Survey on the current status of services that acquire location information of people

Abstract

　The dissemination of mobile devices and the establishment of various communication modes enlarge a growth potential of services utilizing location information of mobile devices. The aim of this study is to describe the role of mobile location service (MLS) provider, MLS technology, and its function, and also to clarify the relationship among those. While previous literature has emphasized the role of third party in expansion of MLS functions, our results how that integrative platformers including Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple play key roles provide diverse MLS functions, who have core technologies in acquiring location information and developing software for mobile devices and utilize short range information.