Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

Smartphone with FM Radio Tells Your Position

posted by LaminatorX on Wednesday May 21 2014, @03:54PM   Printer-friendly
from the Radio-Gaga dept.

kaszz writes:

The reason why FM receivers are present on smartphones is that they can be used to locate your position by noting a simple thing as signal strength of transmitters. More advanced methods makes use of SNR, frequency deviation and multipath interference characteristics. And the same method can be used for WiFi which of course makes collection of such data very useful for localization purposes where GPS etc isn't useful. Arrival time of a radio signal that is reported to the operator from many devices may also be used for the same purpose.

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Smartphone with FM Radio Tells Your Position | Log In/Create an Account | Top | 32 comments | Search Discussion
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

  • (Score: 2) by bucc5062 on Wednesday May 21 2014, @04:52PM

    by bucc5062 (699) on Wednesday May 21 2014, @04:52PM (#46019)

    And where can one find one of these new fangled "FM receivers" for my smartsphone.

    Here we have one guy telling me "hey, you're phone is a radio transceiver" and I go yeah, can I dial up 90.1 and listen to NPR ETV Radio? No for unless I now download some app that sill of course dish up ads (if I want it free, which I don't) or assume I want to listen to FM radio over the internet (what, no signal, but its a radio man...) /sarcasm

    I doubt it would be so hard to has as a basic function a built in FM receiver in my Samsung super phone. That is maybe the one thing I miss for one of my older phones had (gasp) a way to listen to local FM stations without needing to "connect".

    As to the article, really, locate via FM signals on a device that uses apps to listen FM signals 99% of the time...that is beyond amazing.

    --
    The more things change, the more they look the same
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  
    Total Score:   2  

  • (Score: 1) by MostCynical on Thursday May 22 2014, @03:28AM

    by MostCynical (2589) on Thursday May 22 2014, @03:28AM (#46247) Journal

    My Samsung i9197 (S4 mini) and many other "new fangled" phones sold in Australia have fm radio.

    There are have been moves to get people onto digital radio (DAB) but until they force it (as they did by turning off analgue tv), most people listen to FM and even AM radio (although many "young people" can bee seen using headphones while driving.. Which is one reason why emergecy services vehicles now have an extra "very loud" siren setting now)

    --
    "I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex