Beware, you are being tracked

Imagine being handed over a pink slip instead of conveyance reimbursement?

Well those of you who never step out of your home while on official travel better beware, because, it is possible that you are being watched all the time thanks to the ubiquitous mobile phone that you own.

And guess what, your employer will have and may produce proof in the form of cell-phone statements if you try to argue with the 'new' watchdog.

Yes, employers can now track the movements of their employees in real-time with just a phone call to the mobile phone service providers who can pinpoint the exact location of a user within 100 metres of accuracy following the signal trails emanating from cell phones.

The signals are picked up from the base transceiver systems (BTS) or cell sites.

The technology is as old as cell phones itself, just that it was used more constructively than for tracking lazy bones.

"Mobile applications are moving beyond voice and text, voice as in calls and text as in messaging, and tracking using cell phones is an emerging phenomena. This falls under enterprise value-added services (VAS) and the biggest use of this technology is to track vehicle movement," Idea Cellular Chief Marketing Officer Pradeep Shrivastava told Business Standard.

Even though, the technology was always available, the recent discovery of its importance and convenience has resulted in many industries like logistics, courier, transportation, FMCG, fast food and retail among others jumping on to the bandwagon.

Detective agencies and police are also using this technology to keep a tap on suspects and habitual offenders.

Omx, the express division of OM Logistics, is one such company that uses the services to monitor its 2,000 trucks plying across the country.

According to the company's country head Shantanu D, "GSM-based monitoring is cheaper and faster, compared with the earlier software-based tracking the company was using".

Previously, truck drivers used to SMS or call in and report the location of their vehicles, which was fed on to the net. Now this real-time tracking available, the data is received from the service provider. This also eliminates the need to trust the driver, who often might not be telling the truth.

Sumit Modi, a telecom analyst with Emkay Shares says, "GSM tracking is a service that falls under value-added services (VAS), which rakes in revenues of over Rs 4,000 crore per annum for cellular service providers."

Revenues from VAS for Bharti Airtel stands at around 10 per cent, while that of Reliance Communications is 6.6 per cent of its total mobile revenue.

With addition of more and more services like the GSM tracking, Indian mobile firms would register increase in revenues from VAS, he added.