New tech gadgets gizmos hi tech An artist wheeled 99 smartphones around in a wagon to produce fake traffic congestion on Google Maps

• An artist pulled 99 mobile phones around Berlin in a red wagon, tracking how the gadgets affected Google Maps’ traffic interface.
• Wherever the phones went, Google Maps showed a traffic jam, showing a red line and routing users around the area.
• Google Maps anticipates the density of cars and trucks in a location by pinging mobile phones that utilize the app.
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An artist “hacked” Google Maps’ traffic display– and all it took was a red wagon and 99 smartphones.

Simon Weckert toted the pile of smart devices down empty streets in Berlin. Every street he traversed all of a sudden looked like a traffic-heavy red zone on Google Maps, rerouting drivers to avoid the streets, as displayed in Weckert’s YouTube video recording the outcomes

Weckert essentially gamed the mechanism Google Maps utilizes to forecast traffic, he stated in an email to Service Expert.

A Google representative informed Organisation Expert that the app identifies traffic by constantly pinging smart devices that use place services and by utilizing “contributions from the Google Maps neighborhood.”

” We have actually introduced the capability to compare cars and motorbikes in a number of nations including India, Indonesia and Egypt, though we have not quite broken taking a trip by wagon,” the representative stated. “We value seeing innovative uses of Google Maps like this as it helps us make maps work much better over time.”