covering the week's top tech stories
with a slight linux bias google is
creating a worldwide
android phone powered earthquake alert
system
the first part of that system rolled out
tuesday if you opt in the accelero
accelerometer in your android phone will
become one data point for an algorithm
designed to detect
earthquakes eventually that system will
automatically send warnings to people
who could be impacted
it's a feature made possible through
google's strengths
the staggering numbers of android phones
around the world and clear
clever use of algorithms on big data
as with its collaboration with apple on
exposure tracing and other android
features like
car crash detection and emergency
location services
it shows that there are untapped ways
that smartphones could be used for
something important to the community at
large
google is rolling out the system in
small stages
first google is partnering with the
united states geogra geological survey
and the california office of emergency
services
to send the agency's earthquake alerts
to android users
in that state those alerts are generated
by already existing shake alert system
which uses data generated by traditional
seismometers
marx dogade gadis principal android
software engineer at google says
it'd be great if they were just
seismometer-based systems everywhere
that could detect earthquakes
that's not really practical and it's
unlikely to have global coverage because
seismometers are extremely expensive
they have to be constantly maintained
you need a lot of them in an area to
really have a good earthquake
early warning system so the second and
third stages of google's plan will be
powered instead
by the android phones the company is
proceeding fairly cautiously though
in the second stage google will show
localized results
in google searches for earthquakes based
on the data it's detecting from android
phones
the idea there is that when you feel an
earthquake you'll go to google to see if
that's what you felt or not
an android phone can become a mini
seismometer because it's an excel
an accelerometer that's the thing that
detects
if you've rotated it or not android
system uses the data from that sensor to
see if the phone is shaking
it is only on when an android phone is
plugged in and not in use
to preserve battery life once it has
more confidence in the accuracy of the
system
google will begin actively sending out
earthquake warnings to people who live
in areas where there are not seismometer
based warning systems over the long term
google hopes to create an api based on
its earthquake detection system
it doesn't plan on using the system on
iphones
but if the api comes out then apple
would be free to use it
more interesting though is what other
systems would benefit from an earthquake
detection api
for example somebody could build
something that automatically stops an
elevator at the next floor and opens the
door so that people can get out before
the wave comes
and you can turn off gas valves
automatically you can have something
that stops medical procedures or
open the door to fire stations ahead of
time that's a common problem in
earthquakes where fires are a big deal
and firefighters often just can't get
out
so you can build something that does
that airplanes can stop landing as
they're doing this
aboard their landing trains can be
slowed down
there's an entire ecosystem that can be
enabled by using this android-based
detection
and having it publish server-side so
that others can plug into it
google's plan is to minimize false
positives and tune the system right away
and users near earthquake fault zones
will soon see
info in google searches and the
inevitable rollout of local
notifications
it wasn't long ago jeff that simon
weckert berlin-based artist
took 99 android smartphones put them in
a red wagon
and walked down the main street that was
completely devoid
of vehicles and yet google's
map service showed that
there were traffic jams everywhere he
went right because there's 99
android phones so you know i hate to put
the thought
in people's heads but this is the thing
with an
android-based system such as this while
it sounds amazing well it sounds like
hey this is a very
brilliant idea
how hard is it to take a raspberry pi
zero
and a motor and connect it
to one centralized server
and share the diagrams of that online
and say okay everybody i want you to to
build this take a raspberry pi plug it
into this motor
put your phone in this motor when you go
to bed and
because it's internet connected they can
make it they can set off all the phones
vibrating like this
in any area of the world where they have
these devices
it'd be so easy it'd just be it's such
an easy hack so it's like
how can they trust that data well i
think it's brilliant
an accelerometer to detect earthquake
well and that's the thing like this is
an amazing thing that they're doing yeah
but
with amazing ideas also comes the
amazing ability to mess with it
thanks to human beings yeah i mean not
only terrible
like what if you have you know if
somebody decides to use it as a
uh a type of social attack so to speak
where there's a group of 15 20 people
they all of the phones
they congregate in a particular area and
they just sit there and start shaking
their phone
and if they also synchronize it with
with
like raspberry pi is through the
internet like you could actually
like pick a spot and make an earthquake
on google maps
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