Location Based Services in Commerce Development

Tracking can be defined as the act of monitoring or checking someone or something. A tracking system is used to observe persons or objects on the move and supplying a timely ordered sequence of location data for further processing. The increasing rate of theft in the world makes tracking useful. Tracking a misplaced or stolen device on a real-time map interface using Global Positioning System (GPS) helps in reducing/solving this problem.

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a network of about 30 satellites orbiting the Earth at an altitude of 20, 000 km. The system was originally developed by the US government for military navigation. A GPS navigation device or receiver, is a device that is capable of receiving information from GPS satellites and then to calculate the device's geographical position. Any GPS receiver contains a computer that "triangulates" its own position by getting bearings from at least three satellites. The result is provided in the form of a geographic position - longitude and latitude - to, for most receivers, within an accuracy of 10 to 100 meters.

Location techniques operate in two steps: Signal measurements and Location estimate GPS satellites broadcast signals from space, and each GPS receiver uses these signals to calculate its three-dimensional location (latitude, longitude, and altitude) and the current time. Computation based on the measurements which may be carried out by the user equipment or the telecommunications network.

Location Tracking seems to be an interaction of various technologies such as Mobile telecommunication systems, Cell Identification, Global system for Mobile Communication (GSM), General packet Radio service (GPRS) and Geographic Information systems (GIS). In today’s world, the development of smartphones is gaining significant progress in the market with extreme performance parameters. During the last years the development of mobile devices have gained significant progress with respect to memory capabilities, advanced processing power and higher transfer rates to name only a few performance parameters. Navigation and positioning is one of the most enormous features available today, most liking and useful entity for the user.

Location Based Service is actually an intersection of three main technologies which are; “New Information and Communication Technologies” that encapsulate “mobile telecommunication system”, handheld devices and geographical information system.

One potential area of mobile commerce development is in location-based services (LBS). By the end of September 2002, there were an estimated 605. 6 million Internet users worldwide In June 2014, the global number of mobile phone users reached one billion for the first time. Together, the convergence of these technologies promises to bring further services. Worldwide, revenues from mobile commerce i. e. transactions over wireless telecommunications network are expected to exceed $75 billion by 2014.

There are many types of LBS which function at varying degrees of accuracy and scope. E911 is the most widely used LBS in the US which relays the location of mobile phone users to emergency units. One of the major benefits of GPS tracking is personnel tracking. GPS is also useful to track the movements of certain groups of people. Alzheimer’s and dementia sufferers can be tracked so they can be easily found if they ever wander.