How Secure Do You Feel Now?

[sumps]

Go to this place...

http://earth.google.com/

Download the freebe and then run it from you desk top....

You will be presented with a globe.

In the Layers box (Bottom left) the Airports/transportation...then using your mouse spin round to al-Basrah....

Then zoom in as a far as you can (let it build) now what can you see?

Next go to Kabul ...then go to...

Now ask your self what can you do with this information...I find this very perturbing

Comment please....

 

[Albert Fatchock]

Not many by the pool that day!!! Things are only going to get worse with this kind of info on the net.

 

[The Helpful Stacker]

That imagery was taken quite a while ago and is very out of date.

To be honest its of less use to insurgents than the hundreds of locals crawling all over the camp day in day out, or the 'on our side' Police and Iraqi Army that have free access.

 

[Albert Fatchock]

Yep. Baggers is very different now as is the other place up north. At least two years out of date .

 

[pba_target]

yeah, most of the imagery is digital globe from about 2003/2004 era, although some are considerably more up to date. Still of concern in some areas (Nuke storage in Alb, NM, USA anyone?) but already available from various sources around the place. Google just put it together. Interestingly though, google have chosen not to blank out areas such as Area 51 in the sates, which Microsoft chose to do with their version of the same, although Google have fuzzed the whitehouse and such places. Would be more worried if I lived in L.A. (6inches to a pixel res, you can see people in the back of pickups, etc!)

 

[sumps]

You are missing the point.There is enough info...Think about what these pictures show to what you know now, from these images you get a Lat -Long, it wont take the "Iraqi Amature Rocket Society" long to work out the correct trajectory! - Go talk to the Int guys for a better understanding.

S

 

[pba_target]

You are missing the point.There is enough info...Think about what these pictures show to what you know now, from these images you get a Lat -Long, it wont take the "Iraqi Amature Rocket Society" long to work out the correct trajectory! - Go talk to the Int guys for a better understanding.

S

Hmm, depends on how much things have changed though.... and surely you can get a lat/long from a map? Although I grant you perhaps in some parts of the world maps are perhaps not as readily available as our good friends in OS would like them to be.....

Besides, if you can get the broadband connection to use google, you can buy a GPS with a sighting function from amazon

Seriously though, yeah, it is mildly worrying, but relying on imagery that's 2/3 years out of date would perhaps allow you to enhance your understanding of the layout of an area, but no more so than being a local! And given how many "locals" in that area have broadband internet.... perhaps we shouldnt be too worried? (Although perhaps the full version on a small tablet/pda with a sattelite uplink and gps would be quite useful)

 

[twitch]

I think you're missing the point

I think you're missing the point

No offence meant but I think you are underestimating the guys you refer to. These groups of people are not new to this game and are probably trained from an early age so the use of internet programmes for this reason will be pretty futile. I spent two tours out on the streets of southern Iraq (yes I am in the RAF) and the airport can be seen from miles around, no need for a laptop.

 

[ICATQ]

PIRA managed to drop home made mortar rounds into the back garden of No 10 based on experience and some chalk marks on the ground, coupled with a bit of basic map reading from an A-Z.

No laptop or Google back then.

 

[reddeathdrinker]

Have a look at Basra International as well then

2 nimrods, 2 Hercs, several Pumas, contra-rotating death bananas and Lynxes, plus all the accomodation sites mapped out.......

 

[The Helpful Stacker]

Have a look at Basra International as well then

2 nimrods, 2 Hercs, several Pumas, contra-rotating death bananas and Lynxes, plus all the accommodation sites mapped out.......

Its very dated image.

Without going into too many details a current satellite image would show a very different BAS. For starters the place I worked at a few months back is a big empty patch of sand according to that image.

Of course some stuff hasn't changed but thats why we have the ever efficient RAF Regt at Basrah, to keep all us eggs safe in our basket.

 

[sherminator]

Having worked out there on FP it makes no difference at all, the bad guys just line up with the tower and fire off what they have. They don't have long to set up cos of the RAF Regt patrols in the area. xxxxxxxxx. i would not worry about the maps i'd be more worried about when the bad guys get more experience and can land a mortar right on target, then it's tent city inferno time.