Geolocation

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Principles of geolocation using GPS Geolocation.png
Principles of geolocation using GPS

Geolocation is the identification or estimation of the real-world geographic location of an object, such as a radar source, mobile phone, or Internet-connected computer terminal. In its simplest form, geolocation involves the generation of a set of geographic coordinates and is closely related to the use of positioning systems, but its usefulness is enhanced by the use of these coordinates to determine a meaningful location, such as a street address.

Contents

The word geolocation also refers to the latitude and longitude coordinates of a particular location. The term and definition have been standardized by real-time locating system standard ISO/IEC 19762-5:2008.

In the field of animal biology and ecology, the word geolocation is also used to refer to the process of inferring the location of a tracked animal based, for instance, on the time history of sunlight brightness [1] or the water temperature and depth [2] measured by an instrument attached to the animal. Such instruments are commonly called archival tags (including microchip implants, Pop-up satellite archival tags, and data storage tags) or dataloggers. [3]

Techniques

For either geolocating or positioning, the locating engine often uses radio frequency (RF) location methods, for example Time Difference Of Arrival (TDOA) for precision. TDOA systems often use mapping displays or other geographic information system. When satellite navigation (such as GPS) signals are unavailable, geolocation applications can use information from cell towers to triangulate the approximate position, a method that is not as accurate as GPS but has greatly improved in recent years. [4] This is in contrast to earlier radiolocation technologies, for example Direction Finding where a line of bearing to a transmitter is achieved as part of the process.

Internet and computer geolocation can be performed by associating a geographic location with the Internet Protocol (IP) address, RFID, hardware embedded article/production number, embedded software number (such as UUID, Exif/IPTC/XMP or modern steganography), invoice, Wi-Fi positioning system, device fingerprint, canvas fingerprinting or device GPS coordinates, or other, perhaps self-disclosed information. [5]

IP address location data can include information such as country, region, city, postal/zip code, [6] latitude, longitude and time zone. [7] Deeper data sets can determine other parameters such as domain name, connection speed, ISP, language, proxies, company name, US DMA/MSA, NAICS codes, and home/business.

At times geolocation can be more deductive, as with crowdsourcing efforts to determine the position of videos of training camps, combats, and beheadings in Syria by comparing features detected in the video with publicly available map databases such as Google Earth, as practiced by sites such as Bellingcat. [8] [9]

Standards

Some standards and name servers include: ISO 3166, FIPS, INSEE, Geonames, IATA and ICAO. For geographic locations in the United States, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) Codes are often used. ANSI INCITS 446-2008 is entitled "Identifying Attributes for Named Physical and Cultural Geographic Features (Except Roads and Highways) of the United States, Its Territories, Outlying Areas, and Freely Associated Areas, and the Waters of the Same to the Limit of the Twelve-Mile Statutory Zone A number of commercial solutions have been proposed:

See also

Related Research Articles

Enhanced 911, E-911 or E911 is a system used in North America to automatically provide the caller's location to 911 dispatchers. 911 is the universal emergency telephone number in the region. In the European Union, a similar system exists known as E112 and known as eCall when called by a vehicle.

Geo- is a prefix derived from the Greek word γη or γαια, meaning "earth", usually in the sense of "ground or land"; as a prefix, it may also mean "global" or relate to the planet Earth.

In the context of information security, and especially network security, a spoofing attack is a situation in which a person or program successfully identifies as another by falsifying data, to gain an illegitimate advantage.

A geocode is a code that represents a geographic entity. It is a unique identifier of the entity, to distinguish it from others in a finite set of geographic entities. In general the geocode is a human-readable and short identifier.

In computing, geolocation software is software that is capable of deducing the geolocation of a device connected to the Internet. The identification of a device's IP address can be used to determine the country, city, or post/ZIP code, determining an object's geographical location. Other methods include examination of a MAC address, image metadata, or credit card information.

Geotagged photograph photograph which is associated with a geographical location by geotagging

A geotagged photograph is a photograph which is associated with a geographical location by geotagging. Usually this is done by assigning at least a latitude and longitude to the image, and optionally altitude, compass bearing and other fields may also be included.

Geotagging Act of associating geographic coordinates to digital media

Geotagging, or GeoTagging, is the process of adding geographical identification metadata to various media such as a geotagged photograph or video, websites, SMS messages, QR Codes or RSS feeds and is a form of geospatial metadata. This data usually consists of latitude and longitude coordinates, though they can also include altitude, bearing, distance, accuracy data, and place names, and perhaps a time stamp.

Geocoding is the process of taking input text, such as an address or the name of a place, and returning a latitude/longitude location on the Earth's surface for that place. Reverse geocoding, on the other hand, converts geographic coordinates to a description of a location, usually the name of a place or an addressable location. Geocoding relies on a computer representation of address points, the street / road network, together with postal and administrative boundaries.

Multilateration is a navigation and surveillance technique based on measurement of the times of arrival (TOAs) of energy waves having a known propagation speed. Prior to computing a solution, the time of transmission (TOT) of the waves is unknown to the receiver.

In marketing, geomarketing is a discipline that uses geolocation in the process of planning and implementation of marketing activities. It can be used in any aspect of the marketing mix – the product, price, promotion, or place. Market segments can also correlate with location, and this can be useful in targeted marketing.

Georeferencing means that the internal coordinate system of a map or aerial photo image can be related to a ground system of geographic coordinates. The relevant coordinate transforms are typically stored within the image file, though there are many possible mechanisms for implementing georeferencing. The most visible effect of georeferencing is that display software can show ground coordinates and also measure ground distances and areas. In other words, Georeferencing means to associate something with locations in physical space. The term is commonly used in the geographic information systems field to describe the process of associating a physical map or raster image of a map with spatial locations. Georeferencing may be applied to any kind of object or structure that can be related to a geographical location, such as points of interest, roads, places, bridges, or buildings.

Geotargeting method of determining the geolocation of a website visitor and delivering different content to that visitor based on their location

Geotargeting in geomarketing and internet marketing is the method of determining the geolocation of a website visitor and delivering different content to that visitor based on their location. This includes country, region/state, city, metro code/zip code, organization, IP address, ISP or other criteria. A common usage of geo targeting is found in online advertising, as well as internet television with sites such as iPlayer and Hulu. In these circumstances, content is often restricted to users geolocated in specific countries; this approach serves as a means of implementing digital rights management. Use of proxy servers and virtual private networks may give a false location.

Geobytes is a global company specializing in geolocation and anti-spam software. Geobytes was incorporated in the State of Delaware, USA in 1999 making it one of the oldest companies in the online geolocation industry.

Wi-Fi positioning system (WPS), WiPS or WFPS is a geolocation system that uses the characteristics of nearby Wi-Fi hotspots and other wireless access points to discover where a device is located. It is used where satellite navigation such as GPS is inadequate due to various causes including multipath and signal blockage indoors, or where acquiring a satellite fix would take too long. Such systems include assisted GPS, urban positioning services through hotspot databases, and indoor positioning systems. Wi-Fi positioning takes advantage of the rapid growth in the early 21st century of wireless access points in urban areas.

Real-time geotagging is a name given to the automatic technique of acquiring media, associating a specific location with the media, transferring the media to an online map and publishing the media in real time. It is thus an extension of an automatic geotagging process, requiring an in-built or attached location acquisition device, but also requires communication with a wireless data transfer device. Several modern cell phones and digital cameras already integrate camera, aGPS, and wireless data transfer into one device, thus directly producing a geotagged photograph. Real-time geotagging is sometimes referred to as "mobile geotagging" or "autogeotagging", but this does not imply the real-time publishing step.

The Ricoh 500SE digital compact camera is suitable for outdoor photography and networkability. Capability includes external information such as GPS position or barcode numbers within the image headers. External vendors sell hardware and software for workflows involving GPS positioning or barcode scanning. Most NMEA compliant bluetooth GPS receivers can be used with this camera through its built in bluetooth communication capability. The body is resistant to dust and water, making it robust for many environments.

The W3C Geolocation API is an effort by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to standardize an interface to retrieve the geographical location information for a client-side device. It defines a set of objects, ECMAScript standard compliant, that executing in the client application give the client's device location through the consulting of Location Information Servers, which are transparent for the application programming interface (API). The most common sources of location information are IP address, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth MAC address, radio-frequency identification (RFID), Wi-Fi connection location, or device Global Positioning System (GPS) and GSM/CDMA cell IDs. The location is returned with a given accuracy depending on the best location information source available.

Satellite geolocation is the process of locating the origin of a signal appearing on a satellite communication channel. Typically, this process is used to mitigate interference on communication satellites. Usually, these interference signals are caused by human error or equipment failure, but can also be caused by deliberate jamming. Identifying the geographical location of an interfering signal informs the mitigation activity.

In geographic information systems, toponym resolution is the relationship process between a toponym, i.e. the mention of a place, and an unambiguous spatial footprint of the same place.

Geomessaging is a technology that allows a person or system to send a message based on any media to a device that enters or exits one or more regions. Those regions can be created by using geofences, based on Latitude and Longitude, or adding beacons to the system associating those beacons with named locations. The device will receive the message according to the rules defined by the campaign administrator.

References

  1. ↑ Hill, Roger D.; Braun, Melinda J. (2001). "Geolocation by Light Level". Electronic Tagging and Tracking in Marine Fisheries. Reviews: Methods and Technologies in Fish Biology and Fisheries. 1. pp. 315–330. doi:10.1007/978-94-017-1402-0_17. ISBN   978-90-481-5871-3.
  2. ↑ Lam, Chi H.; Nielsen, Anders; Sibert, John R. (2008). "Improving light and temperature based geolocation by unscented Kalman filtering". Fisheries Research. 91: 15–25. doi:10.1016/j.fishres.2007.11.002.
  3. ↑ Galuardi, Benjamin; Lam, Chi Hin (Tim) (2014). "Telemetry Analysis of Highly Migratory Species". Stock Identification Methods. pp. 447–476. doi:10.1016/B978-0-12-397003-9.00019-9. ISBN   9780123970039.
  4. ↑ Ionescu, Daniel (2010-03-29). "Geolocation 101: How It Works, the Apps, and Your Privacy". PCWorld. Archived from the original on June 15, 2013. Retrieved March 29, 2010.
  5. ↑ Holdener, Anthony T. (2011). HTML5 Geolocation. O'Reilly Media. p. 11. ISBN   9781449304720.
  6. ↑ "Digital Element Finding Demand for Granular IP Targeting". 2009-08-20. Archived from the original on 2011-12-17. Retrieved 2011-12-11.
  7. ↑ IPInfoDB (2009-07-10). "IP Geolocation database". IPInfoDB. Archived from the original on 2009-06-11. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
  8. ↑ David Leveille (2014-08-29). "This hobbyist-turned-journalist is a one-man digital detective agency". PRI. Archived from the original on 2014-09-24. Retrieved 2014-09-20.
  9. ↑ "Crowd-Funded Journalists Geo-Locate ISIS Training Camp Using the Militants' Own Photos". PetaPixel. 2014-08-25. Archived from the original on 2014-09-24. Retrieved 2014-09-20.
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