[governance] Is this for real?

[Roland Perry]

In message <4F4DEA42.6080600 at digsys.bg>, at 11:05:06 on Wed, 29 Feb 
2012, Daniel Kalchev <daniel at digsys.bg> writes
>>> In recent times, it also includes geo-location information, 
>>>including  the (very) precise location of your home wifi network.
>>>
>>> This is real funny, I once made experiment with the later: while 
>>>traveling, configured an AP with the same SSID that I have at home. 
>>>When asked to locate me on the map, Google "found" me at my home 
>>>location, even if I was few hundred km away from there.
>>
>> I'm a bit surprised they are doing it on the SSID of the APs, not the 
>>MAC address. (You didn't say if your travelling AP was the same as the 
>>one you used to have at home).
>
>Different device and model, although the same manufacturer so MAC 
>address is similar. It is either poor mapping algorithm (Google also 
>makes the weird assumption that they know where particular IP 
>address/network is geo-located -- which with modern networking is naive 
>assumption) or because my home SSID for a long time was available on 
>only one location, it was marked as 'unique' (as long as my mobile 
>version of it is not on all the time, their surveillance equipment has 
>no chance to map it's location anyway). But all this is technology and 
>it will improve....

Thinking this through again... they cannot know the location of your AP 
when travelling, unless it's been mapped - which requires capturing the 
SSID/MAC *and* a GPS location using crowd-sourcing techniques. (Where 
the streetcar is one of the crowd, albeit an infrequent visitor, and you 
can be one of the crowd too[1]).

So what's probably happening here is that because the SSID is the same 
as the one you normally use, they are making an assumption you are at 
home.

If there are other mapped wifi points within reach, it might make a 
different decision, because of the inconsistency of location between 
your AP, and all of those others. What would be interesting is finding 
out what a third party's laptop was told about the location, when logged 
in via your AP for the first time.

[1] In Google Maps, it's possible to set a "default location", which it 
would seem updates the database corresponding to "your" SSID/MAC. I've 
moved across town with the same AP and my location moved too. You could 
perhaps try setting a new default via your travelling AP next time you 
are in the field, and see what happens.
-- 
Roland Perry

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