Towards a Collaborative Smartphone Sensing Platform

In recent years, Armed Services and other Law-enforcement agencies around the world have shown increased interest in evaluating the possibility to recommend smartphones and hand-held devices as part of the standard gear for its personnel, who are actively engaged on battlefield or in crime-prone areas. The primary motive that drives these analysis efforts to employ smartphones is the prospect of increased “Situational Awareness” that can be achieved through a digitally connected network of humans. In this vein, a group of researchers at TecˆEdge facility have developing a collaborative smart phone sensing platform that is focused on providing a pervasive, seamless and convergent communications platform for a group of interested collaborators, equipped with only a off-the-shelf smart phone. This paper provides a brief introduction to the prototyped sensing platform and three smartphone applications that show potential to solve real-world problems, when applied aptly. Further, the paper concludes by providing the implications of the present work and the insights into future work.