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Legoland Introduces Wi-Fi Tracking for Kids
mindless4210 writes "Lego announced today the successful deployment of a full-scale child-tracking system within Legoland Billund in Europe. The tracking system, deployed by Bluesoft, Inc and KidSpotter, allows park visitors keep track of their children using one of the world's largest Wi-Fi tracking networks. The children must wear a wrist band with a Wi-Fi tag on it, and if they become separated, parents simply send a text message from their mobile phone, and receive an automated response giving them the accurate location of their child."
The AeroScout Location System can locate the tags which I believe is in use with Lego's Kidspotter Wi-Fi tracking watch. The tag itself seems to be very small. Privacy concerns, anybody?
That'll come next :)
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
No, I didn't RTFA.
I hope these things have some sort of security mechanism. You wouldn't want just anything being able to instantly locate your kids would you?
Given the history of these types of deployments it wouldn't surprise me if there were more than a few holes in any security (if any) they have.
A leash.
Oh great. We're now giving kids IP addresses so their parents can ping them. What it going on now?
Excuse me while I compile IPv6 on my systems. We need it now.
--
# Canmephians for a better Linux Kernel
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.net";
Wow, this sound like a great idea. The peace of mind for parents is great. Not to mention not having to use one of those horrible Child Leashes that make it look like you are taking your child for a walk.
"I can not bring myself to believe that if knowledge presents danger, the solution is ignorance" - Isaac Asimov
[this is reasonably political - feel free to ignore]
Whereas this is bound to be a 'good thing' (the cry 'child in trouble' is just about the most instinct-driven response any adult has), the signature is somethinng to be wary of.
Consider that analysis of people-in-crowds is pretty easy these days. Consider that tracking (after positive analysis) is again reasonably simple (I was doing it 15 years ago - the key is to track in feature-space (region features: circularity, RGB, connectivity, 1st- and 2nd-order parameters) rather than just using image intensity. Using relations between features gives you context and thus more contextual information).
Consider that if you can track individuals within crowds, and given a covert surveillance system (eg: London, UK) you can track indivduals from locality to locality. You can start to (automatically) build circles-of-trust where individuals who meet regularly are automatically associated.
Consider that biometric information is now being put forward (eg: fingerprints, DNA samples, Iris scans, head ratios (eye:nose:chin parameters) and other observable information) and encoded within a compulsory identity card
Consider the amalgamation of this automatic identification, automatic relation of associates, and automatic recognition of individuals. Consider the implications. And yet a "Labour" government (the "People's" party!) is putting this forward in the UK.
I am fortunate. I am planning to emigrate this year to the US from the UK - previously I thought the UK (despite the lack of consitution) had a reality more responsive to the people and their ideals than the US. No more. I am one of the lucky ones that Joseph "Blunkett" Stalin will have no hold over. I feel deeply for my erstwhile compatriots. Freedom, after all, is a state of mind, and mind control is a tool of (this UK) government.
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
Well, it's about time for kids to start wearing tinfoil hats.
The IT section color scheme sucks.
Johnny's location is: Wedged in the swing.
Its a nice step up from the Leash that some mothers seem to employ upon thier crying 5 year olds.
I wonder how they'll get a wifi tracker out of a kids stomach?
Thats where some of my sisters lego ended up.
But it kept breaking every time I moved.
The key difference between a Programmer and a Senior Programmer is that one of them is Mexican.
It shouldn't just give the location of the child. For a lot of people, that's totally useless. Most people couldn't tell you the difference between latitude/longitude and UTM coordinates. Instead, it should guide them to their child... let the parents page through instructions. Not only would this be more useful for them, they could get charged by the page, so our corporate overlords should be pleased as well (afterall, reuniting a parent and child isn't satisfying enough).
Secondly, what ever happened to Darwinism? The lost children should starve and/or form their own feral societies. Only the best would survive to re-enter society, hopefully as very productive, since they'll have lots of useful skills.
Lastly, where the hell are all the wolves? Aren't they supposed to take care of the lost children?
First post? I doubt it...
Down with Saudi Arabia!!!
"Asset Management" at its best :)
...you get to put it together first!
Show me on the doll where his noodly appendage touched you.
Michael Jackson
Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen has already installed that a month ago, and before them another park in Jutland - so they are a bit late :)
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
We plop kids in front of TVs and now we let them run around amusement parks alone? Yes, I understand that this is probably intended for kids who get away from their parents, but you know some parent is going to sit somewhere with a laptop tracking their kid and not actually keeping an eye on them. I'm horrified.
~~Guildencrantz
Penguin Trivia #46: Animals who are not penguins can only wish they were. -- Chicago Reader 10/15/82
I'm normally opposed to this sort of thing, but in a place like a theme park this sounds great. Assuming that the tag could be hired from the theme park, you need only use it while you are there.
When you are in a place which the parent or the kid knows reasonably well, you can easily arrange a good meeting place if you get seperated, and the kid has a reasonable chance of finding it. OTOH, most people only go to a theme park occasionally: even if you do decide on a meeting place, you could easily get lost en route to it.
It could also help if the child is with the other (custodial) parent: the first parent can quickly check whether other parent is still queueing for a ride, or has gone onto designated meeting spot. Dh and I have tried using mobiles, but as dh's mobile is his work phone he is too likely to get work related calls for it to be particularly useful on his day off.
Does this mean we can ping our kids now?
Thus this is a nice way to get parents to consent to having their motions tracked as they move throughout Legoland, under the guise of helping "the children."
Imagine it... If you had a giant database of people's movements as they go through the park, you can more strategically position the food vending carts, move the rides and displays around in order to maximize the "candy aisle effect," etc.
for kids!
I take it you haven't been in a place like that with 4 kids.
Gutless AC.
I hope his pants get caught and a bloodbath ensues.
What is with you today ?
I don't wish the kid harm, but his mother should suffer that horrific ordeal...
So she'll learn how to manage her child !
Sort of a harsh lesson.
Man, there's not a year goes by...
That I don't read about some escalator accident involving some bastard kid...
That could've been easily avoided had some parent-- I don't care which one--
But some parent conditioned him to fear and respect that escalator !
Though these WiFi Trackers do sound like a good idea, maybe if the parents kept a good eye on their children, the need for these trackers could be avoided.
Which may be precisely the problem. "Peace of mind" causing parents to be inattentive, incautious, and careless. And when the systems goes down, as it inevitably will? Will there be civil liability, or will the parents have to sign a waiver of liability when they rent the wrist band for their child?
When the system goes down, will a child be lost, kidnapped, hurt, etc. that otherwise would not have been because his parents relied on the system instead of knowing that they, and only they were responsible for keeping track of their child?
Perhaps the analogy is a bad one, but this reminds me a bit of the problem national parks are having with people who *rely* on GPS and/or their cell phones to keep them out of trouble. No wilderness or outdoor skills, no ability to use a compass or read a map, and half of the time no jacket. But they figure as long as they have their cell phones, they'll be ok. And when they can't get reception, the battery goes dead, or they drop it.....
Only Women Bleed (Sex, Sharia remix)
>"...giving them the accurate location of their child."
Actually, it will give them the location of the wristband.
The biggest problem I see is that this service is subject to a perfectly legal denial of service if anybody were to flood the place with any other WiFi signal...
That's the advantage that licensed frequencies have, they'd could be jammed, but then the jammer would be transmitting without a license and in trouble. Here the DOS wouldn't quite be covered by that.
I'd gnaw off the wrist band and flush it down the toilet. The ensuing search in the sewer system by rescue teams should prove amusing...
"There is no spoon." - The Matrix
I worked for Openwave, you know, the Software.com and Phone.com merger baby...
We worked with MMO2 in Britan, and they had a nicname for Fridays...SMS Fridays...
They would send SMS (Text) messages during the week, and the lost ones (which there were a lot of) would get delivered on Friday, when they system went through housecleaning.
So, send a text message looking for you kid at the park and MAYBE you will find out the location by Friday.
I wonder how hard the wristbands would be to remove?
What's to stop kids from switching their wristbands?
I can't imagine being unable to find my kid, tracking him down, and finding some other kid instead.
Unless little Wally realises they are lost and has been reduced to tears, knowing where they are this instant will be useful for only a few seconds. I'm sure the mobile phone company is gleefully aware of this.
Why not fit the rugrats with something like those electric dog collars? If their squeals exceed X decibels or they move more than Y metres from their parent, they receive a little reminder from the collar... >:-)
My first thought was, "What, a CF card on each kid with a little microcontroller where you have to cha[r|n]ge the batteries every day?"
Then I looked at the website for the tags - 5 years worth of service, regular MAC address, only transmits occasionally, never receives.
Way geeky, I think. I'd like to know what kind of 802.11 packet they're transmitting!
Then I read the comments. Are all you guys privacy geeks, or what? What happened to all the "Cool technology! How'd they do that? etc" comments, consequences be darned (as in fixing holes in socks)
Ah well. So much for *real* geeks.
-Adam
... I was more concerned with acurately tracking all of my lego pieces!
My other sig is a Porsche!
Sorry. Lost track of time. I'll have her home by 8:00 PM.
OK, having actually taken a child (my nephew) back in 1999 to Legoland (California) I can comment on why I think this might be a good thing.
Legoland has a number of "playground romper room" style attractions, which are very much kid-sized for kids. While they centralize the exits so you can watch who's coming and going from them, I was constantly pacing along the edge of it, trying to keep him in sight as he climbed around in the tunnels and bridges and such (some of these things were very large) and watching the exits as well...
While I doubt something like this would have kept me from trying to eagle eye him all the time while he played in there, it would have helped MY peace of mind for the 5 minute periods where I wasn't sure exactly where he was...
As another example, but going back farther to when I was the little kid. Many years ago, I was at Six Flags Magic Mountain (I think, its hazy, it could have been Knotts) when some of my family wanted to ride a roller coaster that I could not (probably would not, being the wimp that I was) go on. So my aunt and I waited at the exit for my sister and the rest of my family to get off the ride. I was impatient, so I ran to the exit ahead of my aunt, where I got swept by a crowd of people coming off and got confused (hey, I was maybe 5) and ended up following a group into a gift shop across the way. Of course, both my aunt who had tried to keep up with me and my parents when they got off the ride got fairly frantic in searching for me, but they found me fairly quickly (not before I had gotten scared and bawling of course. I told you I was a wimp.)... Having something like the finder wristband would have been great for them.
Inevitably, if you have a kid, they are going to get lost at a department store, park, amusement park, etc, even if you are the most attentive of parents, unless you're all about the smothering. While I don't think its a good idea to use this stuff as a substitute for paying attention to your kids (and contrary to the likely childless respondants here, I don't think that really would be how they're used most often), I do think the option of having it is a good thing.
_nfotxn
Because if it does, they've got my money.
And if the kid walks outside the park boundary... kaboom! Right?
My other processor is big-endian.
5, Insightful?
What the fuck? How fucking stupid do you think we are??? Of course it gives the location of the wristband you dumbass.. and of course we know it could be taken off... but the chances of kids doing that is rather remote.
Jesus F. Christ, you "deep thinkers" here are really annoying because you think your deep, but your just dumb.
The Tag can be mounted in many different ways on a variety of assets, including the use of double-sided tape, screws and straps.
Tape??? Screws??? Straps???? My kid isn't getting with a hundred miles of these guys. Nobody screws a wifi tag to my kid!
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
In my experiences with backcountry search and rescue, the major cause of disaster is delilberate, repeated, acts of stupidity. It is almost never just one thing that leads to grief. Reliance on a battery opperated electronic gadget just adds one more thing to a long list.
Not to troll or anything, but what does it say when your child has been taken away from the complex? "Owned"?
Do we know if they will be using the tracking to evaluate park use? Compiling that information? I think we need to evaluate each new technology to see if the balance of our loss in privacy is outweighed by the benefit. In this case, I think as a parent of a child who may have wandered off before that I'd opt in, but
Years before I made my first tinfoil hat, someone showed me an article about a tracking device for pets.
It was placed under the skin and if the pet was ever lost it could be located. I was so naive, I never once thought anything like this would ever be used to find human beings.
So now here we are, just over a decade later and people think it's a good idea to track their kids using computers.
If your kids aren't big enough to understand the words "check in" and "meet up area" they shouldn't be away from you in the first place.
I'm certain that Lego will take security into strong consideration with this system. I am certain they will ensure that preditors of children will not be able to hijack the system and locate your kids as effectively as you can. Afterall, strong cryptographic authentication will be used and identifications will be universally unique, or some other such mechanisms will be in place... right?
Join Tor today!
for a kid to get freedom from his/her parents to go explore legoland by themselves. False or not, it gives the parents a sense of security that is likely to loosen their hold on the kid so they can really go have fun. I remember going to parks and lands like this but being unable to do what I really wanted to because of paranoid parents over my shoulder at every turn.
There are no real privacy issues here, except I suppose the old slippery slope argument that we are being slowly conditioned to accept radio tracking tags. As it stands though, this development seems pretty harmless.
... and I can see a high-tech ransom outfit using this data to know where one certain child would be for quicker in-and-out kidnapping. Or knowing when that child might have been separated from it's protecive older siblings.
Or how bout this: 5-year-old son of European royalty is playing at legoland, taken out by a sniper from a huge distance based on his location from an SMS query to their wristband system...
OK, I'm being dystopian, and hopefully the crypto on those wristbands is bulletproof, but if the potential is there it will be abused and to think otherwise is naive.
They will never stop until somebody makes the