You Can Surf, but You Can't Hide

Making a phone call has always been a game of chance. You never know whether the person you are calling is available. You just punch in the numbers and hope to get lucky.

Imagine being able to learn without dialing a single digit whether another person's phone is in use, or in the case of a cellphone, whether it is even turned on. Now imagine being able to do the same thing with any wired or wireless device of the future whether it is in the car, in an airplane or at the gym. Not only could you learn whether a person is available for a chat, but you could also deduce what that person might be doing at that exact moment, all without exchanging a word.

That is the idea behind a programming concept called presence awareness, which is based on the realization that appliances on a network can automatically be detected by other devices.

"The days of phone tag are on the way out," said Sonu Aggarwal, chief executive of Cordant, a company in Bellevue, Wash., that develops instant-messaging technology. "This is a very powerful concept with long- term implications."

Many software developers predict that presence technology will become almost as ubiquitous as communication devices themselves. In six months, Motorola officials say, the company will roll out a system that will allow a caller to tell whether another person's mobile phone is on and whether it is in use. Nokia and Ericsson,among several other telecommunications companies, are also developing the technology, for use in either land-line or wireless phones.

Presence technology is also being considered for hand-held computers, wireless Web pads, communications systems in cars, and even exercise machines that provide Internet access at the gym. Some systems, the officials say, will go as far as using tracking systems like the Global Positioning System, or G.P.S., to detect the location of a person who is logged in.

The prospect of information that can reveal a person's availability at a given moment, anywhere in the world strikes many people as both creepy and intriguing.

Katelyn Y. A. McKenna, an assistant professor at New York University who conducts research on Internet relationships, has found that people are comforted when they can see the distant movements of people from their inner circles, like family and friends. Devices that use presence technology could provide such reassurance.

"You could see that you could instantaneously reach these people if you need them," Dr. McKenna said. "I know my mother would be extremely reassured if she could see, `Oh, she's off the plane; her cellphone came on; she's landed.' "

But along with comfort comes the unnerving feeling of being watched, a lesson that has been experienced by millions of instant messaging users. By keeping track of the activity on their Buddy Lists, people with I.M. can use log-in information to get a sense of their buddies' routines when they arrive at work, when they are online at home on a weekend, or in some cases how long they have been away from their computers. Information that was private (or at least not easy to acquire) can become known with little effort by employers, co-workers, friends, family members and, sometimes, by strangers.

"When you have these technologies you really expose yourself and your day to a lot of people," said Bonnie A. Nardi, an anthropologist at Agilent Technologies, a company in Palo Alto, Calif., that makes high-tech monitoring devices.

After spending a few years studying instant messaging, Dr. Nardi said she became aware of the subtle impact of presence technology on people's lives. It is time, she said, to think about "what we want people to know about what we are doing at a given moment."

Software programmers and executives have begun talking about how to capitalize on presence technology's potential. For example, at Dynamicsoft, a company in East Hanover, N.J., officials have discussed how presence software, wireless hand-held computers and G.P.S. tracking could alert a person when a friend happened to be a few blocks away. A phone-based system could also automatically plug in teleconference participants the instant everyone in the group was available.

In the future, Mr. Aggarwal of Cordant said, technology might be so integrated that a traveler could wear a wireless badge that interacts with a computer on the back of an airplane seat. When the computer sensed that the traveler was seated, it could automatically redirect messages to the computer's screen or send word to the traveler's contacts that he was on board.

The only widely available version of the technology currently in use is instant messaging. If I.M.'s popularity is any indication, people may be ready to embrace the possibilities of presence detection.

More than 50 million people in the United States use instant-messaging products today, according to industry estimates, and many of those people say that their favorite aspect of the technology is the ability to see whether a buddy is online.

Still, even some of the technology's adherents acknowledge how strange it is to remotely broadcast their whereabouts. Mr. Aggarwal uses MSN Messenger, which displays a clock icon in the contact list to indicate when a person has not touched the keyboard or mouse for, say, five minutes. As soon as he resumes use of his keyboard or mouse, the clock goes away. Often, he said, he gets a phone calls the minute he hits the keys, and the caller is invariably someone who had been waiting for that icon to disappear.

Hints of a coming struggle between privacy and openness turned up in a recent project at Bell Labs, the research and development arm of Lucent Technologies. In the project, which was called Rear View Mirror, a scientist, Dr. James Herbsleb, and several colleagues studied a group of Lucent employees in American and European offices who used a Bell Labs instant messaging system for more than a year. Privacy issues arose from the start.

"Some people in Germany said,
`This looks like a surveillance tool for us,' " Dr. Herbsleb said.

He added that they did not like the idea that supervisors could detect and therefore monitor exactly how long they had been online and how much time they had spent typing on their keyboards.

As a result, Bell Labs researchers altered the software to give users complete control. The program's default options were set to make users appear to be offline. If people wanted co-workers to know they had logged in, they had to turn on the feature that displayed their availability.

That solution did not work very well, Dr. Herbsleb said. The software, which was intended to avoid problems like phone tag, was useless if people had to badger colleagues to announce their availability. Besides, he said, it missed the point of presence technology, which is useful precisely because it senses what is going on without any action by a user.

Ultimately, the researchers and employees compromised. The presence system was automatically turned on for people within small work groups. People outside those groups had to get colleagues' permission to watch their movements. "Don't allow people to just lurk and spy," Dr. Herbsleb said.

But as staying in touch electronically becomes the mark of modern movers and shakers, many people say they will gladly allow their presence to be known in exchange for the convenience of constant contact. "It's sort of like leaving the front door open, and saying, `Come on in; don't even knock,' " said David Wertheimer, who writes a daily Web log called Netwert and is an avid user of instant messaging software.

Software developers say they can design presence awareness systems to accommodate both those who seek privacy and those who want constant contact. Yahoo and Microsoft for example, include privacy features in their instant messaging products. Users must grant permission before their names can be added to someone's contact list. Instant Messenger, both the stand-alone version and the one embedded in AOL's Internet service, does not allow that level of control. Users have no way of knowing whether someone has added their screen names to a buddy list.

Michele Magazine, a publishing consultant in Manhattan who briefly used the Instant Messenger program from America Online, said she was troubled by the lack of privacy. "I don't want people to know when I'm at home," she said. "There was no way to hide."

Whether people will use permission features or other blocking tools is another question. Social pressure can be a powerful disincentive. Some teenagers who use instant messaging programs, for example, said they would not block their peers because they would not want to seem rude.

Consider something like the following alert showing up on your screen: "Bill wants to put you on his buddy list. Do you accept?" If Bill is merely a distant acquaintance, and you decline, will it look like a snub? Suppose your girlfriend can tell that you are in your office, using your computer but not your phone. If she decides to call and you don't answer, she may think: "Why not? Clearly you are available. Are you ignoring me?"

The Internet Engineering Task Force, the group that develops standards for Internet communication, has been thinking about several such implications, according to the engineers involved. One of them is Jonathan Rosenberg, chief scientist for Dynamicsoft and a co-author of the task force's standards for presence and instant messaging technology.

Dr. Rosenberg has come up with an answer for the social dilemma of managing privacy without appearing rude. His idea is appropriately called polite blocking, and it works something like a little white lie. Users could appear to be busy with phone calls when, in fact, they might be blissfully enjoying a few minutes of solitude.

There is another alternative, of course: People could extricate themselves from the technology often enough to keep their contacts guessing. A contact may determine that someone's mobile phone is on, and it very well may be, but it may also be sitting at home.

"Until we get to the bioimplant," said Craig Peddie, who works on presence technology at Motorola, "we won't be able to know that you really have it with you."

This and most of the news bothers me less and less these days.

What's my secret?

I'll tell you. I have resigned myself to being an outlaw. Once you accept your fate your future seems so much clearer.

Claire Wolfe might not be well known but she's well said.

Furuno makes a great plotter with a brilliant radar overlay. I took a trip across the bay today and the charted channel markers lined up with the radar targets perfectly.

We're on the cusp of technology and social chaos.

Get thee to a boat show.

I guess that you don't know much history. Never heard of "party lines " ?

I never disbuted this type of technology, I simply stated that when technology advances we are bound to "lose" some privacy. And there will always be people who fear that we have lost our rights.

I am leary of having a combined radar/GPS plotter. One input function or software glitch can "contaminate" the other, and you would not know it.

Better to have a radar independent of the GPS, side by side with it. Then if one goes nuts, the error will jump out at you. If both displays agree, you know you can trust them both.

I'll tell you. I have resigned myself to being an outlaw. Once you accept your fate your future seems so much clearer.

The sheer weight of modern law requires most people to be selective about which laws they keep and those that they break, your decision goes further in that you have removed all the associated guilt, modern pragmatism at work. Don’t look now but you are bound to piss off all the statist, nannies and thought police here at FR

It is time, she said, to think about "what we want people to know about what we are doing at a given moment."

I don't want people knowing my regular schedule which is why I refuse to use I.M. on my public E-mail.(I know it's all public,please don't start) My cell phone shows who's calling, and Family+Friends have my distinct separate Emails.Everyone else is blocked,and I like it this way!At least the article admits that "even some of the technology's adherents acknowledge how strange it is to remotely broadcast their whereabouts.A surprising admission!

I am still enamored of old fashioned paper charts. I dearly love my radar, my GPS, and my Loran but I syill take a solar or stellat fix every so often and I will still be able to avoid those rocks with my compass, my watch, charts, a knowledge of the currents from a coastal pilot if necessary, and dead reckoning. To me a big part of the fun is doing it the old fashioned way. It still amazes me that people will go out on the water without the knowledge that at any given GMT a star is only directly overhead one point on the planet amd the angle from verticle defined the circle of position. Oh well, I guess I am a traditionalist.

As to the sensing of presence on the network this does not seem like an advance in technology to me.

Stay well - Stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown

I love the new technology it makes passagemaking so much easier but I still do noon fixes when offshore.

I would be the first to say that redundancy is the better way to go but I'm telling you guys the Furuno system really works and the LCD screen is much smaller than the older CRTs.

The overlay is crisp and reinforces the chart data.

Come on in guys the water's fine.

And just so you know I don't have all my eggs in one basket I did get the differential GPS. It's accurate to within feet.

I shall at least check it out. Like you I have differential GPS. I have Two radar sets aboard both Raster scan color LCD. I used tohave a Vifil but I have gone to Raytheon. I do have chart plotter software aboard the computer I carry aboard but I have not intehrated any of the above other than in my head.

Stay well - Stay safe - stay armed - Yorktown

My last boat that I built had Furuno radar out to 72 miles. I also had a Trimble plotter with GPS (and NOAA charts by Maptech).

I always wanted to integrate the two and now the technology has finally caught up with my dreams.

Was it worth the wait. Hell yes!

The price is a quarter of the former system and everything is connected.

We owe all this to the blue water sailors from the Vendee Globe and Whitbread.

I was out the other day and just kept shaking my head while I watched the channel markers show up as hard targets on the radar line up with the plotter.

It is worth it but I won't give up my noon sight. I'm too used to the fact that someone could kick out a plug and shut down the whole system or the government could decide to degrade the signal like they did before.

Regards.

I agree about using the old tools and skills in coastal navigation.

But offshore off soundings it's GPS all the way.

Celestial is a beautiful thing. Did you know it is no longer taught at Annapolis? The sextant has gone the way of the astrolobe.

If GPS is ever shut down due to war, we will all have lots of time to dig out the sextant and tables. In that case, we will have many more serious problems than navigation.

If GPS is ever shut down due to war, we will all have lots of time to dig out the sextant and tables. In that case, we will have many more serious problems than navigation.

Then I guess the GPS satellites become a critical node of our defense structure. An attack against them would take out our Navy far more effectively than the Japanese ever did in World War II. I really do disagree with no longer teaching celestial navigation to naval officers. A ship whose GPS is disabled is therefor lost until it gets position fixes some other way.

Stay well - Stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown

I rarely pick up the phone in my own house unless I recognize the call by Caller ID.

Yeah, and if you didn't have caller ID you wouldn't have any satisfaction in not answering the phone. Admit it!

I see this starting a new industry. Masking software or virtual clones (bots)that generate so many random electronic ghost trails that the software tracking systems are overwhelmed.

Government nanny state will create new industries.

Anyone want to finance me?

Well, not exactly. I had an answering machine before Caller ID and I waited for people to leave messages and then break into the call if it was someone I wanted to talk to. The downside was calling folks long distance after they left a message.

A lot depends on if I'm expecting a call. Then, I'll be more likely to answer. I worked the graveyard shift for 18 months and got used to ignoring the phone the rest of the time.

I suppose the chief advantage of Caller ID, besides the obvious, is knowing when you return home if NOBODY called. But it's not like I live a lot differently without Caller ID. It's worth it but I could live without it if I needed to.

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