A location-based service (LBS) is a general term denoting software services which use
geographic data and information
Geographic data and information is defined in the ISO/TC 211 series of standards as data and information having an implicit or explicit association with a location relative to Earth (a geographic location or geographic position).
It is also c ...
to provide services or information to users. LBS can be used in a variety of contexts, such as health, indoor
object search, entertainment, work, personal life, etc. Commonly used examples of location based services include navigation software,
social networking services
A social networking service or SNS (sometimes called a social networking site) is an online platform which people use to build social networks or social relationships with other people who share similar personal or career content, interests, act ...
,
location-based advertising, and
tracking systems. LBS can also include
mobile commerce when taking the form of coupons or advertising directed at customers based on their current location. LBS also includes personalized weather services and even location-based games.
LBS is critical to many businesses as well as government organizations to drive real insight from data tied to a specific location where activities take place. The spatial patterns that location-related data and services can provide is one of its most powerful and useful aspects where location is a common denominator in all of these activities and can be leveraged to better understand patterns and relationships. Banking, surveillance,
online commerce, and many weapon systems are dependent on LBS.
Access policies are controlled by
location
In geography, location or place are used to denote a region (point, line, or area) on Earth's surface or elsewhere. The term ''location'' generally implies a higher degree of certainty than ''place'', the latter often indicating an entity with an ...
data and/or time-of-day constraints, or a combination thereof. As such, an LBS is an information service and has a number of uses in
social networking today as information, in entertainment or security, which is accessible with
mobile device
A mobile device (or handheld computer) is a computer small enough to hold and operate in the hand. Mobile devices typically have a flat LCD or OLED screen, a touchscreen interface, and digital or physical buttons. They may also have a physical ...
s through the
mobile network
A cellular network or mobile network is a communication network where the link to and from end nodes is wireless. The network is distributed over land areas called "cells", each served by at least one fixed-location transceiver (typically th ...
and which uses information on the geographical position of the mobile device.
["Foundations of Location Based Services"](_blank)
Stefan Steiniger, Moritz Neun and Alistair Edwardes, University of Zurich
The University of Zürich (UZH, german: Universität Zürich) is a public research university located in the city of Zürich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 ...
This concept of location based systems is not compliant with the standardized concept of
real-time locating system
Real-time locating systems (RTLS), also known as real-time tracking systems, are used to automatically identify and track the location of objects or people in real time, usually within a building or other contained area. Wireless RTLS tags are ...
s (RTLS) and related local services, as noted in ISO/IEC 19762-5 and ISO/IEC 24730-1. While networked computing devices generally do very well to inform consumers of days old data, the computing devices themselves can also be tracked, even in real-time. LBS privacy issues arise in that context, and are documented below.
History
Location-based services (LBS) are widely used in many 21st Century computer systems and applications. Modern location based services are made possible by technological developments such as the
World Wide Web
The World Wide Web (WWW), commonly known as the Web, is an information system enabling documents and other web resources to be accessed over the Internet.
Documents and downloadable media are made available to the network through web se ...
,
Global Positioning Systems, and the widespread use of
mobile phones.
Location based services were developed by integrating data from
satellite navigation systems
A satellite navigation or satnav system is a system that uses satellites to provide autonomous geo-spatial positioning. It allows satellite navigation devices to determine their location ( longitude, latitude, and altitude/ elevation) to hi ...
,
cellular networks, and
mobile computing
Mobile computing is human–computer interaction in which a computer is expected to be transported during normal usage, which allows for the transmission of data, voice, and video. Mobile computing involves mobile communication, mobile hardware ...
, to provide services based on the geographical locations of users. Over their history, location based software has evolved from simple synchronization based service models to authenticated and complex tools for implementing virtually any location based service model or facility.
There is currently no agreed upon criteria for defining the market size of location based services, but the
European GNSS Agency estimated that 40% of all
computer applications
A computer is a machine that can be programmed to carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations ( computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as programs. These prog ...
used location based software as of 2013, and 30% of all internet searches were for locations.
LBS is the ability to open and close specific data objects based on the use of location and/or time as (controls and triggers) or as part of complex
cryptographic key or hashing systems and the data they provide access to. Location based services may be one of the most heavily used
application-layer
An application layer is an abstraction layer that specifies the shared communications protocols and interface methods used by hosts in a communications network. An ''application layer'' abstraction is specified in both the Internet Protocol ...
decision framework in computing.
The
Global Positioning System was first developed by the
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD or DOD) is an executive branch department of the federal government charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government directly related to national secur ...
in the 1970s, and was made available for worldwide use and use by civilians in the 1980s. Research forerunners of today's location-based services include the infrared Active Badge system (1989–1993), the
Ericsson
(lit. "Telephone Stock Company of LM Ericsson"), commonly known as Ericsson, is a Sweden, Swedish multinational networking and telecommunications company headquartered in Stockholm. The company sells infrastructure, software, and services in ...
-Europolitan
GSM LBS trial by Jörgen Johansson (1995), and the master thesis written by Nokia employee Timo Rantalainen in 1995.
In 1990 International Teletrac Systems (later
PacTel
Pacific Telesis Group was one of the seven Regional Bell Operating Companies, sometimes also referred to as "RBOCs" or "Baby Bells", created in 1983 in preparation of the breakup of AT&T as a holding company for Pacific Bell and Nevada Bell, P ...
Teletrac), founded in Los Angeles CA, introduced the world's first dynamic real-time
stolen vehicle recovery
Motor vehicle theft (also known as a car theft and, in the United States, grand theft auto) is the criminal act of stealing or attempting to steal a motor vehicle. Nationwide in the United States in 2020, there were 810,400 vehicles reported ...
services. As an adjacency to this they began developing location based services that could transmit information about location-based goods and services to custom-programmed alphanumeric
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorola ...
pager
A pager (also known as a beeper or bleeper) is a wireless telecommunications device that receives and displays alphanumeric or voice messages. One-way pagers can only receive messages, while response pagers and two-way pagers can also acknowl ...
s. In 1996 the US
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisd ...
(FCC) issued rules requiring all US mobile operators to locate
emergency callers. This rule was a compromise resulting from US mobile operators seeking the support of the emergency community in order to obtain the same protection from lawsuits relating to emergency calls as fixed-line operators already had.
In 1997 Christopher Kingdon, of Ericsson, handed in the Location Services (LCS) stage 1 description to the joint GSM group of the
European Telecommunications Standards Institute
The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) is an independent, not-for-profit, standardization organization in the field of information and communications. ETSI supports the development and testing of global technical standard ...
(ETSI) and the
American National Standards Institute
The American National Standards Institute (ANSI ) is a private non-profit organization that oversees the development of voluntary consensus standards for products, services, processes, systems, and personnel in the United States. The organ ...
(ANSI). As a result, the LCS sub-working group was created under ANSI T1P1.5. This group went on to select positioning methods and standardize Location Services (LCS), later known as Location Based Services (LBS). Nodes defined include the Gateway Mobile Location Centre (GMLC), the Serving Mobile Location Centre (SMLC) and concepts such as Mobile Originating Location Request (MO-LR), Network Induced Location Request (NI-LR) and Mobile Terminating Location Request (MT-LR).
As a result of these efforts in 1999 the first Digital Location Based Service Patent was filed in the US and ultimately issued after nine office actions in March 2002. The patent has controls which when applied to today's networking models provide key value in all systems.
In 2000, after approval from the worlds 12 largest telecom operators, Ericsson, Motorola and
Nokia
Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational telecommunications, information technology, and consumer electronics corporation, established in 1865. Nokia's main headquarters are in Espoo, Finlan ...
jointly formed and launched the Location Interoperability Forum Ltd (LIF). This forum first specified the
Mobile Location Protocol The Mobile Location Protocol (MLP) is an application-level protocol for receiving the position of Mobile Stations (MS: mobile phones, wireless devices, etc.) independent of underlying network technology.
The MLP serves as the interface between a Lo ...
(MLP), an interface between the telecom network and an LBS application running on a server in the Internet Domain. Then, much driven by the
Vodafone
Vodafone Group Public limited company, plc () is a British Multinational corporation, multinational Telephone company, telecommunications company. Its registered office and Headquarters, global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It ...
group, LIF went on to specify the Location Enabling Server (LES), a "
middleware
Middleware is a type of computer software that provides services to software applications beyond those available from the operating system. It can be described as "software glue".
Middleware makes it easier for software developers to implement c ...
", which simplifies the integration of multiple LBS with an operators infrastructure. In 2004 LIF was merged with the
Open Mobile Association
Open or OPEN may refer to:
Music
* Open (band), Australian pop/rock band
* The Open (band), English indie rock band
* ''Open'' (Blues Image album), 1969
* ''Open'' (Gotthard album), 1999
* ''Open'' (Cowboy Junkies album), 2001
* ''Open'' (YF ...
(OMA). An LBS work group was formed within the OMA.
In 2002, Marex.com in Miami Florida designed the world first marine asset telemetry device for commercial sale. The device, designed by Marex and engineered by its partner firms in telecom and hardware, was capable of transmitting location data and retrieving location based service data via both cellular and satellite based communications channels. Utilizing the Orbcomm satellite network, the device had multi level SOS features for both MAYDAY and marine assistance, vessel system condition and performance monitoring with remote notification, plus a dedicated hardware device similar to modern GPS units. Based upon the device location, it was capable of providing detailed bearing, distance and communication information to the vessel operator in real time, in addition to the marine assistance/MAYDAY features. The concept and functionality was coined Location Based Services by the principal architect and product manager for Marex, Jason Manowitz, SVP, Product and Strategy, Marex.com, the device was branded as IMAMS or Integrated Marine Asset Management System and the proof of concept beta device was demonstrated to various US government agencies for vessel identification, tracking, and enforcement operations in addition to the commercial product line. The device was capable of tracking assets including ships, planes, shipping containers, or any other mobile asset with a proper power source and antenna placement. Marex's financial challenges were unable to support product introduction and the beta device disappeared.
The first consumer LBS-capable mobile web device was the
Palm VII, released in 1999. Two of the in-the-box applications made use of the
ZIP code-level positioning information and share the title for first consumer LBS application: the Weather.com app from The Weather Channel, and the
[Vodafone Friendzone: Mobile Community auf SMS-Basis Freunde mit Ortungs-Serviceim D2-Netz finden](_blank)
tarif4you.de. 8 April 2003 (in German) TrafficTouch app from Sony-
Etak / Metro Traffic.
The first LBS services were launched during 2001 by TeliaSonera in Sweden (FriendFinder, yellow pages, houseposition, emergency call location etc.) and by EMT in Estonia (emergency call location, friend finder, TV game). TeliaSonera and EMT based their services on the Ericsson Mobile Positioning System (MPS).
Other early LBS include friendzone, launched by swisscom in
Switzerland in May 2001, using the technology of valis ltd. The service included friend finder, LBS dating and LBS games. The same service was launched later by
Vodafone
Vodafone Group Public limited company, plc () is a British Multinational corporation, multinational Telephone company, telecommunications company. Its registered office and Headquarters, global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It ...
Germany, Orange Portugal and Pelephone in
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
.
[ Microsoft's Wi-Fi-based indoor location system RADAR (2000), MIT's Cricket project using ultrasound location (2000) and Intel's Place Lab with wide-area location (2003).
In May 2002, go2 and AT&T Mobility launched the first (US) mobile LBS local search application that used Automatic Location Identification (ALI) technologies mandated by the FCC. go2 users were able to use AT&T's ALI to determine their location and search near that location to obtain a list of requested locations (stores, restaurants, etc.) ranked by proximity to the ALI provide by the AT&T wireless network. The ALI determined location was also used as a starting point for turn-by-turn directions.
The main advantage is that mobile users do not have to manually specify ZIP codes or other location identifiers to use LBS, when they roam into a different location. GPS tracking is a major enabling ingredient, utilizing access to mobile web.
]
Location industry
There are various companies that sell access to an individual's location history and this is estimated to be a $12 billion industry composed of collectors, aggregators and marketplaces. As of 2021, a company named Near claimed to have data from 1.6 billion people in 44 different countries, Mobilewalla
MobileWalla is a Singapore-based web-based search portal for applications targeted at mobile devices. It was founded on 7 March 2011 by Dr. Anindya Datta, a professor with the NUS School of Computing, School of Computing, National University of Si ...
claims data on 1.9 billion devices, and X-Mode claims to have a database of 25 percent of the U.S. adult population. An analysis, conducted by the non-profit newsroom called The Markup, found six out of 47 companies who claimed over a billion devices in their database. As of 2021, there are no rules or laws governing who can buy an individual's data.
Locating methods
There are a number of ways in which the location of an object, such as a mobile phone or device, can be determined. Another emerging method for confirming location is IoT and blockchain-based relative object location verification.
Control plane locating
With control plane locating, sometimes referred to as positioning, the mobile phone service provider gets the location based on the radio signal delay of the closest cell-phone towers (for phones without GPS features) which can be quite slow as it uses the 'voice control' channel.[ In the UK, networks do not use trilateration; Because LBS services use a single base station, with a "radius" of inaccuracy, to determine a phone's location. This technique was the basis of the E-911 mandate and is still used to locate cellphones as a safety measure. Newer phones and PDAs typically have an integrated ]A-GPS
Assisted GNSS (A-GNSS) is a GNSS augmentation system that often significantly improves the startup performance—i.e., time-to-first-fix (TTFF)—of a global navigation satellite system (GNSS). A-GNSS works by providing the necessary data to the ...
chip.
In addition there are emerging techniques like Real Time Kinematics and WiFi RTT (Round Trip Timing) as part of Precision Time Management services in WiFi and related protocols.
In order to provide a successful LBS technology the following factors must be met:
* coordinates accuracy requirements that are determined by the relevant service,
* lowest possible cost,
* minimal impact on network and equipment.
Several categories of methods can be used to find the location of the subscriber.[ The simple and standard solution is LBS based on GPS or an alternative ]satellite navigation
A satellite navigation or satnav system is a system that uses satellites to provide autonomous geo-spatial positioning. It allows satellite navigation devices to determine their location ( longitude, latitude, and altitude/ elevation) to hi ...
system. Sony Ericsson
Sony Mobile Communications Inc. ( ja, ソニーモバイルコミュニケーションズ株式会社) was a multinational telecommunications company founded on October 1, 2001, as a joint venture between Sony Group Corporation and Ericsson. I ...
's "NearMe" is one such example. It is used to maintain knowledge of the exact location, however can be expensive for the end-user, as they would have to invest in a GPS-equipped handset. GPS is based on the concept of trilateration Trilateration is the use of distances (or "ranges") for determining the unknown position coordinates of a point of interest, often around Earth ( geopositioning).
When more than three distances are involved, it may be called multilateration, for ...
, a basic geometric principle that allows finding one location if one knows its distance from other, already known locations.
Self-reported positioning
A low cost alternative to using location technology to track the player, is to not track at all. This has been referred to as "self-reported positioning". It was used in the mixed reality game A mixed reality game (or hybrid reality game) is a game which takes place in both reality and virtual reality simultaneously. According to Souza de Silva and Sutko, the defining characteristic of such games is their "lack of primary play space; th ...
called Uncle Roy All Around You in 2003 and considered for use in the Augmented reality
Augmented reality (AR) is an interactive experience that combines the real world and computer-generated content. The content can span multiple sensory Modality (human–computer interaction), modalities, including visual, Hearing, auditory, hap ...
games in 2006. Instead of tracking technologies, players were given a map which they could pan around and subsequently mark their location upon.[ With the rise of location-based networking, this is more commonly known as a user " check-in".
]
Other
Near LBS (NLBS) involves local-range technologies such as Bluetooth low energy, WLAN, infrared and/or RFID
Radio-frequency identification (RFID) uses electromagnetic fields to automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. An RFID system consists of a tiny radio transponder, a radio receiver and transmitter. When triggered by an electroma ...
/Near field communication
Near-field communication (NFC) is a set of communication protocols that enables communication between two electronic devices over a distance of 4 cm (1 in) or less. NFC offers a low-speed connection through a simple setup that can be ...
technologies, which are used to match devices to nearby services. This application allows a person to access information based on their surroundings; especially suitable for using inside closed premises, restricted or regional area.
Another alternative is an operator- and GPS-independent location service based on access into the deep level telecoms network ( SS7). This solution enables accurate and quick determination of geographical coordinates of mobile phone numbers by providing operator-independent location data and works also for handsets that are not GPS-enabled.
Many other local positioning systems
A positioning system is a system for determining the position of an object in space. One of the most well-known and commonly used positioning systems is the Global Positioning System (GPS).
Positioning system technologies exist ranging from world ...
and indoor positioning systems are available, especially for indoor use. GPS and GSM do not work very well indoors, so other techniques are used, including co-pilot beacon for CDMA networks, Bluetooth, UWB, RFID
Radio-frequency identification (RFID) uses electromagnetic fields to automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. An RFID system consists of a tiny radio transponder, a radio receiver and transmitter. When triggered by an electroma ...
and Wi-Fi.
Applications
Location-based services may be employed in a number of applications, including:[
* recommending social events in a city][
* requesting the nearest business or service, such as an ATM, restaurant or a retail store
* turn-by-turn navigation to any address
* assistive healthcare systems
* locating people on a map displayed on the mobile phone
* receiving alerts, such as notification of a sale on gas or warning of a traffic jam
* location-based mobile advertising
* asset recovery combined with active RF to find, for example, stolen assets in containers where GPS would not work
* contextualizing learning and research
* games where your location is part of the game play, for example your movements during your day make your avatar move in the game or your position unlocks content.
* real-time Q&A revolving around restaurants, services, and other venues.
* tracking a ]NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research.
NASA was established in 1958, succeedi ...
lunar lander.
* sending a mobile caller's location during an emergency call using Advanced Mobile Location
For the carrier, location-based services provide added value by enabling services such as:
* ''Resource tracking with dynamic distribution''. Taxis, service people, rental equipment, doctors, fleet scheduling.
* ''Resource tracking''. Objects without privacy controls, using passive sensors or RF tags, such as packages and train boxcars.
* ''Finding someone or something''. Person by skill (doctor), business directory, navigation, weather, traffic, room schedules, stolen phone, emergency calls.
* ''Proximity-based notification (push or pull)''. Targeted advertising, buddy list, common profile matching (dating).
* ''Proximity-based actuation (push or pull)''. Payment based upon proximity (EZ pass, toll watch), automatic airport check-in.
In the U.S. the FCC requires that all carriers meet certain criteria for supporting location-based services (FCC 94–102). The mandate requires 95% of handsets to resolve within 300 meters for network-based tracking (e.g. triangulation) and 150 meters for handset-based tracking (e.g. GPS). This can be especially useful when dialing an emergency telephone number
Most public switched telephone networks have a single emergency telephone number (sometimes known as the universal emergency telephone number or the emergency services number) that allows a caller to contact local emergency services for assista ...
– such as enhanced 9-1-1 in North America, or 112 in Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...
– so that the operator can dispatch emergency services such as emergency medical services
Emergency medical services (EMS), also known as ambulance services or paramedic services, are emergency services that provide urgent pre-hospital treatment and stabilisation for serious illness and injuries and transport to definitive care. ...
, police
The police are a constituted body of persons empowered by a state, with the aim to enforce the law, to ensure the safety, health and possessions of citizens, and to prevent crime and civil disorder. Their lawful powers include arrest a ...
or firefighters to the correct location. CDMA and iDEN operators have chosen to use GPS location technology for locating emergency callers. This led to rapidly increasing penetration of GPS in iDEN and CDMA handsets in North America and other parts of the world where CDMA is widely deployed. Even though no such rules are yet in place in Japan or in Europe the number of GPS-enabled GSM/WCDMA handset models is growing fast. According to the independent wireless analyst firm Berg Insight the attach rate for GPS is growing rapidly in GSM/WCDMA handsets, from less than 8% in 2008 to 15% in 2009.
As for economic impact, location based services are estimated to have a $1.6 Trillion impact on the US economy alone.
European operators are mainly using Cell ID
A GSM Cell ID (CID) is a generally unique number used to identify each base transceiver station (BTS) or sector of a BTS within a location area code (LAC) if not within a GSM network.
In some cases the first or last digit of CID represents cell ...
for locating subscribers. This is also a method used in Europe by companies that are using cell based LBS as part of systems to recover stolen assets. In the US companies such as Rave Wireless in New York are using GPS and triangulation to enable college students to notify campus police when they are in trouble.
Comparison of location tracking apps for mobile devices
Currently there are roughly three different models for location-based apps on mobile devices. All share that they allow one's location to be tracked by others. Each functions in the same way at a high level, but with differing functions and features. Below is a comparison of an example application from each of the three models.
Mobile messaging
Mobile messaging plays an essential role in LBS. Messaging, especially SMS, has been used in combination with various LBS applications, such as location-based mobile advertising.
SMS
Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...
is still the main technology carrying mobile advertising / marketing campaigns to mobile phones. A classic example of LBS applications using SMS is the delivery of mobile coupons or discounts to mobile subscribers who are near to advertising restaurants, cafes, movie theatres. The Singaporean mobile operator MobileOne carried out such an initiative in 2007 that involved many local marketers, what was reported to be a huge success in terms of subscriber acceptance.
Privacy issues
The Location Privacy Protection Act of 2012 (S.1223) was introduced by Senator Al Franken
Alan Stuart Franken (born May 21, 1951) is an American comedian, politician, media personality, and author who served as a United States senator from Minnesota from 2009 to 2018. He gained fame as a writer and performer on the television comed ...
(D-MN) in order to regulate the transmission and sharing of user location data in the United States. It is based on the individual's one time consent to participate in these services (Opt In). The bill specifies the collecting entities, the collectable data and its usage. The bill does not specify, however, the period of time that the data collecting entity can hold on to the user data (a limit of 24 hours seems appropriate since most of the services use the data for immediate searches, communications, etc.), and the bill does not include location data stored locally on the device (the user should be able to delete the contents of the location data document periodically just as he would delete a log document). The bill which was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee
The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, informally the Senate Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of 22 U.S. senators whose role is to oversee the Department of Justice (DOJ), consider executive and judicial nomination ...
, would also require mobile services to disclose the names of the advertising networks or other third parties with which they share consumers' locations.
With the passing of the CAN-SPAM Act
The Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing (CAN-SPAM) Act of 2003 is a law passed in 2003 establishing the United States' first national standards for the sending of commercial e-mail. The law requires the Federal Trad ...
in 2003, it became illegal in the United States to send any message to the end user without the end user specifically opting-in. This put an additional challenge on LBS applications as far as "carrier-centric" services were concerned. As a result, there has been a focus on user-centric location-based services and applications which give the user control of the experience, typically by opting in first via a website or mobile interface (such as SMS
Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...
, mobile Web, and Java
Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...
/ BREW applications).
The European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been ...
also provides a legal framework for data protection that may be applied for location-based services, and more particularly several European directives such as: (1) Personal data: Directive 95/46/EC; (2) Personal data in electronic communications: Directive 2002/58/EC; (3) Data Retention: Directive 2006/24/EC
Directive may refer to:
* Directive (European Union), a legislative act of the European Union
* Directive (programming), a computer language construct that specifies how a compiler should process input
* "Directive" (poem), a poem by Robert Frost
...
. However the applicability of legal provisions to varying forms of LBS and of processing location data is unclear.
One implication of this technology is that data about a subscriber's location and historical movements is owned and controlled by the network operators, including mobile carriers and mobile content providers.["WhyGeo"](_blank)
What are the downsides of using location-based services? (2010) Mobile content providers and app developers are a concern. Indeed, a recent MIT study by de Montjoye et al. showed that 4 spatio-temporal points, approximate places and times, are enough to uniquely identify 95% of 1.5M people in a mobility database. The study further shows that these constraints hold even when the resolution of the dataset is low. Therefore, even coarse or blurred datasets provide little anonymity. A critical article by Dobson and Fisher discusses the possibilities for misuse of location information.
Beside the legal framework there exist several technical approaches to protect privacy using privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs). Such PETs range from simplistic on/off switches to sophisticated PETs using anonymization techniques (e.g. providing k-anonymity), or cryptograpic protocols. Only few LBS offer such PETs, e.g., Google Latitude offered an on/off switch and allows to stick one's position to a free definable location. Additionally, it is an open question how users perceive and trust in different PETs. The only study that addresses user perception of state of the art PETs is. Another set of techniques included in the PETs are the location obfuscation
Location obfuscation is a technique used in location-based services or information system
An information system (IS) is a formal, sociotechnical, organizational system designed to collect, process, store, and distribute information. From a so ...
techniques, which slightly alter the location of the users in order to hide their real location while still being able to represent their position and receive services from their LBS provider.
See also
* Advanced Mobile Location
* At-location mapping
* Cartography
Cartography (; from grc, χάρτης , "papyrus, sheet of paper, map"; and , "write") is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an ...
* Dashtop mobile
* Dead reckoning
In navigation, dead reckoning is the process of calculating current position of some moving object by using a previously determined position, or fix, and then incorporating estimates of speed, heading direction, and course over elapsed time. T ...
* Enterprise digital assistant
* Fire Eagle
* Geo (marketing)
* Geoloqi
* GeoReader GeoReader is a landmark locating software application and website for mobile iPhone and Android based devices. Users travel into the vicinity of a “talking point”, and the software enables the phone to read text aloud that is linked with a GPS ...
* Geosocial networking
Geosocial networking is a type of social networking in which geographic services and capabilities such as geocoding and geotagging are used to enable additional social dynamics.
* Groundhog Technologies
* Key finder
* Indoor positioning system
* LocationSmart
LocationSmart, originally called TechnoCom Location Platform, is a location-as-a-service (LaaS) company based in Carlsbad, California, that provides location APIs to enterprises and operates a secure, cloud-based and privacy-protected platform. I ...
* Location awareness
* Location as a service
* Location intelligence
In business intelligence, location intelligence (LI), or spatial intelligence, is the process of deriving meaningful insight from geospatial data relationships to solve a particular problem. It involves layering multiple data sets spatially and/or ...
* Location-based games
* Location-based media
* Mobile dating
Mobile dating services, also known as cell dating, cellular dating, or cell phone dating, allow individuals to chat, flirt, meet, and possibly become romantically involved by means of text messaging, mobile chatting, and the mobile web.
These ser ...
* Mobile identity management
* Mobile local search
* Mobile positioning
Mobile phone tracking is a process for identifying the location of a mobile phone, whether stationary or moving. Localization may be effected by a number of technologies, such as the multilateration of radio signals between (several) cell towers o ...
* Navizon
* Near-me area network
* Real-time locating
* Reverse geocoding
* Social positioning method
* Urban informatics
* Wayfinding
Wayfinding (or way-finding) encompasses all of the ways in which people (and animals) orient themselves in physical space and navigate from place to place.
Wayfinding software is a self-service computer program that helps users to find a location ...
* Wi-Fi positioning system
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Location-Based Service
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Geopositioning
Applications of geographic information systems