Location service in mobile computing environments

With the advent of mobile computing devices and cheap location sensing systems, location information has become an important resource both for mobile and ‘desktop users’. In this paper, we describe some key concepts a scaleable ubiquitous location service should be based on. Firstly, we show how such a service can accommodate multiple location sensing systems. Secondly, we discuss hierarchy-based access control policies as a flexible and powerful mechanisms to protect users’ privacy. Thirdly, we address some issues concerning the visualisation of location information.