Google helped fight illegal fishing with new tool

Giant tech company Google unveiled its new tool that can track down thousands of boats around the world. The new tool can harness satellite data around the world in real time according to Google. This tool aims to track illegal fishing activities in protected oceans.

90 percent of fisheries in the world are exploited and over-fished according to th Global Ocean Commission and this resulted to the decreasing number of tuna and swordfish in the oceans.

To create the powerful tracking device, Google Inc. has teamed up with mapping company SkyTruth and marine-advocacy group Oceana. Global Fishing Watch, the interactive tool that Google produced was launched in Sydney.

The Global Ocean Commission estimated the cost of the tool to be around US$23.5billion. It works by analyzing Automatic Identification System traffic signals. It can gather information like ship’s name, speed and direction, and location.

A statement from Brian Sullivan of Google's Earth Outreach and Oceans section says:

"While many of the environmental trends in the ocean can be sobering, the combination of cloud computing and massive data is enabling new tools to visualize, understand and potentially reverse these trends."

According to SkyTruth, the new tool will be used to track fishing vessels and much of the information and its activities are available to the public.

Since one of the problems in stopping illegal fishing is the lack of jurisdiction involving high seas, the Global Ocean Commission hopes that the new tool can track down and identify vessels that are planning to do fishing on protective waters such as the Phoenix Islands Protected Sea in Kiribati.

Google Inc said the program’s target is to have it available to the public by 2015 or 2016. Availability will depend on the funding.