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Google Deducing Wireless Location Data
bizwriter writes "When it comes to knowing where wireless users are, the carriers have had a lock on the data. But a patent application shows that Google is trying to deduce the information based on packet headers and estimated transmission rates. This would let it walk right around carriers and become another source of location data to advertisers."
You gotta admire Google. They are so endlessly, avidly proliferating themselves. If they ever turn evil we could be in a lot of trouble.
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
What's stopping carriers from deliberately slowing transmission rates for random customers during random intervals? Just enough such that Google's data is inaccurate.
Aside from 'google' 'mobile' 'patents' 'privacy' 'cellphones' and 'story' ... there should *always* be a 'not surprised' and 'obvious'. Google is king of data pillaging and border-line inter-personal information mining. This may fail or it could be highly successful for Google; regardless of the outcome, they've got their hands in just about anything as it pertains to identity on the internet now. This shouldn't be any more surprising; and it sounds pretty cool.
If the carriers are "jealously guarding" their location data, how come every time I pull up Google Maps on my non-GPS BlackBerry it can figure out where I am to within a block or so? Either this patent is for a technology Google had figured out a long time ago, or else the carriers aren't as worried about having "a lock" on this data as TFA makes it sound.
Breakfast served all day!
O'RLY?
Either this patent is for a technology Google had figured out a long time ago
Ding ding ding. Google's been using the technology for a while; they just filed for the application.
You don't have to file for a patent the second you invent something. In fact, you usually want to wait as long as possible before the final steps. You get your foot in the door by filing some paperwork with the patent attorney, notarizing documents showing the invention, etc. etc.
Please help metamoderate.
Now we know the real reason for the suggestion Google has made recently to change the way DNS works to report part of the requesting IP address. They don't give one whit about decreasing unnecessary traffic. They just want to use that for additional location data.
All the better to sell you a soda, pizza, shoes, movie, games ect. as walking down the street.
Also good for the feds to allow 'market forces' to track you.
Opt in for local deals direct to your phone.
No opt out if your of interest for the DHS.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Why would they need DNS modified for that? For users connecting to a Google service, which is what would be needed to measure the kind of stuff this patent talks about, they already have the IP address, because the user, well, connected to them.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Modifying DNS in the way they are requesting could be used - along with the technologies mentioned in this article - to determine or narrow down location information even on connections that aren't going to Google's servers. Thus allowing Google to track location information on everyone in the world all the time. That would be very valuable information to Google even if it were not as accurate as GPS, or as specific as a whole IP address, and even if it were in aggregate form.
The more information they can glom together the better for them and potentially worse for us in the long run. Especially when they redefine "evil" to mean "anything that doesn't help us make money."
Rather, they own a majority of the voting interest between founders & CEO. The initial prospectus made it clear that they would control the company, based on the share structure, and that public shareholders would simply be along for the ride.
Besides which, look at Shlensky v. Wrigley for how shareholders typically can't dictate management decisions beyond hiring and firing management:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=safari&rls=en&q=shlensky+v.+wrigley&aq=0&aqi=g2&oq=shlensky+v
Nah, they're a search engine looking for data to index.
Nah, they're a market analytics company looking for more markets to analyze. I'm amazed that so few have figured out yet that Google's innovation was not search engines but the business model that actually turned their user base back into a crop to be harvested, like the mass marketing execs have been wishing for ever since the boom times of print and TV were not accelerating anymore.
This is probably why my google calender app on my iphone switches to French when I am using it on my home network. I live in Sweden but somehow my ISP has been designated as French and I get a lot of French ads when browsing from home.
Its weird and somewhat annoying but I am getting a chance to brush up my French.
This is my sig, show me yours
If they have the time of the DNS request and then the time of the HTTP request the interval is an extra measurement they can use.
To be fair on Google, this story could actually just be sensationalist crap.
On Android phones for example, applications that use location data can either use GPS if available, or use your rough network location based on the cell tower you're communicating with- but obviously that's very rough.
This patent sounds like they're just trying to improve the usefulness of location data to make location based apps more useful when you don't have a GPS signal, have GPS disabled on low battery, or just don't have GPS in your phone.
This is one of those cases where the sensationalism is likely just paranoid stupidity, because the solution to avoid it would simply be to not use location based apps, or if you do, tick the box that stops the app sending your location data to Google. It just seems to be a better way of doing something that's already done and where the privacy argument has already been had and the safeguards have already been put in place.
I have an older CDMA handset that can be put into test mode by entering **DEBUG and Send, which then displays (among many other things) the nearest cellsite's Latitude and Longitude. It's not the exact handset location, location, but it is useful data. Google's HTC handset is GSM, not CDMA. Do GSM cellsites broadcast their location?
This is another example of why patents are bad.
A a technical person - saying "Hey, if we have some devices communicating wirelessly, and we know about the protocols they are using to communicate, we can deduce a bunch of information about their approximate location just by watching how long it takes them to have certain conversations from different points of view.
Why should that be patentable? It is clever, but it's also somewhat obvious.
I was wondering why Google didn't scan for wifi access points when they did their streetview; this would have seeded their location database. After that, all the people running google maps on various smartphones with GPS capability would allow them to keep it up to date or cover areas street view mapping didn't cover.
Or maybe they did and sold the data to skyhook instead ;-)
mod him -5: bullshit.
Google already has the user's IP address.
The fiction that a corporation is a person - combined with the legal precedent that says that the executives can be sued if they do something that reduces profits - makes for some pretty well defined behavior by the corporation. It is solely concerned with maximizing its own revenue and any other concern is incidental or done to "look good". If the corporation were a real person and was evaluated by a psychologist it would be likely be diagnosed as a psychopath (sociopath).
Consider this when you parrot the "Do No Evil" marketing slogan; Google is a corporation and isn't capable of making the distinction between good and evil. At least not by the same standards we common folk do. Don't be surprised when they violate your personal privacy in every possible way so that they can increase their profits - and never forget that for the corporation, the need to increase profits is paramount. Any other consideration takes a distant second place. Even for Google.
GPS in our cell phones. Location-aware OSes. Now Google has figured out how to identify where packets came from.
Google turning evil nothing. Imagine what the government could do with this.
Only the dead have seen the end of War. - Plato
Did you read my other comments in response to this point?