A year ago we related how the National Statistics Institute was preparing to track the movements of users, using the data provided by the telephone operators to the government. Today the INE offers its results clarifying how they use that information and what it is for.
Tara the controversy caused a year ago by the exposure of user privacy, the statement now shows how the anonymous data from millions of mobile phones have served to see how on certain days of last year the Spanish have moved from one province to another. other. The information lets you know where citizens are coming from and where they are going with amazing precision.
Four key days
As we indicated months ago, the objective is to analyze the movements in summer and Christmas and the differences in movements between day and night. This allows evaluating the flow of displacements in order to be able to act better on key dates such as those analyzed.
According to the study, these data only collect the mobility of the population residing in Spain , classified in more than 3,000 different regions, given that the original source is national dialing telephones . Therefore, the movements of foreign tourists are not reflected. This allows us to see how certain coastal areas multiply their population in summer by 4, based on July 20 and August 15, 2019. Based on this information , mobile tracking allows us to focus on some of the most popular destinations for Know the specific areas from which vacationers arrive (even at the district level).
The tracking of our smartphones is so millimeter that it allows us to know that in summer Gandía is filled with citizens of a certain district of Getafe, Leganés or Alcorcón at the same time that Benidorm does not stop receiving visitors from Arganda de Rey, Albacete and, above all, all, from different districts of Vitoria-Gasteiz.
The day and the night
But the position of mobile phones not only detects movements, but also moments. In this way it is possible to know which areas multiply their population to a greater degree and at what time they do so. In this way, it is observed that certain regions of the big cities (financial, university and industrial centers, double the population during the day compared to the night).
Curiously, at night there is less data due to a key action that many users do with their mobile phones at bedtime: turn it off. The only way to avoid tracking your phone .