The Ugly LBS Word: Privacy

February 24, 2010 - By Eric Gakstatter

As usual with an emerging personal, digital communications technology on the brink of mass appeal (think e-mail, mobile phones), privacy is a major concern and a serious topic of discussion with regard to location-based services (LBS). With the GPS component, LBS worries users and regulators even more. So much so that there was a House Congressional hearing this week on Capitol Hill regarding this very subject. It’s not the first hearing on location privacy and certainly won’t be the last. Following are the people who testified:

Lorrie Cranor, Associate Professor, Computer Science and Engineering and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University

Mike Altschul, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, CTIA – The Wireless Association

John B. Morris, Jr., General Counsel, Center for Democracy and Technology

Anne Collier, Co-Director, ConnectSafely.org

Jerry King, Chief Operating Officer, uLocate Communications, Inc.

Tony Bernard, Vice President and General Manager, Useful Networks

If you’d like to read the testimony from each of these folks, you can do so here.

I guess as geospatial-knowledgeable people, most are either on one side of the spectrum or the other. One side being the folks who understand the power of location and are willing to gamble that our privacy will remain within our control while enjoying the benefits of LBS applications. The other side being the folks who understand the power of location and are scared to death that Big Brother will have some amazing new tools to trace our every step and record our every decision.

As you may surmise, I’m on the gambling side of the spectrum. While I don’t typically live on the bleeding edge of technology (I don’t own an iPhone or Blackberry), I do own a lot of technology and have a fairly powerful smartphone with GPS capability. I don’t currently subscribe to any LBS apps on my phone besides the navigation feature. However, I’m seriously excited about the future of LBS applications. Personally, I’m excited about LBS technology because it will help make my life run more efficiently. That’s what I’m in it for. GPS navigation has done that for me and I think some other LBS apps will do that for me too.

I realize (and appreciate) that not everyone is like me. I’ve got four kids (ages 12-18), an active spouse, and a fair number of extended family members in the Portland, Oregon, metro area. I’m a family-oriented person so I’m active in my kids’ lives and also try to keep in regular touch with family members who are local. I also am involved in some community activities that require meetings, etc. All of this is on top of my work schedule, which can be hectic. To manage my schedule, I enter my commitments (business as well as personal) in my smartphone calendar. In turn, it tells me where I need to be and when I need to be there. Without it, I’d be in trouble. There’s no way I could commit to memory where I need to be and when.

My smartphone takes care of helping me manage my schedule and how to get where I need to be (via GPS). I’m happy with it. It’s very good when I set up all my appointments and addresses in advance.

However, I know I’m missing a lot of opportunities to meet up with my family and friends…if I only knew where they were (or they know where I am) at a particular point in time. For example, maybe I’m on the other side of town watching my kid’s basketball game. My sister could be in the same high school watching her kid, but on a different court. If I knew that at the time, I would certainly make the effort to go sit with her, even if it was just for a few minutes. Yes, I could call her and ask her where she is at, but she’s not the only one. There’s probably 25-30 people like her I stay in touch with and it is not practical to call each one. That number would grow substantially if I include business contacts who I’d be interested in meeting up with if the opportunity arose (think airports and conferences).

This sort of dynamic people-connecting is what LBS can bring to the table. Of course, LBS can offer many other services (coupons at nearby restaurants, etc.) but the people-connecting opportunity, for me, is the big one.

What does people-connecting entail?

Essentially, you’ll need three items:

your current location.
some way to communicate with people.
software to make it all work.

A mobile phone w/GPS fits that bill. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a smartphone, but a more powerful phone will offer more powerful features. Also, you’ll need some kind of data plan and possibly text messaging. Lastly, you’ll need some sort of software on the phone to make it all work together.

Following is a sample phone screen of a people-connecting software application.

Back to the original topic of this column: Privacy

Of course, a major concern by regulators and potential users is how personal location information will be used by the LBS application software. Will this be just another way that your personal information will be collected and sold to spammers? In addition to spammers, do you really want your family/friends knowing where you are 24/7? These are not unreasonable concerns.

I don’t worry about privacy with LBS applications and I’ll tell you why.

There is a lot of hyper-sensitivity about privacy with LBS applications (House Congressional Hearing this week on the subject) so I think LBS software vendors are well aware that a line has been drawn in the sand and a sort of zero-tolerance policy has been established. Secondly, leading LBS companies were involved with CTIA (The Wireless Association) in developing a document titled “Best Practices and Guidelines for Location-Based Services” so they are intimately aware of the privacy issue.

There are two guiding principles in the Best Practices guidelines mentioned above:

LBS providers must inform users about how their location information will be used, disclosed, and protected so that a user can make an informed decision whether or not to use the LBS or authorize disclosure.
Once a user has chosen to use an LBS, or authorized the disclosure of location information, he or she should have choices as to when or whether location information will be disclosed to third parties and should have the ability to revoke any such authorization.

Read the entire CTIA Best Practices guideline here.

The Final Analysis

One consideration I will give when subscribing to a LBS app in the future is to make sure I subscribe either through my wireless service provider (Sprint, AT&T, Verizon, etc.) or by an established, reputable LBS app provider. This kind of due diligence is no different from when you consider purchasing an application for your personal computer. Common sense tells you not to download an app from Nigeria. You’ll need to practice the same diligence when selecting an LBS application.

I also wouldn’t consider an LBS application where I don’t have the opportunity to control my personal network of people who are granted access to my current whereabouts. In fact, I’d want the ability to shut off broadcasting my location altogether. Again, I don’t think that any mainstream LBS application is not going to have these features due to the h
igh-profile sensitivity to privacy.

I know the LBS applications are already available to accomplish the people-connecting that I want. But, like I wrote earlier, I don’t live on the bleeding edge of technology. I live a step back from the edge. I wasn’t the first to join Facebook (although I’m glad I eventually did) and I won’t be the first to run a people-connecting LBS application, but there’s no doubt in my find that it will eventually be an important tool for me and, most likely, you too. The upside is just too big to ignore.

Thanks, and see you next week.

Follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/GPSGIS_Eric

If you’d like to learn more about LBS, GPS World is hosting a free webinar entitled “What’s Next for LBS” on March 18, 2010.