ASIGN / GEO PICTURES – CROWDSOURCED, IN-SITU VISUAL GMES VALIDATION

Data in Use
Satellite radar images and in-situ photos

Service summary
Satellite radar images in urban areas require in-situ verification due to backscatter. After asking the public for help, we needed a crowdsourcing tool to provide reliable data. In GEO-PICTURES, AnsuR created the smartphone app ASIGN, which captures and sends reliably geo-tagged and time-stamped images to UNOSAT at CERN. Announced on Facebook, the app was successful in helping the UN produce better flood maps during the 2011 Thailand floods.

Customer Benefit
ASIGN�s crowdsourced in-situ photos provide for faster, higher quality remote-sensing products that help save lives, property, costs, and infrastructure.

The Expertise
«The usefulness of the ASIGN mobile app was already demonstrated during the Thailand flooding of 2011. It clearly exhibits the social dimension of near real-time information from space and from the ground, merged for the benefit of those struck by disaster.»

Dr Thomas Beer
GMES Policy Coordinator
European Space Agency (ESA)