How does this work?

[Biggles Bear]

From The Age

Police use satellite positioning to find cash
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<P>Spokane
<P>January 8, 2006 - 12:25AM<br>
The staff of a bank on the United States west coast tucked a global positioning satellite device into a bag of cash as they handed it to a robber.
Police tracked the device, quickly recovered the cash and arrested the alleged robber.
<P>
"You guys are good!" Thomas Fricks, said as Spokane policeman Tim Moses arrested him shortly after the Washington Trust Bank branch robbery, according to documents filed in federal court in Spokane, Washington.
<P>
Fricks told FBI agents he robbed the bank on Wednesday because "of his inability to keep a steady job and his need to provide for his family," according to court documents.
<P>
During the robbery, a masked armed man herded three employees into the bank vault and threatened to kill their families if they didn't cooperate, the documents say.
<P>
A teller who was on the phone with her husband told him the bank was being robbed and to call police.
<P>
The robber threw a black duffel bag to another bank employee and said he wanted $US40,000 ($A53,000) "and no bait bills," according to the court documents.
<P>
The employee complied, stuffing in more than $US37,900 ($A50,700) in cash - and the GPS device.
<P>
Police recovered a black duffel bag containing a loaded BB gun and the missing cash from the getaway minivan Fricks was driving.
<P>
AP

<P>My question is how did they track a GPS unit? A mobile phone I can understand but a GPS???

[Bronze]

GPS can be tracked, not the "Reciever" units we use but in the example of an eperp (However spelt) once a GPS "transmitter" is activated it will send an identifiable signal which will be trangulated and tracked until disabled.

This is very popular for tracking shipping containers, semi trailers, employee vehicles, ships and special aircraft. The commercial use is really starting to be applied and at last update the sats were needing to seriously upgrade to keep up with demand.

Mobil phones use similar technique but land based infrastructure.

Sorry - having a bad spelling day.

The Bronze.

[GIN51E]

a GPS unit with a built in transmitter which is likely designed for this purpose, just like the ones attached to sharks etc to watch their travels

[team_diesel]

Something like this http://www.surveillance-equip.com/surveillance.html

[Zytheran]

Something like this http://www.surveillance-equip.com/surveillance.html

And the next time someone with half a brain robs a bank they will use something like this..

http://www.ymcorp.co.kr/gps-jammer.htm

..or someone feels the impending impact of a GPS guided munition..

Others can mention all the other uses of a GPS jammer and get flamed..

[Chwiliwr]

Something like this http://www.surveillance-equip.com/surveillance.html

And the next time someone with half a brain robs a bank they will use something like this..

http://www.ymcorp.co.kr/gps-jammer.htm

..or someone feels the impending impact of a GPS guided munition..

Others can mention all the other uses of a GPS jammer and get flamed..

With devices like these around its a good thing that GPS is not the only way they track the criminals.

[Biggles Bear]

So it wasn't a GPSr as we know it in geocaching but something else all together that uses GPS to locate it self and then broadcast that information?

[Geof]

Think non technical journalism...... It involves the GPS system so it must be a GPS right

However I have wondered if it's posable to track the local osc in the GPSrs we use. A bit like the Radio inspecters did back in the days of radio & TV liscensing. Probebly would be possable from close range.

[Geodes]

But how did the GPS device get a satellite lock - it was in a black duffel bag and inside the guy's van? Maybe it was ouside for a short time while he transferred it to a house or whatever, but you wouldn't think it could get much of a fix under the conditions it was presumably operating under.

[Chwiliwr]

Most people are right in assuming GPS means the satellites but some systems that are called GPS use signals from other dedicated devices set up in a lot of cities to triangulate their position. They are not global as they will only work in cities. They work the same as the satellite GPS and have about the same accuracy as all they were originally designed to do was to track vehicle fleets.

It is more likely that what the bank had was a transmitter device that was tracked by a dedicated receiver held by the police. The old fashioned tracking bug concept.

[Kerry]

General generic journo terminology, sounds good but means bugga all.

That is of course unless the teller asked the nice bank robber could you please stick this aerial on your roof before you make your getaway, we want to track you.

No doesn't have all that much to do with GPS proper at all. But one thing that GPS Sats also do is detect and pin point nuclear detontations, every GPS Sat has a nuc detector and does mcuh the same in finding the position but just in reverse.

Maybe drop a nuc device in the duffel, wouldn;t be hard to find the hole!

[Rabbitto]

So it wasn't a GPSr as we know it in geocaching but something else all together that uses GPS to locate it self and then broadcast that information?

<p>It could have been a plain old Geko 101 with a siren, a red flashing light and a loudspeaker broadcasting the message "I am the idiot who robbed the bank. Please come and arrest me". As long as he didn't notice these extra modifications this would probably have worked. This would have probably worked equally as well on an Etrex or a Magellan. Come to think of it, it would probably also worked if it had been attached to a stick, though he may have been a little suspicious had it been a large stick.

[Team Stargazer]

Others can mention all the other uses of a GPS jammer[...]

Hmm ... that's given me an idea for a new cache ...

[team_diesel]

Others can mention all the other uses of a GPS jammer[...]

Hmm ... that's given me an idea for a new cache ...

But then there is always this: http://www.acma.gov.au/ACMAINTER.65668: ... pc=PC_1088

[Kerry]

GPS jammers are wonderful things, Moscow air show you can buy any size you wish. GPS jammers also attract "very unwanted attention" (and cruise missiles) like the plague, just ask Saddam who brought a few Russian made jammers.

Cheers, Kerry.