Social Sensing and Crowdsourcing: the future of connected sensors

Conference Paper by C. Geijer, M. Larsson, M. Stigelid: “Social sensing is becoming an alternative to static sensors. It is a way to crowdsource data collection where sensors can be placed on frequently used objects, such as mobile phones or cars, to gather important information. Increasing availability in technology, such as cheap sensors being added in cell phones, creates an opportunity to build bigger sensor networks that are capable of collecting a larger quantity and more complex data. The purpose of this paper is to highlight problems in the field, as well as their solutions. The focus lies on the use of physical sensors and not on the use of social media to collect data. Research papers were reviewed based on implemented or suggested implementations of social sensing. The discovered problems are contrasted with possible solutions, and used to reflect upon the future of the field. We found issues such as privacy, noise and trustworthiness to be problems when using a distributed network of sensors. Furthermore, we discovered models for determining the accuracy as well as truthfulness of gathered data that can effectively combat these problems. The topic of privacy remains an open-ended problem, since it is based upon ethical considerations that may differ from person to person, but there exists methods for addressing this as well. The reviewed research suggests that social sensing will become more and more useful in the future….(More).”