Community poll forum: If the technology existed to track your movements...

If u check the history of privacy concerns in America. When leaders of the past made decision to identify small towns with names, cries of privacy were heard; when leaders set up street names, there were howls of privacy; when leaders created phone numbers for each house, howls of privacy rose; and so on. People generally resist changes -especially technology changes that may impact lives of people. Eventually public accepted these changes. I see the same thing with this tracking of movement. Many of posts clearly indicate that policies should be clearly identified to allow this wonderful technology to work - I agree. Let's us not be Luddites, and make most out of this wonderful innovative concept.

In a world where consumers told Intel exactly what could be done with the software readable CPU serial number, any tracking capability in a phone should be consumers' option. It has long been my belief that a Universal Distress Frequency tracking device should be rentable to people who are going hiking, climbing, or anywhere that they could become stranded. In such circumstances, activate the device and wait for help.

To build continuous tracking into a cell phone would be a dramatic drain on the battery (although I understand that all phones now carry an internal GPS record); but a separate alkaline cell that powers a distress beacon in the case of emergency would be much more sensible. Three modes of operation are suggested:
1. Off
2. Dead man's switch--the customer sets the time delay... 1/2 hour to six hours. If the phone (or independent device worn like an over-sized wrist watch) starts beeping and you are unable to stop the alarm inside one minute then it automatically switches over to mode three.
3. On until turned off, flat battery or found. Such a device should be able to keep transmitting the distress signal and a 120dB "beep" once every thirty seconds for a minimum of 48 hours.

What I am suggesting is DISTRESS tracking only, not PERPETUAL tracking.

The ability to remotely interrogate a phone to find out it's location should be an option controlled solely by parents.

The device I am suggesting does not NEED to be part of a mobile phone, but could be an independent device, or given the tragic circumstances that have started this discussion, a device powered by the car battery, in which case no one would have been compelled to leave the comparative safety of the vehicle. If fitted to a vehicle, such a device could activate simultaneously with air bags or other collision sensors on modern vehicles or manually be activated from the central roof light (reachable from all or most seats of the vehicle).

It seems that the location of the Kim family was greatly helped by a last ping from a cell phone. Ordinary citizens do not have access to such data; only telephone company workers, the government, and hackers can locate you, so privacy is not an issue. However, the Kims did not make wise use of the remaining electrical power from their car battery to (1) keep the cell phone charged, (2) use the lights at night to flash SOS, (3) use the horn periodically during the day to blast out SOS, (4) move around in search of a cell tower signal (there is a little signal strength guage on most cell phones), (5) monitor news stations for weather reports and news of an ongoing search (6) improvise a directional antenna for the cell phone to extend its range.

Prayer is very comforting, but it does nothing to prevent our death. People have been praying, and then dying for thousands of years. Instead, I think we all need to spend less time praying, and more time acquiring practical wilderness survival skills.

The question is ambiguous. It implies that the technology in question is a device that you purchase and selectively use. It also implies a hypothetical technology that the government would use to spy on you. But the big issue here is that we already have GPS devices, spy satellites that can supposedly read the headline of a newspaper, we can track credit card purchases. We can triangulate cell phone locations from the cell towers. And that is just the stuff that we know about. You know that for every cool new technology that is known, there is some newer more capable technology being developed in a secret bunker somewhere that "doesn't exist". How do you define freedom? To me freedom is my ability to go about my life without some fanatics trying to kill me because I don't have the same imaginary friend as they do. If some stuffy politicians or some war-mongering military brass know that I do my grocery shopping on Sundays and I buy cheetos, yoohoo, then so be it.

Technology already exists that can track many of our movements. Kim's wife was foound by a signal from her cellphone. Mobile providers offer ads of upcoming attractions during your travels, vehicles have gps in them. But privacy is still an issue. Yu may say that our government would be okay to rack us, what happens when the wrong people get the information? Terrorists would love to have that ability. Any and all tracking capabilities should be closly guarded and only used when the device is activated by the owner of that device.

Jim is right where GPS can help raise the level of functional equivalency for the persons with disabilities closer to what hearing and able-body folks enjoy. Balance - like many of you already said - must be found in policy making and protection of the individuals. It is more scary if public resists technology innovations; better is to embrace them and make sure policies or regulations are in place. I'm deaf and I readily acknowledge that if not for technology innovations, I would not be where I am now. The irony is the more technology innovations there are, the more freer I am.

I think that they can already listen in on our conversations. I am more concerned that in an emergency we have no way to respond except maybe pushing a button on a cell phone. I would appreciate that ability and I also think that if you have nothing to hide then who cares if they listen in. We all have junk in the closet and to be honest most of us have the same kind of junk. There are a few really bad guys out there and they are the ones I don't want listening to me. But we have to take some bad with the good. And the reality is who the heck wants to listen to me.

OK, I did my rant about privacy now on to the real issue. Cell phones save countless lives yearly. Look at how many of the rescues on Mt Rainier and Mt Hood are via cell phones and without nearby cell relay towers. Also if you contact your local law enforcement they can direct you to a group that will recycle your old "junk" phones. What happens is that they give these phones to people in need. These old phones are useless except for one thing - dialing 911, the phone does not even need the sim card to call 911. Now my guess is that most of you out there are too young to remember the first cell phone, the Motorola "brick" or the "bag phone." Well these analog phones operated at about 6 watts compared to the digital phones at about .5 watt. Now if the current phones in their "emergency" state were able to boost the transmission up, even to 3 or 4 watts the range and possibility of being heard is increased exponentially. Very simple to add to existing circuitry and no one would run in circles of paranoia thinking big brother has nothing better to do than watch them...

For those who have had to obtain a temporary or permanent protective order against someone, having a cell phone that could be tracked could potentially put them at risk. Would need the option to enable or disable such a feature.

I've read thru all the posts carefully, before choosing this point in the discussion to post my 2-cents worth - this techno is also being used commercially here in Taiwan, where "security companies" use it (and advertise it widely.. so they must be a market for them!!) to help keep track of the young & the old alike.

Enuff's been argued about the types of technos/"privacy concerns" etc etc, so I won't waste any more space by contributing to any of those growing opinion-lists. Yes, its very very sad the way James Kim died... and call me an eternal optimist, but I'm glad his family did survive (and it WAS due to techno!!).

James Kim... RIP.

Let us fore go the governmental misuse of such technology, my first worry is that of fellow citizens. Individual being able to track the movements of children and I dont mean their parents. A stalker using such to follow a celebrity or provide constant updates to their current location. Being able to turn on the GPS locator on a cell phone when you dial 9-1-1 is great in emergencies but like too many things in the modern world little about the usage or who is using it is known and there is no punishment attached to the misuse of the technology.

Honestly, if youre worried about invasion of privacy youre too late. The government, big brother, whatever you really want to call the organization already has the ability to track what you say, and do. I read an article years ago about monitoring phone conversations via satellite. What this article depicted was technology being put to use allowing phone conversations to be scanned via satellite. The article explains the conversations are randomly scanned for certain phrases and words. If a certain string of words is picked up the conversation is then monitored by whatever computer the satellite is communicating with to determine whether the phone conversation is a possible threat. Now, I realize this was just some article I was reading in some magazine years ago, and I also dont have the magazine anymore to actually give you the reference, but more than likely if the idea is there to be printed it is being put into effect somewhere. When it comes down to it were just the citizens of a nation, and have no idea at all what is really going on. We hear about some new technology that might be available one day, and for some reason think its some huge undiscovered breakthrough. Pretty much everything is tested; it cant be that new and unused.

Did anyone read the news article (I think on yahoo.com) about a year ago about cell phone companies handing over your call logs to aid in the war against terrorism?

Am I against being tracked around the world? Am I against anyone knowing my every move? Of course I am! But for this subject just to be gaining publicity, and to be fooled into thinking this is new technology is ridiculous.

Think about this. During Hurricane Katrina I could use Google Earth to look at a satellite picture of my flooded house. You really think you cant already be watched?



So you dont think who you call is already tracked? Check some of these out.

http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000202.html

http://www.senate.gov/~schumer/SchumerWebsite/pressroom/press_releases/2005/PR41780.NYC%20Cell%20Phones.072405.html

My main concern would be that of reliability. Privacy would not be an issue if a tracking feature was voluntary. If I'm on a road trip as the Kim family was, I would set my cell phone on "Tracking." Only those on my tracking list would be able to know my whereabouts.

I would be willing to pay a premium for this service, but it would be nice if I could implement this service only when I needed it.

I don't say that out of paranoia but from a business observation. My business is surveillance, if you carry your cell phone, THEY can place you in the cell vicinity, so if you're planning "covert/discreet" activity---leave the cell at home!

The cameras at intersections you see everywhere--dual purpose. You would be amazed at the telephoto/resolution capabilities of these "traffic cameras". The tech has been out there for a while now--I work with the stuff and as interesting as it is--I personally am very weary of the whole lot of it.