You don’t have to be a fan of the X-Files to believe that the government is listening to us and watching our every move. Discoveries about the level of wire-tapping in the United States in recent years have reached a high enough frequency to where every American has to stop and wonder about the nature of their privacy. Now, many people have begun to focus their privacy concerns towards the growing consumer GPS industry. With GPS devices for your car and cell phones, the ability for satellites to locate your whereabouts has grown exponentially. In fact, it is this capability that makes the GPS such a useful device in the first place. GPS devices transmit a signal out to the satellites that make up the global position system. While it is highly unlike that you will be tracked without your knowledge, it could happen, provided the tracker was equipped with some very high level technology. But face it, GPS devices are great, and many people would never give their’s up – having grown accustomed to the convenience of never getting lost, always knowing the best routes to take and having a friendly voice in the car with them at all times. In the midst of this double-edge sword are two sides of the privacy debate. On the one hand, you have those individuals who have no problem sacrificing a portion of their privacy in the name of convenience, while on the other hand you have those who are genuinely concerned about the state of their privacy. Consider the following laws and rulings: · A recent ruling in New York City made it OK for police to plant a GPS device in the car of a suspect to help making trailing them easier. While most people will say that you haven’t done anything wrong, you don’t have anything to worry about, it still creates a slippery slope. · Some states now allow law enforcement and other government officials to activate the GPS devices inside cars or cell phones with a warrant. Both of these cases have been challenged, but are expected to be upheld by the Supreme Court. Taking concerns about their privacy to the next level, some people have even gone so far as to purchase “GPS Jammers” for their systems. These devices plug into the side of the GPS device and block communications between the satellites and your car. The result? You won’t be able to use your GPS while the jammer is in place, but there will be no way to monitor your signal either. As the “War against Terrorism” rages on, and the popularity of GPS devices continues to grow, expect the privacy debate to drag on as well. In the meantime, it is safe to say that the individual, law-abiding user of consumer GPS technology has little if anything to worry about in term of government satellites or stealth helicopters tracking their every move. Simply enjoy the flawless directions to the restaurant and everything will work out fine.
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There are two main benefits of installing a GPS tracking system in your car. One, you can always find yourself just in case you go and get lost. Two, you can find your car in case your car gets lost or is stolen. Today, more and more car manufacturers are including this system as standard equipment in the cars they sell. It’s the new-age device that helps you, like some omnipresent being, know where you or your vehicle are every minute of the day and night. There might be times when this might seem like a “big brother watching” feeling but more often than not, it provides a sort of security that someone is watching over your car.
If the GPS tracking system comes with your car, well and good, but if it does not, where do you get it? There are a number of retail outlets that stock them or you could find them on the Internet. You will find you have quite a choice of the latest devices. Many electronic shops not only sell you the devices but also install them for you. You’ll also find them in car specialty stores or shops that stock car accessories. On the Internet of course, no matter where in the world you are, you will find that you can order the tracking system of your choice and it will be mailed to you.
The extra cost involved in paying for a GPS tracking system might well be worth it if you consider your insurance payments. Many insurance companies have substantially reduced insurance premiums for car owners who either buy a new vehicle with a tracking device already installed or those who fit one after they have bought a vehicle. From a long-term point of view, you might just save a lot as far as your insurance payments go. Add to this the fact that the possibility of your car being stolen and not recovered is pretty slim and you’ll see it makes a lot of money sense to go the GPS tracking device route.
Very often, in a new car, the cost of the tracking device is not an extra and comes pre-installed as part of the car and its many features on offer. Even if you do not get it as part of the standard equipment, you would do well to consider paying for one and fit it in after you have got your vehicle. Not only do you have the security of knowing that it is a deterrent to vehicle theft, you also know that if your car did get stolen, chances are that you will find it with the help of the police tracking the emitting signal from your stolen car.
Besides that, if you have a teenager in the family and you want to know he is safe and where he is, a tracking device ensures a certain degree of peace of mind. It’s a great device to have in your car if you are lost, too. You can pinpoint exactly where you are and, even better, you can map your way to wherever it is you want to go from the spot you are in. In fact, you can chart out a whole course for your travel by road to any part of the country.
If you watch the History channel and watch the top 10 disasters that will befall the world, the number one prediction that is actual happening today is Global Warming.
We begin this article with a brief explanation of Global Warming and it’s impact on life on earth and then move on to the worlds first and only command and control system that will help first responders help save lives when disaster strikes.
Global warming is the increase in the earth’s average temperature due to the buildup of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from human activities.
Global climate changes were due to many factors, including massive volcanic eruptions, which increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere; changes in the intensity of energy emitted by the Sun; and variations in Earth’s position relative to the Sun, both in its orbit and in the inclination of its spin axis. Global Warming: Early Warning Signs Illustrates observed consequences, as indicated by periods of unusually warm weather, coastal flooding, and changes in glaciers and polar regions.
If there is coastal flooding in coming years due to melting ice caps, it won’t happen suddenly and give you a tidal wave effect.
Scientists all over the world are making predictions about the ill effects of Global warming and connecting some of the events that have taken place in the pat few decades as an alarm of global warming.
They also report of extreme weather events, long-term droughts, and rising sea levels. Warmer temperatures will alter weather patterns, making it likely that there will be more intense droughts and more intense rain events. Most scientists also agree extreme weather events like Hurricane Katrina or Los Angeles’ July record 119-degree Fahrenheit temperature are directly attributed to global warming.
Moreover, extreme weather events, including heat waves, droughts and floods, are predicted to increase in frequency and intensity, causing loss of lives and property and throwing agriculture into turmoil.
And the science tells us that human activity has made enormous impacts to our planet that affect our well-being and even our survival as a species. Many are agreed that climate change may be one of the greatest threats facing the planet.
Scientists have linked even this amount of warming to numerous changes taking place around the world, including melting mountain glaciers and polar ice, rising sea level, more intense and longer droughts, more intense storms, more frequent heat waves, and changes in the life cycles of many plants and animals.
Glaciers are melting, plants and animals are being forced from their habitat, and the number of severe storms and droughts is increasing.
In the next few years we will see great disasters happening right before our eyes in every corner of the world as man made gases continue to be spewed into the atmosphere causing death and pestilence.
Mankind however will not be extinct. People will survive only if there are systems in place that will aid the successful rescue and evacuation of people on a global scale.
A company called Ordia Solutions that had just released a Mobile Tactical Collaboration System (MCTS) interoperability / communication solution for law enforcement, fire/EMS, and search and rescue agencies. The MTCS is the first of a new generation of intuitive, easy-to-use browser-based solutions that addresses improved interoperability for first responders. The MTCS can be securely hosted inside an agency’s firewall and can be delivered to desktop PCs and laptops, and requires no client installation.
Ordia Solutions MTCS is built around the concept of shared workspaces. Multiple authorized user’s can simultaneously browse to a shared workspace to access the same dynamic operating picture. Each user sees identical data displayed on the map, including incident reports, infrastructure, operations, photographs, drawings, and streamed videos.
Any change to the operating picture by a user with editing access is immediately reflected on every other user’s display. Unlike traditional collaboration tools, MTCS facilitates seamless scaling of the user base during multi-agency operations. Because the system is entirely web browser-based, new task force members can be integrated quickly and begin collaborating by simply sharing a secure hyperlink.
The MTSC system use GPS Tracking called AdvanTraq GPS through a collaboration with GLC Enterprises, Inc. This uses an advanced tracking solutions for personnel, vehicle, K9, and cargo that operate as standalone solutions or integrated with and traceable through a Mobile Tactical Collaboration System workspace. Applications range from tactical operations and border/perimeter security to coordinating multi-jurisdictional and multidisciplinary critical incident response.
The MTCS system allows for real time GPS Tracking with shared workspaces to allow first responders to save lives during the upcoming disasters caused by Global Warming. The system is currently in trials with many governmental agencies including the FBI!
All trials to date have exceeded expectations and will be deployed throughout the world in the coming months.
The bad news is that the impacts from Global Warming cannot be stopped! It’s already a runaway train.
Massive disasters and death will continue to take the toll on the human race. How rescue personnel and first responders respond to the upcoming disasters will no doubt determine how many people can be saved now and in the future.
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All PC’s and networking devices use clocks to maintain an internal system time. These clocks, called Real Time Clock chips (RTC), provide time and date information. They are battery backed so that even during power outages, they can maintain time. However, personal computers are not designed to be perfect clocks – their design has been optimized for mass production and low-cost rather than maintaining an accurate time.
These internal clocks are prone to drift and although for many application this is can be quite adequate for some applications, but machines on a network that drift at different rates, become out of sync with each other and problems can arise, particularly with time-sensitive transactions.
NTP servers (Network Time Protocol) use a single time reference to synchronise all machines on the network to a time reference. This time reference can be either relative (a computer’s internal clock or the time on a wrist-watch perhaps) or absolute such as a UTC (Universal Coordinated Time) clock source like an atomic clock that is as accurate as is humanely possible.
For some applications a relative time source is sufficient, however in many environments, such as airlines and the stock exchange it is essential for time to be absolute. Imagine buying an airline seat only to be told at the airport that the ticket was sold twice because it was purchased afterwards on a computer that had a slower clock!
Atomic clocks are the most absolute time-keeping devices. They work on the principle that the atom, caesium-133, has an exact number of cycles of radiation every second (9,192,631,770). This has proved so accurate the International System of Units (SI) has now defined the second as the duration of 9,192,631,770 cycles of radiation of the caesium-133 atom and the development of UTC (Coordinated Universal Time) now means computers all over the workld can be synchronized to the same time.
However, atomic clocks are extremely expensive and are generally only to be found in large-scale physics laboratories. However, NTP servers can synchronise networks to an atomic clock by using either the Global Positioning system (GPS) network or specialist radio transmissions (MTF in the UK). It must be noted that Microsoft and others strongly recommend that external based timing should be used rather than Internet based, as these can’t be authenticated. Specialist NTP servers are available that can synchronise time on networks using either the MSF (or equivalent) or GPS time server signal.
GPS is an ideal time and frequency source because it can provide highly accurate time anywhere in the world using relatively cheap components. Each GPS satellite transmits in two frequencies L2 for the military use and L1 for use by civilians transmitted at 1575 MHz, Low-cost GPS antennas and receivers are now widely available.
The radio signal transmitted by the satellite can pass through windows but can be blocked by buildings so the ideal location for a GPS antenna is on a rooftop with a good view of the sky. The more satellites it can receive from the better the signal. However, roof-mounted antennas can be prone to lighting strikes or other voltage surges so a suppressor is highly recommend being installed inline on the GPS cable.
The cable between the GPS antenna and receiver is also critical. The maximum distance that a cable can run is normally only 20-30 metres but a high quality coax cable combined with a GPS amplifier placed in-line to boost the gain of the antenna can allow in excess of 100 metre cable runs.
There are also a number of national time and frequency radio transmissions that can be used to synchronise a NTP server. In Britain the signal (called MSF) is broadcast by the National Physics Laboratory in Cumbria which serves as the United Kingdom’s national time reference, there are also similar systems in Colorado, US (WWVB) and in Frankfurt, Germany (DCF-77).
A radio based NTP server usually consists of a rack-mountable time server, and an antenna, consisting of a ferrite bar inside a plastic enclosure, which receives the radio time and frequency broadcast. It should always be mounted horizontally at a right angle toward the transmission for optimum signal strength. Data is sent in pulses, 60 a second. These signals provides UTC time to an accuracy of 100 microseconds, however, the radio signal has a finite range and is vulnerable to interference.
Both a GPS NTP server and MSF time server can provide an affordable and efficient way to accurately synchronise computer networks using NTP.
Richard N Williams is a technical author and a specialist in the telecommunications and network time synchronisation industry helping to develop dedicated time server products; ethernet clocks, GPS time servers, NTP servers, digital wall clocks, atomic clock servers and SNTP time servers. Please visit for more information about NTP products and NTP servers This article may be republished and reprinted in its complete form or in part without seeking permission providing a relevant link to this site is maintained. It is a violation of copyright law to reprint or publish this content without following these terms.
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