GPS World

Tag: GPS monitoring

  • GPS monitoring and crimes that shouldn’t have happened

    GPS monitoring and crimes that shouldn’t have happened

    Headshot: Tracy Cozzens
    Tracy Cozzens

    Law enforcement agencies have been quick to adopt GPS monitoring of offenders on parole or awaiting trial. An estimated 300,000 people in the U.S. are wearing ankle bracelets. Proponents say the systems enhance public safety, reduce prison costs and provide social benefits.

    However, technology is only as good as the people who use it, as a tragic case from Ohio illustrates. In February 2017, 21-year-old Reagan Tokes was kidnapped and murdered after leaving work in Columbus. The man convicted of killing her had been recently released from prison. Yes, he was wearing a GPS monitor, but no one was tracking his movements until after he robbed six people and killed Tokes.

    In response, Ohio lawmakers introduced a bill to improve real-time monitoring of parolees by shrinking the workload for parole officers, who now are responsible for 90 to 100 offenders at one time.

    In cases in Florida and New York, the system worked as intended and alerts were sent, but authorities took no action. In the Florida case, no one was on duty, despite the suspect having triggered more than 100 alarms.

    An offender in Syracuse, New York, was able to remove and reassemble his ankle bracelet in less than a minute, using techniques he learned when he watched the officers put the bracelet on him. Because of numerous false alarms, the monitoring company had set a five-minute limit before officers were notified, at the police department’s request. Having beat the monitoring system, the offender committed a murder.

    A nationwide investigation by ABC’s “20/20” news magazine program found at least 50 murders allegedly committed since 2012 by people ordered to wear monitored ankle bracelets.

    “Public safety is only as good as the supervising entity we provide our products to,” Jennifer White of monitoring company BI Analytics commented on “20/20.” Criminal justice experts say the monitoring system should not be used for anyone who is a risk to the public.

    While policymakers and law-enforcement authorities determine the most effective use of such systems —and how to address issues of monitoring response, overtaxed officers and tight budgets — the monitoring industry continues to improve the “tamper-resistant” devices as well as the services offered.

    After all, no one wants to live with a false sense of security.

  • GPS actively monitoring Kilauea’s eruptions, lava flows

    GPS actively monitoring Kilauea’s eruptions, lava flows

    GPS measurements are playing a key role in monitoring the erupting Kilauea volcano in Hawaii.

    The floor of the Pu’u ‘O’o Crater started to collapse on April 30, following weeks of uplift and increasing lava levels within the cone and seismicity in the East Rift Zone. The eruptions began on May 3, when a magnitude 5 earthquake struck, causing further collapse of the crater.

    The Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO) has monitored volcanic activity on the islands since 1912. The HVO is operated by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and is issuing continuous updates on Kilauea.

    The HVO is closely monitoring the biggest fissures in what is known as the lower East Rift Zone. Geologists are onsite to track ongoing and new fissure activity and the advance of lava flows.

    Kilauea eruption map as of 8 a.m. HST, May 21. Shaded purple areas indicate lava flows erupted in 1840, 1955, 1960 and 2014–2015. (Photo: USGS)

    GPS stations monitor land movement of Kilauea. The Big Island’s most active volcano has erupted nearly continuously for more than three decades.

    “Magma supplied to the Lower East Rift Zone was indicated by the northwest displacement of a GPS monitoring station,” the HVO said in its May 26 status update, but the station ceased movement a few hours later, telling a new story.

    “Magma continues to be supplied to the Lower East Rift Zone; however, a GPS instrument near the Lower East Rift Zone is no longer moving, suggesting that the rift zone is no longer inflating in this area,” the HVO stated. “Elevated earthquake activity continues, but earthquake locations have not moved farther downrift in the past couple of days.”

    Map of GPS stations installed near the Pu’u O’o vent on Kilauea. (Photo: USGS)

    The GPS stations also monitor earthquake activity associated with the volcano. For instance, the May 4 magnitude 6.9 earthquake resulted in seaward motion of 1.5 feet along portions of Kīlauea’s south flank as measured by GPS stations across the volcano.

    “Because active volcanoes make for unstable land, highly sensitive seismometers come in handy to track the frequency and strength of micro-earthquakes,” the HVO explained. “Global Positioning System (GPS) devices and another satellite-based technology, InSAR (Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar), map ground deformation (inflation and deflation) to within a fraction of an inch while tiltmeters measure slope from ground level. Together, these technologies help track lava’s movement underground and help pinpoint where it might break through the surface.”

  • Lockheed Martin begins modernizing receivers for GPS monitoring stations

    Lockheed Martin begins modernizing receivers for GPS monitoring stations

    Three of six new Lockheed Martin-developed state-of-the-art receivers are now deployed to help the U.S. Air Force maintain the accuracy of GPS satellite signals.

    In June, the first new Monitor Station Technology Improvement Capability (MSTIC) receiver became operational at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The upgrades continued at U.S. Air Force monitoring stations on the Kwajalein Atoll and Hawaii.

    These critical upgrades of the GPS Monitoring Stations from early 1990s technology are part of an overall effort to modernize and maintain the current GPS ground control system, known as the Architecture Evolution Plan Operational Control Segment.

    GPS monitoring stations are globally dispersed, fixed-position sites that monitor GPS satellite signals and help maintain their navigation and positioning accuracy for users around the world.

    Under Lockheed Martin’s GPS Control Segment (GCS) Sustainment contract, the company used an agile development methodology to develop and deploy the first MSTIC receiver on schedule in under 36 months. The three remaining Air Force GPS Monitoring Stations will be upgraded with MSTIC receivers by the end of 2017.

    “Taking advantage of current commercial technology trends has allowed us to provide the Air Force with a monitoring capability that can support the Air Force’s GPS mission for years to come,” said Vinny Sica, vice president and general manager of Mission Solutions for Lockheed Martin. “The MSTIC receiver addresses today’s obsolescence problem while providing the opportunity for the monitoring of modernized navigation signals in the future.”

    The new MSTIC receiver’s software-defined radio (SDR) technology will replace the legacy monitor station receiver element (MSRE)’s hardware-based ASIC (application-specific integrated circuit) platform originally deployed almost two decades ago, Sica said.

    MSTIC leverages commercial off-the-shelf hardware without the need for custom firmware. Standard interfaces and the inherent configurability of the architecture simplifies sustainment and enables MSTIC software to migrate to new hardware platforms as commercial vendors increase processing power, improve reliability and enhance cybersecurity, Sica said.

    “MSTIC’s new SDR technology enables the remote application of mission specific software updates which will improve performance and enable reception of modernized GPS signals,” added Sica.

    The GPS Directorate at the U.S. Air Force Space and Missiles Systems Center contracted the MSTIC upgrade. Air Force Space Command’s 2nd Space Operations Squadron (2SOPS), based at Schriever Air Force Base, Colorado, manages and operates the GPS constellation for both civil and military users.

    Gen. David L. Goldfein, chief of staff of the Air Force, listens to 1st Lt. Mark Skinner, 2SOPS GPS mission commander, explain current 2SOPS activities during his visit to Schriever AFB Dec. 20, 2016. (U.S. Air Force photo/Christopher DeWitt)

  • GPS Monitoring of Sex Offenders Can Cut Recidivism

    The United States Department of Justice’s National Institute of Justice (NIJ) recently released a study that evaluated the use of global positioning systems (GPS) technology to monitor high-risk sex offenders on parole in California.

    Offenders in the GPS group demonstrated significantly better outcomes than offenders who were monitored in traditional ways. The evaluation showed that risk for a sex-related violation was nearly three times greater for offenders who received traditional parole supervision, than offenders who received GPS supervision. The risk of committing an offense that resulted in an arrest was twice as high for offenders who received traditional parole supervision than for offenders in the GPS group. When compared to traditional supervision, the study found that GPS monitoring costs approximately $8.51 more per day. The outcomes of GPS monitoring, however, are significantly better.

    TITLE: Monitoring High-Risk Sex Offenders with GPS Technology: An Evaluation of the California Supervision Program