Collaborative Proposal: People and Place: Geographic Information Technologies and Patterns of Individual Identification

这一合作研究项目将研究新兴地理信息技术与不断变化的个人身份识别模式之间的关系。跨学科研究小组将研究向数字地理信息系统过渡的长期社会后果，特别是对个人隐私和身份的影响。该项目将对信息系统的一系列案例研究进行全面的比较分析，其中包括地理数据和个人身份数据。这一分析将确定身份识别实践中的趋势和趋势，对社会公平和权力可能产生的影响进行理论分析，在概念上将地方力量与更全球性的力量区分开来，并提出修改这些技术的方法，使其使用更符合对隐私和相关人类价值观的保护。这些案例包括开发三个应用领域的系统：(1)地理人口测绘；(2)应急响应系统；(3)智能车辆和移动远程信息处理。选择案例是为了便于从三个方面进行比较。前两个维度涉及系统的功能：地理信息系统是否旨在对地点、人口或流动个人进行建模；以及该系统是否主要旨在促进商业或监管社会风险。第三个维度涉及该系统运作所在的管辖权。选择的情况允许一组复杂的比较，这些比较可以保持每个维度的方面不变，而保持其余维度的不同方面。每个案例研究将采用文件和访谈数据的汇编和分析，以揭示该系统的信息收集和操纵的机制、人和地点的建模以及该系统开发和使用的体制、经济、法律和文化背景。研究结果将引起各种学科和跨学科团体的兴趣，包括通信和信息技术、公共政策和地理学的学者，以及公共政策实践者、技术开发人员和隐私权活动家。此外，这项研究还检查了个人在日常生活中经常在没有有意义的知识和同意的情况下与之互动的系统。鉴于基于地理信息的系统的激增，以及公众对隐私和身份问题的日益敏感，研究结果可能会引起公众的普遍关注，并对政策讨论具有价值。

This collaborative research project will examine the relation of emergent geographic information technologies to changing patterns of individual identification. The interdisciplinary research team will address the long-term social consequences, and in particular the consequences for personal privacy and identity, of the transition to digital geographic information systems. The project will provide a comprehensive comparative analysis of a set of case studies of information systems which incorporate both geographic and personally identifying data. This analysis will identify trends and tendencies in identification practice, theorize possible effects on social equity and power, conceptually separate local forces from more global ones, and suggest ways in which these technologies may be modified so that their use is more consistent with the protection of privacy and associated human values. The cases include developing systems in each of three areas of application: (1) Geodemographic Mapping; (2) Emergency Response Systems; and (3) Intelligent Vehicles and Mobile Telematics. The choice of cases is designed to facilitate comparisons along three dimensions. The first two dimensions concern the functions of the system: whether the geographic information system is intended to model places, populations, or mobile individuals; and whether the system is intended primarily to facilitate commerce or to regulate social risk. The third dimension concerns the jurisdiction within which the system operates. The chosen cases permit a complex set of comparisons that can hold aspects of each dimension constant, while varying aspects of the remaining dimensions. Each case study will employ the compilation and analysis of documentary and interview data to reveal the mechanics of the system's information collection and manipulation, the modeling of persons and places, and the institutional, economic, legal, and cultural context of the system's development and use. The research results will interest a variety of disciplinary and interdisciplinary groups, including scholars of communication and information technology, public policy, and geography, as well as public policy practitioners, technology developers, and privacy activists. Moreover, the research examines systems with which individuals will interact throughout their daily lives, often without meaningful knowledge and consent. Given the proliferation of systems based on geographic information and the growing public sensitivity to privacy and identity issues, the research results are likely to be of general public interest and valuable to policy discussions.