By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk
This is interesting at CES in Las Vegas this week: Peep Wireless Technology has developed a software App that turns every phone into a client/server viral transmitter/receiver and creates a peer-to-peer mesh network - a mobile Skype without those vulnerable 'supernodes' if you like.
These “seed phones” then capture every device with bluetooth, WiFi or other spectrum points (ie: Game Boxes, Pads, Cafes, Bluetooth cars, PC’s, Internet TV’s, numbering over 450 million locations) and cause the Peep Mesh to grow and grow around the world in a peer-to-peer manner. The app will also be released on other phone platforms in the future.
Why might a consumer want this?: They would never need to pay a phone bill again and all their email, internet and media access would be free forever and they would control a new type of internet/mobile network, says Peep rather excitedly. An embedded social network structure pays them to use the system and transact with the App.
Why might a network owner want this?: It saves them billions of dollars and years of build-out time and doubles their capacity almost overnight. It creates instant, low-cost, femtocell, picocell and dead-zone fill-in solutions.
The entire solution is software based but Peep says it will also launch a keyfob that quadruples the range, scope and power of the PeepApp.
With the Peep technology, every mobile device connects instantly to every other unit by WiFi, Bluetooth, optical, GSM, CDMA or walkie talkie channels that the PeepApp is constantly scanning. No cell tower, base station or internet server is needed. Phone calls, media sharing, texts, movies, media and data sharing can be free between all mobile devices. All mobile units act as nodes. They transport data traffic between all the other mobile devices in clusters. Any phone call moves from one device to the next in segments, sometimes in different duplicate segments with the fastest segment of the duplicates being used until the call reaches its destination. Unused duplicate segments are discarded. This viral mesh network growth can instantly span a vast area with no external infrastructure required. The patent-issued, particulated, AES protected data reduces network logjam by its data-spraying technique.
The proprietary technology offers the ability to interact with any phone anywhere in the world for free. PWT can move across any carrier system, via a “backdoor” technology that Peep says is entirely legal - Peep devices make voice and data calls by scanning and using the entire free spectrum adjacent to them. It only takes a handful of users to cover an entire large city.
Hmm - three BIG problems I see:
- Power consumption in the portable terminals if you are routing calls through the mesh
- The network operators (who own that adjacent spectrum, and if they don't then the devices can't use it, unless you use the crowded ISM or 2.4GHz bands)
- Until enough people download and use it it won't work very well
IMMEDIATE UPDATE:
However, I see California is allowing access to mobile phone records without a warrant - this would be a way to keep calls more secure
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