Boating Law Facts

Different Approaches to Being a Cell Phone Tracker Raise the Question:  Do you really know where they are?

Across the country and around the world, GPS tracking, mobile GPS and mobile phone GPS track software are attracting attention from consumers, mobile phone companies and application developers.   The latest cell phones have GPS locator functionality to track phone location.   These features, and others such as SMS texting, web access and the ability to use other software make mobiles great gadgets.  However GPS satellites aren’t always available, for example when the phone is in a structure such as an school, mall, or even in a car.  That doesn’t mean smartphone locating isn’t possible, but it does mean there are other ways of being a tracker.

To track a cell phone involves several main methods of determining  smartphone position.  GPS Global Positioning System-Satellites, Triangulation, and CellID.   All these technologies transform cell phones into mobile tracking devices.   These systems can be viewed as Network Based, Handset Based or a Hybrid approach.  GPS location is Handset based as it requires software applications installed on the smartphone  in conjunction with GPS hardware.  Triangulation and CellID are Network Based as they use the equipment and information from the cellular provider.  Hybrid systems combine techniques to make best use of available information and to make position cell tracking faster.  

Mobile phone GPS is what people commonly think of when looking at locating cell phones.   GPS (Global Positioning System) using satellites is the most common and more accurate technology of tracking.   However GPS requires satellites to be in direct line of site of the mobile phone. 

Sometimes thick cloud cover and dense trees impedes with signals. 

If sitting in an automobile the signals might not reach the cell phone.  Some smartphones will retain the last known GPS location, others might not.  

Another thing with handset GPS location is the potential of draining the battery.  It is important to be able to remotely adjust how often of taking GPS position.  Selecting real-time or periodic sampling affects both the accuracy of finding position along with how long the battery will last.  

GPS receivers, whether in a mobile phone, or a dedicated GPS tracking device, determine location by precisely timing the signals sent by GPS satellites.  This information includes the time the message was transmitted, precise orbital information (the ephemeris), and the general system health and estimated orbits of all GPS satellites (the almanac).  GPS receivers often take longer to become ready to navigate after being turned on because it must acquire some basic information in addition to capturing GPS satellite signals. This delay can be caused if the GPS cell phone  has been unused for days or weeks, or has been transported a far distance while turned off for.  The GPS must update its almanac and ephemeris data and store it in memory.  The GPS almanac is a set of data that every GPS satellite transmits. When a GPS receiver has current almanac data in memory, it can capture satellite signals and calculate initial position faster. 

GPS Hot Start is when the GPS enabled cell phone  recalls its last calculated location, the satellites that were in view before, the almanac information in memory, and tries to obtain the same satellites and compute a new position based upon the previous information. This is almost always the quickest GPS lock but Hot Start only works if the phone is in the same general area as when the GPS was last switched off. 

GPS Warm Start is when the GPS enabled handset  keeps its last known position, and almanac used, but not which satellites were in range. It resets and attempts  to lock onto satellite signals and calculates a new position. 

The GPS receiver has a general idea of which satellites toseek because it kept its last known position and the almanac data helps identify which satellites are within view. The Warm Start will take more time than the Hot Start but not as long as a Cold Start. 

With GPS Cold Start, the device deletes all the previous information, and attempts to locate satellites and accomplish a GPS lock. This takes longer than other methods because there is no known reference information.  The GPS enabled handset   receiver has to try to lock onto a satellite signal from any available satellites. 

In order to have better GPS lock times cellular manufacturers and network operators introduced Assisted GPS technology.   It downloads the ephemeris and helps triangulate the cell phone   general position.  GPS Receivers can get a faster lock in exchange for a few kilobytes of data transmission.

A-GPS assists location tracking performance of smartphones (and other connected devices) in a couple of ways:

One method is by assisting to obtain a faster “time to first fix” (TTFF). AGPS acquires and archivesinformation about the location of satellitesvia the cell network so the position information does need to be downloaded via the satellite. 

Another way is by assisting locate  mobile phones when GPS signals are weak or blocked.  As mentioned before GPS satellite signals may be interfered with by tall buildings, and do not penetrate building interiors well. AGPS utilizes proximity to cellular towers to calculate location when GPS signals are not available. 

If satellite signals are not available, or accuracy is less important than battery life, using Cell-ID is a useful alternative to GPS smartphone location.  The position of the device can be determined by the cell network cell id, which identifies the cell tower the phone is using.   By knowing the location of this tower, then you can know approximately where the cell phone  is.  However, a tower can cover a huge area, from a few hundred meters, in high density areas, to several miles in lower density areas. This is why location CellID precision is lower than GPS accuracy. Nonetheless tracking using CellID still provides a very good substitute.    

Another method of calculating  handset position is Triangulation or Mobile Location Services (MLS).  Cell Tower Triangulation uses signal analysis data to calculate the time it takes signals to travel from your phone to at least three cell towers to estimate location.   

To comply with Federal Communications Commission guidelines, cellular phone companies must be able to provide authorities with handset latitude and longitude to an accuracy of 50 to 300 meters.   Cell Tower Triangulation doesn’t always meet this requirement.  By way of comparison commercially available GPS modules are able to obtain accuracy down to 3-10m.  This depends upon many factors, as GPS signals are often very weak and are impacted  by many variables.   With Mobile Location Services (MLS), the GSM cellular network provider uses triangulation techniques to try to pinpoint the location of the smartphone, its accuracy is proven to be much worse than that of GPS.  MLS is also impacted by factors similar to  GPS in the sense of the barriers impeding signal quality and the density of GSM towers to help in the triangulation effort.   In rural areas position accuracy may be off as much as a mile. 

It might be important to consider how GPS location software programs handle the data and controls mobile phone settings.   Having real time tracking on demand, or preferring to minimize battery use and data transmission should be offered.   Typically the application determines the location with a GPS receiver and transmits the tracking data to a server through a data connection. The data connection to the server is usually made using the Internet.  How often GPS samples are taken and how often and by what method the information is sent to the server affect effectiveness and costs. 

Keep in mind that there is a basic difference between mobile phone GPS Tracking and Navigation.  GPS mobile phone tracking is typically related to someone keeping records of either real-time or historical cell phone  location, while Navigation deals with the mobile phone  user figuring out how to get from point A to point B.

A really great software package that includes remote control of cell phone settings, and combines Mobile Phone Tracking  with SMS text message, Call Log,  MMS multi-media message monitoring, and a web account for storage and review is PhoneBeagle.  

Follow this link if you are interested in    Cell Phone Monitoring Software  compatible with BlackBerry  and  Android  Smartphones, used or Parental Monitoring and Small Business Employee Monitoring .  

Visit this link for more information regarding the latest software for
GPS Tracking .

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