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Study secretly tracked cellphone users
Summary from the United Kingdom, from articles in English
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The whereabouts of more than 100,000 mobile phone users have been tracked in an attempt to build a comprehensive picture of human movements. (article 1)
The study concludes that humans are creatures of habit, mostly visiting the same few spots time and time again. (article 1)
Most people also move less than 10km on a regular basis, according to the study published in the journal Nature. (article 1)
" It would be wonderful if every mobile carrier could give universities access to their data because it's so rich said Dr Marta Gonzalez of Northeastern University, Boston, US, and one of the authors of the paper. (article 1)
Dr William Webb, head of research and development at the UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, agreed that mobile phone data was still underexploited. (article 1)
The study used data from the website, which allows anyone to track a dollar bill as it circulates through the economy. (article 1)
Studies such as this suggested that humans wander in an apparently random fashion, similar to a so-called "Levy flight" pattern displayed by many foraging animals. (article 1)
Each time a participant made or received a call or text message, the location of the mobile base station relaying the data was recorded. (article 1)
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Other summaries about this story:
Event tracking:
Story keywords
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researchers, Hidalgo, Study, data, Tracked |
Source articles
- Mobile phones expose human habits (BBC News, 06/04/2008, 922 words)
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blaster@cs.columbia.edu
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