stillgoogling writes to tell us the Associated Press is reporting that the Missouri Department of Transportation is stepping up a project to track the mass movements of cellular phones. This project is designed to use the movements of cell phones to map real-time traffic conditions statewide on more than 5,500 miles of road. From the article: "Officials say there's no Big Brother agenda in the Missouri project -- the data will remain anonymous, leaving no possibility to track specific people from their driveway to their destination."Ads_xl=0;Ads_yl=0;Ads_xp='';Ads_yp='';Ads_xp1='';Ads_yp1='';Ads_par='';Ads_cnturl='';Ads_prf='page=article';Ads_channels='RON_P6_IMU';Ads_wrd='communications,tech';Ads_kid=0;Ads_bid=0;Ads_sec=0; Tracking Cell Phones for Real-Time Traffic Data Log in/Create an Account | Top | 121 comments | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 121 comments 0: 116 comments 1: 99 comments 2: 73 comments 3: 25 comments 4: 13 comments 5: 7 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. Done by the french ... (Score:4, Informative) by dago (25724) on Sunday October 16, @06:35AM (#13802331) It seems that INRETS (= National Institute for Transport and Safety Research) teamed up with SFR (one of the mobile operators) to do just that.I can't find any direct link to the paper, altough somebody with an IEEE account could probably find some. It is also cited on University of Virginia Center for Transportation studies [virginia.edu].If somebody can link to more info ... [ Reply to This Here (Score:4, Informative) by Poromenos1 (830658) on Sunday October 16, @07:44AM (#13802506) (http://porocrom.poromenos.org/) Paper [tc.gc.ca] (pdf warning). [ Reply to This | Parent They're several years behind (Score:5, Interesting) by sopuli (459663) on Sunday October 16, @06:35AM (#13802332) This was done in Finland a long time ago. Even made it to slashdot [slashdot.org]. [ Reply to ThisRe:They're several years behind by mlush (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @07:54AMRe:They're several years behind by irishxpride (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:00AMThey are not so honest about their intentions by twitter (Score:3) Sunday October 16, @10:32AMRe:They are not so honest about their intentions by NixieBunny (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @12:05PMRe:They are not so honest about their intentions by NutscrapeSucks (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @01:52PMRe:They are not so honest about their intentions by jonfelder (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @04:27PMRe:They are not so honest about their intentions by NutscrapeSucks (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @05:05PMRe:They are not so honest about their intentions by jonfelder (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @04:55PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. 1984 (Score:3, Insightful) by kcyber (652633) on Sunday October 16, @06:40AM (#13802352) I don't think that the state will invest money only for traffic control purposes.Traffic was also the excuse for installing cameras on roads during the 2004 olympic games in Athens but were used to track people during demonstrations... [ Reply to ThisRe:1984 by KiloByte (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @06:54AMRe:1984 by wealthychef (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @12:37PM Re:1984 (Score:5, Interesting) by Dun Malg (230075) on Sunday October 16, @02:23PM (#13804488) (https://addons.mozil...&application=firefox) Anyone know what ever happened to the ECHELON project, which is a system intended to monitor literally every piece of human communication on the planet and mine it for analysis later? Paranoid nutcases with little knowledge of basic electronic intelligence strategy have flooded the internet with hysterical rants and lunatic ravings about ECHELON. It's almost always traceable to a specific error in reading comprehension, i.e. the failure to distinguish between "capable of monitoring any communication" and "capable of monitoring all communication". The former is true. The latter is not. There does not exist enough electronic analytical capacity to monitor all communications. Anyone who has worked in electronic intelligence knows that one of the primary focuses is tasking: knowing when and where to apply limited collection resources. 99.99% of the electronic communication in the world is inconsequential chatter, and is very easily identifiable as such. NEWS FLASH! The NSA knows your 90 year old grandmother's phone calls aren't worth listening to, so they don't! I speak from experience as a former Signal Intelligence Analyst with the US Army-- they spend most of their time trying to RDUCED the amount of stuff they have to analyze. Really, the theory of "ECHELON listens to everything, all the time" fails the common sense test on so many levels, it boggles the mind why anyone would take it seriously. So the computer flags (say) every utterance of the word "bomb" and "embassy" or some such, eh? Well THEN what? Who goes through the enormous daily log of such flagged conversations? The obvious answer is that they cut down the log by not bothering to monitor communications between irrelevant parties. The tin foil hat crowd thinks the government is listening to them, when the truth is the government doesn't give a shit about them because they don't matter. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:1984 by Dun Malg (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @08:12PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:1984 --- Then DO something about it. 2+2=4! by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @07:06AM Fixing traffic results in other benefits. (Score:5, Interesting) by oneiros27 (46144) on Sunday October 16, @07:07AM (#13802425) (http://www.annoying.org/) But you forget -- in some regions, traffic is a major issue. (eg, the Washington, DC metro area) -- if legislators can get get traffic issues cleaned up in an area that has major problems, it could mean an easy re-election for them.If they're actually thinking about the general population, and not themselves, they'd be looking at the other benefits that something like this could provide -- Cheaper ways to estimate traffic growth, and determine where to allocate money for capacity improvements. Faster detection of accidents, for improved emergency response. The ability for the population to better plan their routes to work, resulting in a happer, more productive workforce. The ability for trucking companies to better plan their routes, possibly making it more likely for them to route through the state (resulting in sales from diesel, food, lodging, etc) Yes, there are potentially less-than-ethical reasons for wanting a system like this, but there are pleny of reasons why something like this is a benefit for the general population -- now, is the money for this project worthwhile? For all we know, it's being done because one of the politicians is getting kickbacks, and they're spending too much, as compared to other, more worthwhile projects for their state (in terms of Benefit/Cost Ratio or some other measure used to determine project viability)(I didn't read the orginal article, so some of this may have already been covered. Of course, there wasn't a link to it, so everyone has an excuse this time. This might also show how much work some of the editors do to look at articles being linked to ... as opposed to looking for articles that are controversial and/or don't hold up, to result in 'animated discussion [slashdot.org]') [ Reply to This | ParentSystem in Minnesota by bb_referee (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @02:59PMmoney by bluGill (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:06PMRe:1984 by IO ERROR (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @10:30AM Text with FNORD-o-VISION (Score:3, Insightful) by Jace of Fuse! (72042) on Sunday October 16, @06:42AM (#13802356) (http://www.tagor.com/) "Officials say there's no Big Brother agenda in the Missouri project (outside of the obvious)-- the data will remain anonymous (Unless we want to watch a specific person), leaving no possibility to track specific people from their driveway to their destination (without a reason, though any reason at all will do)." [ Reply to ThisRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by James Crid (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @06:53AMRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by the eric conspiracy (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @09:34AM Re:Text with FNORD-o-VISION (Score:5, Informative) by keraneuology (760918) on Sunday October 16, @10:46AM (#13803211) (Last Journal: Thursday October 13, @11:31AM) It is the job of the secret service to investigate these threats against the president, and it has been doing this for a long time without any history of abuse of power. Acting on a tip from a Wal*Mart photo clerk, the Secret Service visited a high school and confiscated a posted depicting a student giving a "thumbs down" gesture to a photo of Bush. The last time I checked the confiscation of personal property required due process and expressing dissatisfaction of either government in general or even specific officials was explicitly allowed. I'd say this counts as a fairly obvious abuse of authority.Other sterling examples of abuse of power on the part of the secret service include:The arrest of husband and wife Nicole and Jeff Rank for wearing T-Shirts that read "love America, hate Bush" (who were otherwise not disruptive)The official policy of the Secret Service (since rescinded) of segregating and concealing protesters at public appearancesJanet Voorhies and two companions were denied entry to a Bush event on the grounds that they were wearing T-Shirts that read "Protect Our Civil Liberties"Perry Patterson was arrested for simply saying "no" when Cheney declared that Bush has made our world saferNo history of any abuse of power? According to official accounts the secret service has a 0% rate of abuses of power within their ranks. This is simply impossible: no agency can make the correct hiring calls 100% of the time and any claims to the contrary displays an abuse of power by covering up mistakes - at the expense of those who were violated.Having a perfect track record is impossible: having a very public record of swiftly correcting any problems isn't. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by the eric conspiracy (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:59AMRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by Insightfill (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @02:25PMRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by keraneuology (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @02:38PMRe:Text with FNORD-o-VISION by the eric conspiracy (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:36PM Old Tech (Score:5, Interesting) by JaredOfEuropa (526365) on Sunday October 16, @06:42AM (#13802358) (Last Journal: Saturday January 31, @06:25PM) Our company has been experimenting with this idea since a year or two, to measure the traffic on smaller "B" roads, that unlike highways do not have traffic measuring equiment built into the asphalt.Here is a short article [planet.nl] (In Dutch, use Babelfish), and the site with the traffic information [brabant.nl] (Type in the 6 digit number shown into the "log in" box). They obtain phone location data from one or more GSM providers. The data has been filtered so they only get generic location data; no phone numbers or other identifiers are provided. [ Reply to This Quantum theory of traffic management (Score:4, Interesting) by n0dalus (807994) on Sunday October 16, @06:56AM (#13802400) (Last Journal: Wednesday January 19, @09:07PM) I have a theory which states that traffic, when essentially quantized (grouped into bunches of vehicles moving between traffic lights), exhibits several quantum mechanisms.For example, whether or not a quantum of traffic (bunch of cars) reaches their intended destinations, the affects on the traffic of that area are the same as if they really did reach their intended destinations. This is essentially because people generally choose routes which they think will be the fastest or easiset, and people think "Oh it's Friday afternoon on the start of a long weekend, lots of people will be going out of the city for holidays down highway X, I'll go a different way." Hence whether or not a quantum of traffic is going somewhere, people avoid them just the same.This can be simulated by a computer in a combination with this kind of system, to very accurately time traffic light sequences so as to reduce the average waiting time per vehicle across a large area. In theory it is possible to quantize traffic (eg, stop/allow single cars until they end up in a bigger group) and time traffic lights so that almost no waiting at traffic lights is needed. As long as you travel within one of the quanta you would have green lights all the way. [ Reply to ThisRe:Quantum theory of traffic management by squarooticus (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:58AMRe:Quantum theory of traffic management by bmsleight (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @12:27PMRe:Quantum theory of traffic management by n0dalus (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:39AM2 replies beneath your current threshold. "data will remain anonymous".... BS (Score:3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 16, @06:57AM (#13802403) "Officials say there's no Big Brother agenda in the Missouri project -- the data will remain anonymous, leaving no possibility to track specific people from their driveway to their destination."Maybe for the trial run & to get approval it will remain anonymous - but just like the video cameras put up on american taxpayer paid roads and intersections "for traffic purposes", it won't take long before this technology, pitched as one thing, will be used for another.Coming from a friend in law enforcement - those video cameras are used for whatever they want. [ Reply to This Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... (Score:4, Insightful) by Ron Bennett (14590) on Sunday October 16, @06:59AM (#13802407) (http://www.wyomissing.com/bennett/) Simple solution is to power off the cell phone; some newer models are rumored to never truly power off - simple work-around if unsure / paranoid is to then place the phone into a shielded bag similar to what is provided to folks who use EZPass.Cell phone tracking is already so prevalent that use for traffic monitoring is merely another extension of the extensive data collection that's already being going on for quite some time from cell phone users, including actual data, such as text messages sent/received.On an aside, most folks have no real need to always have their cell phone on when driving - let the voice mail take calls and help keep the roads safer; due to lawsuits some companies forbid use of cell phones while driving, so why even leave the phone on...Ron Bennett [ Reply to ThisRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by drewxhawaii (Score:3) Sunday October 16, @07:44AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Cafe Alpha (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @07:56AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Karma_fucker_sucker (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:10AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by ben0207 (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @10:16AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Shafe (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @10:21AMAre prepaid phones anonymous? by drewxhawaii (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @02:09PMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by penix1 (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @10:29AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Joe Random (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @03:21PMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by xornor (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @06:19PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Re:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... (Score:4, Interesting) by Chocolate Teapot (639869) on Sunday October 16, @08:14AM (#13802590) (Last Journal: Thursday September 08, @09:55AM) Typical. Somebody announces a scheme which may, actually be of benefit to society and your immediate reaction is to suggest a means of ensuring it will fail. I understand that many people do not like the idea of their movements being tracked, but at some point you have to get over your paranoia and take initiatives like this at face value.Officials say there's no Big Brother agenda in the Missouri project -- the data will remain anonymous, leaving no possibility to track specific people from their driveway to their destination. Do you think that they may actually be telling the truth and could in fact be trying to make life better? Nah! Conspiracy theories are much more fun! [ Reply to This | ParentMy Bad .. replied to wrong post... by Chocolate Teapot (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @08:20AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by rhsanborn (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @08:49AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by rossdee (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @10:52AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by keraneuology (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:00AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Chocolate Teapot (Score:3) Sunday October 16, @11:53AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by Secret Agent X23 (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @03:11PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by jordie (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:23AMRe:Solution: Power Off Cell Phone for Privacy... by mobets (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @12:17PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold. give them an inch... (Score:1) by La Fourmi Nihiliste (906448) on Sunday October 16, @06:59AM (#13802410) ...and they'll want the whole mileage you make.whould any goverment official really SAY they are planning to spy on the poulation?? Does anyone remeber ANY government that announced such a spying plan BEFORE putting it in place??seriously, this is just the infrastructure necessary to actualy get to the big brother level. the people putting it in place won't be the ones who get to use it to spy: this is just unlocking the door... [ Reply to This As if by magic (Score:3, Informative) by James Crid (568495) <james@cridland.net> on Sunday October 16, @07:07AM (#13802424) (http://james.cridland.net/) a Wired article [wired.com] appears... [ Reply to This A link to the article? (Score:5, Informative) by oneiros27 (46144) on Sunday October 16, @07:15AM (#13802444) (http://www.annoying.org/) When an editor decides to rewrite the copy, it helps to make sure the meat is still there -- in this case, the actual link to the article.So that other people don't have to waste time like I did, here are a few assorted articles on the topic (some are marked as specifically from the AP): http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/08/tech/mai n927858.shtml [cbsnews.com] http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=1214 73 [go.com] http://www.suntimes.com/output/tech/cst-nws-traffi c16.html [suntimes.com] http://www.heraldnewsdaily.com/stories/news-008609 0.html [heraldnewsdaily.com] [ Reply to ThisRe:A link to the article? by James Crid (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @08:30AMRe:A link to the article? by njyoder (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @12:34PMRe:A link to the article? by kd5ujz (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @03:20PM I invented a new way to map traffic conditions.... (Score:4, Insightful) by Bob Cat - NYMPHS (313647) on Sunday October 16, @07:30AM (#13802479) (http://nymphs.org/) Just count the fucking CARS!!! [ Reply to ThisRe:I invented a new way to map traffic conditions. by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @08:09AMRe:I invented a new way to map traffic conditions. by Bob Cat - NYMPHS (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @08:50AMRe: Just count the fucking CARS!!! by CagedBear (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @09:13AM Airplane interference? (Score:3, Funny) by bhmit1 (2270) on Sunday October 16, @08:00AM (#13802541) (http://members.cox.net/bmitch3020) So what happens when someone forgets to turn off their phone on an airplane?"Wow, traffic is really flying on the I-95 corridor" [ Reply to ThisRe:Airplane interference? by Skater (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:44AM If I'm being chased by the cops... (Score:2, Funny) by yamum (893083) on Sunday October 16, @08:15AM (#13802591) and there's a fork in the road. If they see that 99% of people go left and 1% goes right then they'll know 99% chance I'll go left.So. Then I think they think I'll go left, so I'll go right.But they think that I think that they think I'll go left to go right so they go left.But I think they think that I think that they think .... I'm confused. [ Reply to ThisTie it to a dog... by Karma_fucker_sucker (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @09:15AMRe:If I'm being chased by the cops... by Thing 1 (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @03:25PMRe:If I'm being chased by the cops... by yamum (Score:1) Sunday October 16, @03:46PMObligitory Austin Powers Quote... by SonicSpike (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @04:43PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. data will remain anonymous (Score:1) by sl4shd0rk (755837) on Sunday October 16, @08:19AM (#13802612) ...Until further notice.Please check the 'I agree' box next to your signature to show you have read the contract agreement (which we know you didn't). [ Reply to This It's a good idea (Score:2) by confusion (14388) on Sunday October 16, @08:52AM (#13802712) (http://www.syslog.org/) It's got to be more cost effective than placing all of the speed sensors like they've done in Georgia ( available on www.georgia-navigator.com)Jerryhttp://www.cyvin.org/ [cyvin.org] [ Reply to ThisRe:It's a good idea by ptbarnett (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @11:55AM Patented Long Ago (Score:3, Informative) by junge_m (410514) on Sunday October 16, @09:05AM (#13802759) (http://www.drjunge.de/) This approach has been patented long ago. The latest US Patent on is 6,577,946 [uspto.gov] which has references to all the olds one covering basically the same stuff. [ Reply to This again, out of control. (Score:1) by CDPatten (907182) on Sunday October 16, @09:05AM (#13802760) Wow, could there be any larger in your face privacy violations then this? "Hey we are going to track all our citizens in real-time. Don't worry its only for traffic... until a divorce lawyer subpoenas the logs for his case" [ Reply to This Automobile registration (Score:5, Insightful) by ewg (158266) on Sunday October 16, @09:09AM (#13802768) The next invasion of privacy will be requiring every automobile to be registered with the government. Armed law enforcement agents will compel any vehicle not displaying its government id to stop.Oh, wait a minute... [ Reply to This Concept and reality are miles apart (Score:2, Informative) by Ian.Waring (591380) on Sunday October 16, @10:15AM (#13803026) (http://www.minsystems.co.uk/) Maybe it's different in the USA, but here cells are just too big to meaningfully equate cell transitions into traffic movements on physical roads.Motorola did a lot of work with UK company Trafficmaster on their Smartnav [smartnav.com] product, where most of the traffic data comes in realtime from roadside cameras and sensors on Motorway bridges covering 9,000 miles of UK roads. When you push the button on the unit, the mobile phone rings into a call centre with the current GPS position encoded in the Caller ID of the phone call (3 bytes), you tell them the destination, and they send the turn-by-turn instructions back into the unit. If a jam shows up on your route before you get to your destination, the central servers ring the units and offer (with an estimate of the delay if you do nothing), then download, a route around the jam (if indeed one is available). Works really well.Getting a GPS signal communicated back and forth in real time is the only way this hack will work - at least until the cell sizes get to 3G pico sizes.There have been experiments with floating vehicle sensors, but most companies that say they use these for real time data collection do so as a PR stunt - the number of vehicles that need to be equipped and the economics of getting the data back in real time don't make business sense today, from either an accuracy or cost standpoint. Most instead download history at the end of the day, and just pick up details of roadworks and accidents from "journalistic" sources - whether there's a jam present or not.Until we get GPS in most handsets (and if operators allow the caller IDs to be sent through with GPS data on board, but the call terminated at either end without any money changing hands), the use of mobile phones for spotting jams, or indeed navigating around them, will be very limited.Ian W. [ Reply to This Finally... (Score:1) by non0score (890022) on Sunday October 16, @10:19AM (#13803041) ...does Mapquest not have to hire two guys to drive around and map out the entire North American road system (just track all the cellphones and map out the roads from there...but beware of underground parking lots and off-road adventures)...okay, maybe they still need the two guys for the boonies. [ Reply to This GPS/phone renewal (Score:2) by prisoner (133137) on Sunday October 16, @10:19AM (#13803042) A customer of ours has an older cell phone. He likes it and deosn't see the need to upgrade. He's firmly in the "a phone is a phone" crowd. His contract came up for renewal this month and the sales rep told him that there were new Homeland security rules in place and, since his phone didn't have GPS, they could not renew his contract. Has anyone else heard of this? It sounds like bunk but.... [ Reply to ThisRe:GPS/phone renewal by David_W (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @08:40PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. This is nothing new (Score:1) by CharliePete (923290) on Sunday October 16, @10:27AM (#13803098) The simple fact is we gave up any right we had to privacy in this area when we caved in to the E911 movement. Big Brother already can, will, and does track our movements through our cell phones. I see no reason not to use the info that can already be used to an individual's detriment for the common good. The only real concern here is that this information will be more publicly available. Special care should be taken to insure that only enough information is collected to meet their advertised purpose. [ Reply to This Big Volunteers (Score:2) by Doc Ruby (173196) on Sunday October 16, @11:57AM (#13803588) (http://slashdot.org/~Doc%20Ruby/journal | Last Journal: Thursday March 31, @02:48PM) Making this system "opt-in", rather than universal (and usually undisclosed, especially to the unsophisticated mass of users), would go a long way to reassuring us that Big Brother's agenda isn't driving it. And publishing the source to the software that runs the dataprocessing will make sure that Big Brother isn't hiding in the details. Then an anonymous system that people join because they want to subscribe, so they publish, can be trusted - and popular. [ Reply to This Hasn't this been ruled illegal-USA v. Pen Register (Score:1) by schwit1 (797399) on Sunday October 16, @12:12PM (#13803671) http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/USA_v_PenRegister/ [eff.org] [ Reply to This Yeah they said the same thing about seat belts (Score:1)