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Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Fri Jul 10, 2009 2:38 pm
by chase
Girlfriend had her iPhone 3G stolen. ATT has a service called FamilyMap that you can get to track your phone through GPS. It sucks knowing what apartment complex your phone is in and being able to watch it move around town but not actually be able to find the damn thing. Even went into some of the public buildings in the 0.5 mile radius that the phone was in so I could call it and hopefully hear it ringing. Part of me wants pin-point GPS and part of me wants to get rid of GPS tracking completely.
Plus they deleted all her custom Pandora radio stations and made a bunch of rap stations.
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Fri Jul 10, 2009 3:01 pm
by Solar
Now if that isn't an excellent occasion to use GPS for
what it has been designed for...
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Fri Jul 10, 2009 4:17 pm
by Cognition
It's an amazing system, I hope they don't let it just fall apart due to budget constraints. Amazing with all the money our government spends that this system of all things is some how something we aren't willing to fund as a nation.
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Fri Jul 10, 2009 4:34 pm
by Malevol3nt
Ahh this makes me want to watch Enemy of the State again.
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 12:34 am
by Colonel Kernel
LOL @ Solar
If you have a MobileMe account you can use "find my iPhone" and/or remote wipe:
http://www.apple.com/iphone/iphone-3gs/ ... tures.html
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 5:19 am
by Coty
@chase: is there an option to get rid of the GPS tracking?
Now thats what I'm talking about!
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 8:35 am
by chase
You have to have MobileMe before you lose the phone. AT&T family can be ordered after you lose the phone but the thief will get a text message saying the service has been turned on and it requires that they don't remove the sim.
GPS tracking of your own phone seems to be okay to figure out if you left it at work or not but it doesn't do well for recovering a stolen phone in my opinion. Not even sure if it would work for Solar's approach, what is the blast radius? The smallest area reported was a radius of 0.5 miles. Sure would have made me feel better though...
Re: Stolen phones and GPS
Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:48 am
by quok
most of the time for GPS-enabled phones, the accuracy of the GPS is reduced on purpose. For turn-by-turn GPS directions you'll get within 100 feet or so, but if the phone is used to dial 911 (or whatever emergency services is in your country), then the GPS fix is literally within 5 or 6 feet most of the time.
Disclaimer: I work for a telecom, and I've worked on location based services. I've tested these implementations extensively so I pretty much know what I'm talking about for once.
