PressRel/p
but is disagree with the privacy issue, lets say that they can clock your phone and pass teh info along to the cops, but if you have a prepaid account, how do they know it's yours?
Sometimes I wish I was a plumber, then I'd know how to deal with other people's shit.
So, it is not, at least yet, possible to fine people carrying mobile phones in their cars too fast on public roads (exceeding the speed limit of the road)
Never will be - just switch your phone off if you intend to go above the posted speed limit. It's dangerous to use your mobile while driving anyway. (Much more dangerous than it is to go 20mph above the speed limit on a clear motorway at 1am).
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What? A Car?
They drive there? I thought they just ran Lapps.
Sorry for the joke, but I swear I am finnished...
Well I was lying but now I am definitely am...
--Joey
will be used to calculate how many assholes are in a movie theatre at any given time.
However, in New Jersey (and possibly other states?), if you own a vehicle seen passing a stopped school bus, the bus driver can write down your license plate. The police then will send a ticket via mail to the owner of the vehicle.
In order to avoid prosecution (and a lot of points on your license), you must show that you were not the one driving. They then go ticket that person.
There was also a case in New York where a car was seized and sold off by New York City due to someone other than the owner driving it drunk. The owner of the car appealed, since she was not expecting the driver to be where he was, or him driving drunk at all (he had no history of alchol abuse). She still lost the court case, as well as the car.
Several states are considering and/or implementing similar laws.
There is a conceptually similar system in use today in Atlanta. The system consists of a number of RF readers stationed around the city. These readers are compatible with the Georgia 400 Tollway's "Cruise Card" transponders, used for electronic toll collection. The system reads the transponders in vehicles and uses the data to determine overall traffic speed. Obviously, not everyone in the city has these transponders, but enough vehicles carry them to generate plenty of useful data.
I believe Houston has a similar system in place, since the Sam Houston Tollway uses the same equipment.
People will predictably shout about privacy issues, but it is illegal for this information to be used to enforce speed limits, and the information is not permanently recorded anywhere.
You can read a bit more about this setup at the transponder manufacturer's site among other places.
However, in New Jersey (and possibly other states?), if you own a vehicle seen passing a stopped school bus, the bus driver can write down your license plate. The police then will send a ticket via mail to the owner of the vehicle.
There is a big difference between loaning some your cell phone and loaning someone your car.
Finally they have figured out a way to prevent the driver (if he is alone) from using a cellphone while driving.
As Click and Clack say, "Drive now, talk later."
My mom doesn't understand this. She almost backed into a non-moving car last week.
Perhaps having one's speed measured while their cell phone is on will compell them to shut that damn thing off while they are driving.
If you're afraid of Big Brother or whatever, they
monitor phone calls anyway, not sure about the Netherlands though.
Finns are quite precise about their privacy issues. Finnish media reacts very aggressievly to any insult of privacy, was it about snail-mail, telecommonucation or e-mail. A firm can ruin its reputation very badly, if someone finds out any interfering of privacy.
For example there is one major legal case underway, where Finland's biggest telecommunication company's head was arrested, including the former president of the company. The case is about tracing mobile phones to reveal people who are leaking sensitive information about the company to media.
So in the first place the article attached to this story trys to settle the concerned citizen by proving that the system is truly anonymous (temporary, non-personal and untraceable keys for following all those faceless mobile phones) and the police authorities have no access to it. I see no reason to doubt their honesty because the Road Administraion (which will use the system) is governmental bureau and lying might lead to yet-another privacy scandal in Finland.
Incorrect. Common man thinks to himself this, however, and by doing so gives up. They don't vote. When enough common men think this way, enough common men don't vote.
Think about this: if everyone who didn't vote (40%, was it?) in the last presidential election had voted for Ralph Nader, he would be president now. Think about it.
Marxist evolution is just N generations away!
Even if it was accurate, how do they prove you were the one driving? What if you were the passenger? What if you were riding the bus, taxi, etc etc....
Maybe people in Finland should play Hot-Potato with their phones to pass time in the traffic jam. That would really screw with those boys trying to understand the traffic patterns!
It would probably be reported as a 30,000 car pile up.
Using a cellphone without hands-free equipment in a car is illegal in Finland nowadays (1.1.2003->).
"The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly." --Abraham Lincoln
You can't measure speed of GSM-phone accurately enough to convict people of speeding.
Depends how fast you're going and how far you're tracked while going that speed.
>I can see the day where an automated system can automatically flag and/or ticket you for exceeding the speed limit
How will they prove that you were the driver and not a passenger?
How will they prove that you were in the possession of the cell phone at the time?
"I lent the phone to my son who does not drive, so he must have hitched a ride with one of the neighbours"
Cash is easily traceable. That little metal strip in US Currency is not an anti-counterfit device, it's a homing beacon. Each bill has its own signature, picked up any time you walk through a metal detector.
If you find yourself living alone in a remote cabin, growing a ratty beard, and devising ways to blow up University officials: seek help immediately.
Homing beacon? LOL. Yer killing me!
Serial numbers are used to track cash. Hence the term "unmarked" that actors use to describe ransom payments.
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