By Bill Ray for The Register. This
story was reproduced with permission.
Google Maps Mobile version 2 is currently in Beta, but available
for Symbian and Windows Mobile and can be downloaded from the
Google
mobile site. The application picks up the Cell ID of the local
base station, along with some signal information, and sends that
off to Google for comparison with their database of known
locations.
If the handset has GPS, and can get a GPS fix, then both sets of
information are sent to Google as a new entry in the database -
making it more accurate for the next user.
Using the Cell ID is much, much faster than mucking about with
orbiting satellites, and in many cases the accuracy is enough to
start the user off scrolling to where they want to see. Some rough
testing shows that in the Home Counties users can get a fix within
a few hundred metres, while in the Highlands it's more like a few
tens of miles.
It's always been possible for network operators to track mobile
phones in this way, and in the UK they keep records of such
location information for a year, but until now the link between
Cell ID and location has been something the operators kept to
themselves despite several attempts to create a public
database.
Google's database is far from public, and a spokesman told us
they've not yet got plans to sell access to the information -
though that can't be far off. The same spokesman was eager to point
out that while Google might be collecting GPS and Cell ID
information, they have no way of linking that to a particular
person or phone handset, so (for the moment at least) there's no
significant privacy issue.
Obviously Google needed to get an initial sampling of
information, basically by driving around the place with appropriate
handsets and GPS equipment. An expensive process, and all the more
impressive as 22 countries are already covered. But this investment
should pay well as having a rough fix on your location makes Google
Maps Mobile infinitely more usable, and should increase the
interest to advertisers wanting to sell local services.
This could be exactly the development needed to kick-start the
much-anticipated location-based services industry, and Google have
placed themselves very well to be in the driving seat of that
industry.
© The Register
2007.
