I drive a semi. I use Google maps constantly. It shows my truck's position precisely. No error at all. If I am in a huge facility with hundreds of dock doors, it shows me precisely where I am. Not 5 feet off, precisely. This is helpful to me getting out of large facilities that often lack signage.
Unfortunately Trump had no inclination whatsoever to arrest any rioters, any more so than he had any inclination to help the J6 victims, whom he lured to D.C. then abandoned.
I won't be voting this time around. If God wanted us to vote he would send us some candidates.
If I was a lawyer in Fulton County and they used cell phone data, I would read back her quote. I don't know why I concern myself with this, because nothing will be done.
Not to undercut your overall point, which I think is correct, but don't confuse cell phone pings with GPS. They are different things. GPS can be incredibly accurate, as you point out. Cell phone pings are a lot less accurate. The cell towers aren't trying to identify exactly where a person is located. They're trying to optimize signal strength and decrease transmission power so that communication can occur and the cell companies can have as many people using phones in a given area (RF capacity) as possible. That's opposed to GPS, where the whole point of the technology is to locate things with fairly high accuracy. The GPS data is going to be far more accurate than the cell phone ping data. The cell phone data might only show Wade near Willis's condo, the 9 sq miles thing, but that's still roughly a 3 mile x 3 mile area. But that's still close. What was he doing in her neighborhood at 1 am?
So, even if you can't place Wade inside Willis's condo via cell phone ping data, you could subpoena Google or Apple and get the GPS data. The cell phone ping data should provide probable cause to go after the GPS data. And we all know that the GPS data will show Wade inside Willis's condo.
Thanks for your good comment, dave. You are absolutely correct, and I didn't mean to imply that only the cell phone pings bouncing off the towers is good enough to locate things. It's the worst of the three big methods. I am not an expert, but my understanding is that GPS is normally the most accurate, and super accurate if dual frequency cell phones are used. However, I have read that Wi-Fi is even more accurate in some cases. That would be in urban locations where you might have a Starbucks on one corner, a Wendy's on another corner and a McDonald's on the third corner. My reference to pings was sort of a shortcut for all methods used in a sophisticated modern cell phone.
Cell and WiFi operate in roughly the same way in this respect. They are designed for communication, not location. But the coverage area for a WiFi antenna is generally a lot smaller than a cell phone antenna (yards vs miles). Thus, WiFi can be more "accurate" in terms of locating something. Mostly, what you're doing is asking the question of whether a given antenna (cell or WiFi) can "hear" a given device (phone). If so, then you know that the device is "close" to the antenna in some sense. But you have only coarse directional information (modern antennas are a LOT better at this) and not much really about range, just some idea of the transmission power necessary for a given device to "hear" the antenna.
In contrast, GPS is designed for location, with very accurate clocks and radio transmissions that are able to locate a given object within a meter and can triangulate with multiple satellites to make that calculation increasingly accurate.
For what it's worth, I've spent the last 30+ years working on data communications technologies. I was part of the original WiFi standards team, so I know that one the best. I've also worked for companies that sell mobile telephony products, though I haven't worked deeply in that part of the business. I know enough about GPS to be dangerous but have never worked on that technology directly.
Excellent analysis; appreciate the links to GPS.gov site too. I've not seen anyone else address this w/o doing so to discredit conservative and election-cleansing type reporting.
I guess all the criminal cases that used cell phone data to pinpoint a perpetrator will have to be overturned in Fulton County, GA.
But don't hold your breath!
I drive a semi. I use Google maps constantly. It shows my truck's position precisely. No error at all. If I am in a huge facility with hundreds of dock doors, it shows me precisely where I am. Not 5 feet off, precisely. This is helpful to me getting out of large facilities that often lack signage.
Unfortunately Trump had no inclination whatsoever to arrest any rioters, any more so than he had any inclination to help the J6 victims, whom he lured to D.C. then abandoned.
I won't be voting this time around. If God wanted us to vote he would send us some candidates.
If I was a lawyer in Fulton County and they used cell phone data, I would read back her quote. I don't know why I concern myself with this, because nothing will be done.
Not to undercut your overall point, which I think is correct, but don't confuse cell phone pings with GPS. They are different things. GPS can be incredibly accurate, as you point out. Cell phone pings are a lot less accurate. The cell towers aren't trying to identify exactly where a person is located. They're trying to optimize signal strength and decrease transmission power so that communication can occur and the cell companies can have as many people using phones in a given area (RF capacity) as possible. That's opposed to GPS, where the whole point of the technology is to locate things with fairly high accuracy. The GPS data is going to be far more accurate than the cell phone ping data. The cell phone data might only show Wade near Willis's condo, the 9 sq miles thing, but that's still roughly a 3 mile x 3 mile area. But that's still close. What was he doing in her neighborhood at 1 am?
So, even if you can't place Wade inside Willis's condo via cell phone ping data, you could subpoena Google or Apple and get the GPS data. The cell phone ping data should provide probable cause to go after the GPS data. And we all know that the GPS data will show Wade inside Willis's condo.
Thanks for your good comment, dave. You are absolutely correct, and I didn't mean to imply that only the cell phone pings bouncing off the towers is good enough to locate things. It's the worst of the three big methods. I am not an expert, but my understanding is that GPS is normally the most accurate, and super accurate if dual frequency cell phones are used. However, I have read that Wi-Fi is even more accurate in some cases. That would be in urban locations where you might have a Starbucks on one corner, a Wendy's on another corner and a McDonald's on the third corner. My reference to pings was sort of a shortcut for all methods used in a sophisticated modern cell phone.
Cell and WiFi operate in roughly the same way in this respect. They are designed for communication, not location. But the coverage area for a WiFi antenna is generally a lot smaller than a cell phone antenna (yards vs miles). Thus, WiFi can be more "accurate" in terms of locating something. Mostly, what you're doing is asking the question of whether a given antenna (cell or WiFi) can "hear" a given device (phone). If so, then you know that the device is "close" to the antenna in some sense. But you have only coarse directional information (modern antennas are a LOT better at this) and not much really about range, just some idea of the transmission power necessary for a given device to "hear" the antenna.
In contrast, GPS is designed for location, with very accurate clocks and radio transmissions that are able to locate a given object within a meter and can triangulate with multiple satellites to make that calculation increasingly accurate.
For what it's worth, I've spent the last 30+ years working on data communications technologies. I was part of the original WiFi standards team, so I know that one the best. I've also worked for companies that sell mobile telephony products, though I haven't worked deeply in that part of the business. I know enough about GPS to be dangerous but have never worked on that technology directly.
Excellent analysis; appreciate the links to GPS.gov site too. I've not seen anyone else address this w/o doing so to discredit conservative and election-cleansing type reporting.
Thank you, Cat. Your comments are always appreciated.