Is It Time For GPS SmartPhones To Include Security Tracking

After a recent news story where a stolen Apple iPhone was recovered by police with in 9 minutes of being snatched from the victim thanks to a GPS Tracking application, is it time for all GPS smartphones to include this kind of technology as standard?

The high value of devices like iPhones makes them a hot target for would be thieves and muggers, but if they knew stolen handsets could be quickly tracked down would they be such a target?

Most new smartphones include GPS technology to enable the use of Sat Nav and location based services, would it be such a big step to turn this in to a security feature? Of course the problem is that handsets can be easily turned off which disables the GPS and radio antennas from working and reporting the handsets position. However with collaboration between manufacturers, mobile networks and the police these technical difficulties could be overcome without infringing data protection rights of owners and users.

Many companies have already made tracking applications for iPhones, Blackberrys, PDA’s and Symbian devices and the effectiveness of using tracking to recover stolen assets has been proven with over 19,000 stolen vehicles recovered in the UK by TRACKER alone.