Locaid launches Internet and mobile location-tracking service

Locaid has developed cool mobile tracking technology that gambling companies and banks have exploited. By using tracking data, Locaid can tell whether a mobile user is within the borders of Nevada and can legally place real-money bets on an online gambling site using a mobile phone. It’s a pretty good way to monitor digital rights, device location, fraud, and compliance issues.

Today, the company adds to its “location as a service” platform by adding mobile location to Internet protocol location-tracking techniques. That technology can authenticate where a person or device is, and the combination of an Internet address and mobile location serves to provide better accuracy for companies that have good reasons for tracking users. The technology is important to banks, casinos, e-commerce companies, among others. Seven of the top 10 banks use Locaid, which has data on 350 million devices.

Locaid IP Location determines the physical location of web site visitors anywhere in the world using an IP address of the device that initiates an internet session. That address reveals data about the connection originator (such as  latitude/longitude, state, zip code, and network information). If it turns up something suspicious, it needs more verification to properly identify the user. Mobile location supplements this verification effort, resulting in multisource location verification. The company makes its technology available to customers through a single applications programming interface for developers.

Rob Gerber is the chief executive of the San Francisco company, which was founded in 2009. Rivals include Location Labs and Neustar. All of the companies will have plenty to track, as there are more than 9 billion connected devices today and that is expected to grow to 50 billion by the end of the decade, Locaid says.

“We’re just getting started,” said Gerber. “Draw three intersecting circles – mobile, location and cloud – and Locaid sits right smack in the middle. We are enabling companies and developers to locate every single one of their employees, assets, customers, all through a single API and all permission-based. By making location access simple, we make our customers very happy.”