We have had a raft of stories about how ordinary citizens use GPS datasets to get out of tickets, argue their presence or non presence for a crime. It was only a matter of time before the police attempted to access this datastream, hey they just got myspace down last week and there is this new thing called Facebook…
All kidding aside here is what is happening companies, specifically in this case TomTom are selling anonymized GPS Datasets to police and markets.You know the huge problem with “anonymized” data… it really isn’t one person created it. one use pattern defined the set, and despite not having a name associated other factors could easily pinpoint who did what. Take a GPS stream so a person stops at an ATM at 4:44 pm on Monday the 9th. Go to the bank’s system look up the name of the user who was there at 4:44pm on May 9th. BINGO Re-Identified people. An these are the cops, they have access to these types of things. In fact most people with a little legwork could sort through this data and identify people.
So the police will know where you are speeding, and the marketers will know where you are stuck. to maximize the revenue stream for both. The company is trying to assure people that this is only done for good reasons, and will help people. Let’s be honest it will help line pockets, and make cranky people like me a bit more paranoid. It seems they may be out to get us afterall…
It is only a short hop skip and a jump until cops have access to your phone’s gps and send you the ticket for speeding while you are doing it. The world just got a little sadder, and less fun. And don’t give me that it saves lives malarky. The Autobahn does just fine, tickets are a way to add funds to municipalities, same with red light cameras. Pretty soon we’ll have tagged IDs to prevent jaywalking. To keep the children safe…
TomTom GPS Sends Your Information to Police and Government | The Vigilant Citizen.