Here’s a couple of ArrivedOK privacy questions we’ve been asked to answer in a private communication:

1. How precise is ArrivedOK tracking?

ArrivedOK only knows the town where you landed, with no more precision.

2. What if one’s boss or anyone else wants to use ArrivedOK to track where I am?

The only possibility for your boss or anyone else rather then you of using ArrivedOK to track where you are is to covertly create an account on your behalf by obtaining your telephone for authorization with the system. If you already have an authorized number in your ArrivedOK account, no one can use that number except you – we just don’t allow using same number across different accounts; one’s attempt to register it will be turned down. Even yourself cannot duplicate your once registered number in another account; you will have to delete it from the primary account first.

Please, post your privacy-related questions in the comments below – and I will answer them.

ARRIVEDOK FLIGHT ARRIVAL TRACKER LETS AIR PASSENGERS NOTIFY OTHERS ABOUT THEIR PERSONAL LANDING BY SMS, EMAIL, BLOGS, TWITTER

Austin, TX – 23 March 2009 /PR Newswire/ — ArrivedOK (www.arrivedok.mobi/hello), the personal flight arrival tracker, is now open for public beta testing. The service lets air passengers automatically notify others about their arrival to airports worldwide by SMS, email, via weblogs or Twitter, and enables users to save on international roaming charges.

Developed by Eyeline Communications Inc., ArrivedOK lets air travelers automatically alert others about their arrival at their destinations. Schedule your flight at www.arrivedok.mobi with the destination airport, expected arrival time, your recipient phone numbers or emails. ArrivedOK tracks your cell phone in the mobile network when you turn it on after the landing. Then it instantly sends ‘Arrived OK’ messages to the list of your recipients.

The unique feature of ArrivedOK is that it alerts about one’s personal arrival instead of flight status in general. “Unlike other flight services, which are based on general flight data from dispatcher centers, ArrivedOK rely on particular subscriber’s mobile phone status. It tracks one’s actual appearance in the destination airport, so one’s friends and family are 100 percent sure the person is landed okay.” – says Andrey Deriabin, Director Business Development at Eyeline Communications.

Based on patent-pending technology, ArrivedOK works by detecting its subscriber’s mobile phone when it is registered in a local GSM network. ArrivedOK allows sending personalized arrival alerts to different groups of recipients, and enables subscribers to save on international roaming charges when traveling abroad.

“The service is designed to be both fun and useful,” says Andrey Deriabin. “Air travelers usually spend remarkable amount of money when texting or making phone calls in roaming just to let someone know they landed fine. With ArrivedOK those people who care about their expenses will be able to make it for less.”

ArrivedOK starts its public beta testing with 29 mobile networks in 10 selected countries. For more information visit http://www.arrivedok.mobi/hello

About Eyeline Communications Inc.

Eyeline Communications Inc. is incorporated in Austin, TX and has offices in Singapore, Russia, and CIS. With 80 mln subscriber base in Europe and Asia, Eyeline provides carrier-grade B2B products and delivers mobile services to the end users.

Contact: Andrey Deriabin
Eyeline Communications Inc.
Tel: +73833630139
Cell Phone: +79139859722
Email: andrey.deriabin {at} eyeline.mobi

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Why is ArrivedOK THE PERSONAL flight arrival tracker? Simply because when it notifies your recipients about your arrival it relies on your personal mobile phone status instead of general data from dispatcher centers like all other trackers do. Those data can be about flight delays, scheduled arrivals, departures, even about actual time of a plane’s touchdown but they say a little about YOU – whether you’re okay or not. ArrivedOK does.

Well, it goes a step further in that respect. It’s not a secret that taking off and landing are most dangerous moments of a flight. I don’t want to scare anyone but if a plane crashes at touchdown at the scheduled arrival time, a usual flight tracker still may say that it landed normally, while in fact it did not. ArrivedOK will not mislead you in that case. If you landed safely enough to be able to turn on your phone, it will notify your buddies that you’re ok. If you are not, it will keep shut.

Learn more about ArrivedOK behaviour in different situations (‘Right Time-Wrong Place’; ‘Right Place-Wrong Time’; ‘Wrong Place-Wrong Time’).

See our previous posts about flight trackers:

• Top 5 (Web) Flight Trackers
• Mobile Flight Trackers

While searching the web on the flight tracking topic, I came across this article from New York Times. Citation:

“…when a storm shut down Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport last [on] Dec. 29 [, 2006], forcing American Airlines to divert 130 planes to other airports in the region, what high-tech system came into play at the world’s largest airline?

“A legal pad,” said Don Dillman, managing director of American’s operations center here, where dispatchers direct flights around the world…”

Wait! A legal pad? The article goes on assuring that now there is some nice flight diverting software. However, with all the aviation cuts, it seems very probably that one can find him/her self stranded soemwhere whilst your beloved ones are worrying not having infromation about your whereabouts!

What tracker would track in these circumstances?

Information Requirements

Obviously, I want information supplied by the flight tracker to be:

1) Accurate
That is there are no mistakes regarding times (including mistakes with time zones, summer/winter time change, 24/12 hour format, day+1 etc.), flight status, and other information.

2) Up-to-date
We need real-time tracking and automatic updates.

3) Full
Would be great to have all the required information in one place.

4) Easy to find
Maximum simplicity for finding the most needed information (status, times).

5) Easy to get
Even though it is easy to find, it may not be easy to access and receive — that is to view, save, and have it updated.

6) Accessible from any place
What if you need to look up the info in a taxi on your way to the airport?

7) Accessible any time
This can be a redundant requirement if 6) is valid. But it still needs checking especially regarding upgrades to the service and its reliability.

8) Accessible from any medium
It means access from:

• the Internet
• a phone call
• a mobile service (SMS/USSD/WAP etc.)