We’ve seen GPS tracking systems being used for some very unusual purposes, but this is the first time we’ve seen GPS used to help save the environment, and in this case – trees. Foresters in Jackson, Wyoming, have decided they will begin using GPS to track the damage to whitebark pine trees being killed by beetles. U.S. Forest Service officials are using a budget of $150,00 to start the survey of beetle damage in the Bridger-Teton National Forest. The forest officially contains about 400,000 acres of whitebark pine, but the species has begin to decline due to beetle attacks. The process will begin with mapping through an aerial survey, with the survey then being used to map the pine population and to help lay out the area that will be used for the GPS. This work should be completed by next spring. Foresters specifically want to know where the damage is worst, and why some pockets of pines appear to be unaffected. [...]
Smart Infrastructure, a highly influential IT provider based in Ryadh, Saudi Arabia, is making a difference in the day-to-day operations of the nation’s companies and corporations with the new GPS Fleet Software developed by High-Tech Solutions. HTS is the Dubai based specialist for GPS vehicle tracking and fleet solutions. The GPS Fleet Software allows companies and corporations to pinpoint the exact position of their vehicles. It does this through a GPS black box that sends the location of the vehicle position to a head office where an operator can observe and control vehicles as they see fit. The Fleet Software also generates a logbook and data about driving times and driving behavior. This product has become particularly popular in Saudi Arabia, but it is also being used by companies in the Middle East in countries such as Quater, as well as Europe. [...]
With five stars more than the flag, the true face of a teenage girl is finally revealed.
Claiming that she had mistakenly been tattooed with 56 stars on her face, 18 year old Kimberly Valminck recently admitted that she had lied about the whole ordeal. Valminck blamed tattoo artist, Toumaniantz, for ruining her face and turning her into a “freak” while she was asleep under his needle. Toumaniantz adamantly insisted that she had asked for the stars despite what Valminck was telling her parents and the press. Valminck promised to sue Toumaniantz for 9000 euros, the cost of the surgery needed to remove the stars. Even though Toumaniantz maintained that she had asked for the stars, he agreed to pay for half of the surgery because he felt bad that his client was so unsatisfied.
Recently, Valminck said that she had indeed asked him for the 56 various size and shaped stars to be tattooed on her face and that she was awake the whole time he tattooed them onto her face. She made the whole story up because when she showed her father he was “furious.” [...]
The New York State Court of Appeals recently issued a ruling baring police from tracking the cars of criminal suspects with GPS systems unless a warrant is first obtained from a judge. The ruling was set in motion by a case in Albany County where the state police believed a man may have been committing burglaries. The GPS device was used to place the suspects car at the scene of a shopping center burglary. However, Chief Judge John Lippman ruled that this type of GPS tracking violated the state Constitution.
In the majority opinion, Lippman wrote that “It is quite clear that this would not, and indeed, realistically could not be done without GPS and this dragnet use of of this technology at the sole discretion of law enforcement authorities to pry into the details of people’s daily lives is not consistent with the values at the core of the state Constitution’s prohibition against unreasonable searches.”
A New York State attorney who had been involved in a similar case with a man who was tracked by a GPS device praised the verdict as a strong one. William Tendy, a native of Poughkeepsie, stated that “The decision makes good sense; it’s well-reasoned.” He also said that the ruling was a good sign, as law enforcement agencies are usually believed to be slow in addressing advancements in technology that are seen as eroding citizens privacy.
Ulster County D.A. Holley Carnight, who said that GPS devices are sometimes used in law enforcement cases in the county, particularly in drug investigations, was one law enforcement official who disagreed with the Court of Appeals ruling. He believes that GPS tracking does not give enough information on drivers to be an infringement on privacy.
“It doesn’t tell you who the driver is or what he’s doing, so I don’t think the situation is as sinister as the majority seems to believe,” Carnight said.
The New York State Court of Appeals may have the state’s citizens best interests at heart, but with this ruling, law enforcement may face a major set back in fighting crime. The vehicle GPS tracking systems that law enforcement uses in both New York and other states at this moment in time are very simple and have a clear goal: to track and stop suspected criminals and in doing so, protect communities. Our pinion is that there is no “Big Brother” effect at work here with the trackers. Rather, it is just law enforcement serving and protecting, as it’s their duty to do so.
The buzz of people waiting to board the plane drowns out the heavy breathing of the suspicious looking people clutching their fists hoping to release some tension in their body. Their darting eyes screen the room for any threats as they walk through security. They hold their breath praying that nothing goes wrong and close their eyes as they take their first step under the beams of metal. Then it comes, the beautiful, refreshing sound of absolutely nothing. No alarms. No flashing lights. Plain and utterly priceless nothing. Ignorant is everyone to the fact that another drug dealer just successfully smuggled more drugs into the country.
According to an article written in Stuff.co.nz, an astounding 80% of drugs smuggled into New Zealand go undetected every year, as reported by the National Drug Intelligence Bureau, and changes need to be made to substantially lower that number.
Authorities are trying to respond to the surprisingly high number of successful transportation of illegal drugs into New Zealand every year by implementing a new technology. While the exact methodology of how these devices could be used to prevent drug trafficking cannot be released, authorities have confirmed that they need to implement GPS tracking devices in order to track intercepted shipments. However, there are some obstacles to overcome before any real progress can be made. [...]
Law enforcement’s use of sophisticated cellular tracking techniques to observe suspects before arrest and to build cases against them in criminal cases is building all across the country, and is raising major concern over civil liberties and privacy rights. Existing law is outdated and does not give set guidelines on the use of cellular tracking techniques. Federal wiretap laws are behind the times in passing laws on the use of data to find a person’s location, and guidelines cannot be passed when local laws differ in separate regions of the U.S.
For more than a decade, law enforcement had the technology to match an antenna tower with a cellphone signal so that a cellphone’s location could be tracked to within a radius of 200 yards in urban areas and 20 miles in urban ones. Now, cellular technology is sophisticated enough that its GPS systems can mark a user’s position to within a few dozen yards. Law enforcement can track suspects in real time by having phone companies send signals to a phone that is turned on. [...]
Two researchers working at security firm Inverse Path, recently came out with a paper that reveals a disturbing discovery about many common keyboards. It turns out that the poor shielding used on many keyboard’s PS/2 cables can allow hackers to snoop on what you’ve been typing. When a key is pressed, the data leaks onto the earth wire that connects to the PC’s power unit, which in turns connects to the plug in the power socket. From there, the data potentially leaks out onto the power circuit that is supplying electricity in a room.
“The PS/2 signal square wave is preserved with good quality… and can be decoded back to the original keystroke information,” wrote the pair in a paper describing their work.
The folks over at Inverse Path have even been able to demonstrate this working over distances up to 15 meters. [...]
Catching criminals in action isn’t the only thing surveillance cameras can do– now they are starting to answer hundred year old questions.
Recently, surveillance cameras were used to conduct The Human Speechome Project, an experiment designed to map the way humans acquire speech. The age old question of speech acquisition has been tackled by famous researchers including Noam Chomsky and Eric Lenneberg. From devices in your brain to critical periods there only remains theories about how humans develop language skills.
With the help of surveillance cameras, professors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology hope to provide some of the first conclusive, data based answers to what seems to be the unsolvable question. Stunted by the limited availability to thoroughly track a child’s language acquisition process, previous studies were only given snapshots of a child’s development in weekly or monthly meetings. Considering the fast paced nature of child development, missing a week, day, and even an hour can mean missing a crucial moment in the child’s development. [...]
The Homeland Security Department has announced that it will review the multicolored terror alert system that was created after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano has recently created a 17-member task force chaired by former FBI Director William Webster and former White House homeland Security Fran Townsend that has 60 days to determine the effectiveness of the current system, which could be overhauled or eliminated entirely.
The current Homeland Security alert system is a five-tiered one that goes from the color green, which signals a low danger of attack, to red, which warns of a severe threat. The system has proven to be confusing at times, and many critics believe the colors are used too vaguely for the information they signal to be seen as useful. [...]
It’s 5 a.m. in Broomfield, Colorado and volunteers are already arriving (coffee in hand) at the Broadlands Golf Course for a 7:30 a.m. tee time. But they’re not here to play golf. They’re here to raise money for the Missing Children Task Force during Colorado’s Missing Children’s Week.
The Missing Children’s Task Force is a non-profit organization whose primary mission is to investigate, locate, and recover missing children at no cost to the family. In Colorado alone there were over 14,000 children reported missing in 2006. Nationwide, that number increases to 797,500 children reported missing each year. The Missing Children Task force is working to lower these horrific numbers by raising money and awareness for child safety. [...]
In the midst of thousands of horror stories ranging from murder cases to fiscal scams, the urgency for protection in the online dating world has reached its breaking point. The call has been answered swiftly and mercilessly: saferdates.com. Saferdates provides an unprecedented service in the online dating world that not only allows you to date, but also “investidate.” With a dual level screening process, meeting your other half is no longer a gamble with your safety. The investidate initiative allows members to perform a basic search for a history of felonies, misdemeanors, sex offenses, and marriage for potential mates. Saferdates provides a fingerprint scan for potential mates, which is the best way to ensure that online dating members are screened successfully against a criminal past. Each member must have a “verified” check next to their profile that notifies other members that they have been screened. [...]
Every year law enforcement representatives, cops, FBI agents, and security professionals convene in the mecca of all things over the top, Atlantic City, for the Police Security Expo. This annual trade show attracts the best of the best in all things law enforcement. Representatives from the FBI, CIA, local police precincts, and security professionals from around the world converge upon Atlantic City for the 2-day event.
A frequent exhibitor at various trade shows, the folks at BrickHouse Security were excited to travel to Jersey yet again this year for some quality face-to-face time with their customers.
“We love coming to these types of trade shows because we’re able to meet all the leaders in law enforcement,” said Jason Lazarus, BrickHouse Security’s Director of Marketing who attended the show this year. “I’m really excited to hear from everyone at the show what type of technology they are looking to adopt and that can make their operations simpler.” [...]
Grandma’s new kicks are not only stylish but they could also save her life. A new shoe embedded with a live GPS tracking chip is becoming a hit with Alzheimer patients and their families. Avoid the angst associated with a wandering family member by checking in on their real-time GPS location online, from your cell phone, or 
even on Facebook.
“This product could not only save lives but potentially save governments billion in search and rescue operations,” said Andrew Carle, a professor at George Mason and an adviser for the project.
This GPS tracking unit is part of a significant line of assisted-living products offered for the treatment of Alzheimer’s patients, from sensor systems to pill boxes that remind patients of medication. The market for assisted-living products is growing fast and shows no sings of stagnation soon, as the market for microchip-based technology alone is estimated at $5 billion. [...]
For a number of years, Grant Opperman’s small delivery company D.W. Morgan was struggling to compete with the leaders in their industry.
Industry giants like FedEx and UPS were able to use tracking technology to find packages within mere minutes of arrival, while Opperman’s tiny 90-man firm’s main tracking tool was the memories of its 30 drivers, who were required to call their boss when their shipment arrived. When drivers committed simple human errors such as forgetting to call Opperman and their managers, it put D.W. Morgan behind and left them at the mercy of their clients, to the point that the company sometimes could not even tell clients where their packages were located.
As Opperman made the decision for D.W. Morgan to go towards international expansion, he realized his company could not survive in a tougher market with a good tracking system. Although Opperman could not afford the top-notch systems that top competitors like UPS had, he took the step of buying the cheapest iPhone ($200) for each driver, paid $300 for a developer’s license from Apple, and had one of his in-house tech specialists build a custom application using the iPhone’s GPS system.
With the new system, D.W. Morgan’s clients can now track shipments online in real time. The custom application shows the precise location of each truck on a Google map, drivers ask package recipients to sign their iPhone screens, and signatures are immediately uploaded to the company Web site.
“Even the big guys don’t get it that fast,” says Opperman proudly.
Thanks to the custom application and other visionary ideas, D.W. Morgan is becoming a more efficient company. Opperman estimates that he invested $21,000 to update his companies tracking technology, but has used that investment to save an estimated $96,000 a year, for a profit of $75,000 dollars. The estimate of $96,000 by Opperman is based on the number of hours his drivers spent filing, receiving signature documentation, and making mutual data entries. This system is allowing D.W. Morgan to expand to the Czech Republic and Thailand by the end of this year.
By taking advantage of today’s growing GPS Tracking technology and companies and corporations ability to use it to better themselves, Grant Opperman has made D.W. Morgan into a more powerful and influential company. Here at BrickHouse Security, we offer GPS solutions for companies that are in a similar place to D.W. Morgan which will allow them to compete with the big boys. GPS Trackers like the Spark Nano and LiveWire NavGenius Gps Tracker & Navigation System allow companies to have real-time observation over their mobile assets and constant updates through mapping. With a simple upgrade, companies can level the playing field.
(Via CNN Money)
