Do you ever watch the CBS show 'Person of Interest'? It's about a computer that tracks individual people and sends in a team to rescue them when it perceives they are in mortal danger. It turns out that today's technology is closer to this capability than you might think. Yesterday I attended a talk by a senior program officer from the Polio team about a grant with Oakridge National Laboratory to assess population using satellite imaging. The goal is to accurately determine the population and where they live in Nigeria for the purpose of distributing polio vaccines. Censuses can be inaccurate particularly in countries where 20% of the population is under 5 years old and this can lead to shortages or expensive waste of vaccines for mass immunization programs.
The technology is breathtaking. Sandia scientists can analyze images anywhere in the world down to 0.5 meters resolution. They use team members on the ground to assess which kinds of structures are non residential and residential and also how many people of what socio-economic status and demographic live there, and then apply these assumptions to satellite images. The boundary between different kinds of residences indicates the socio-economic status with shanty towns having ragged edges and more expensive planned developments having straight edges. Infra red imaging can be used to distinguish one crop from another and also to identify water, for example open sewers which often carry diseases. While the power of this technology is immense, the biggest challenge is getting local governments to accept and use the data. Many do not want to know about small communities under the radar as the implications of being obliged to provide services and also even for redistricting and impact on elections can be considerable.
Big brother is watching you!
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