Google is using the location data it collects from billions of smartphones to show how people’s movements have changed as governments around the world lock down cities and issue shelter in place orders to slow down the spread of the coronavirus. From a report: Reports generated using this data, which is normally used to show how busy a certain location is on Google Maps, and which Google says does not identify individual people, are freely available on a brand new website called COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports. “We have heard from public health officials that this same type of aggregated, anonymized data could be helpful as they make critical decisions to combat COVID-19,” wrote Google senior vice president Jen Fitzpatrick and Karen DeSalvo, chief health officer for Google Health, in a blog post published Friday. The data is currently available for 131 countries, and in many locations including the US, you can also access data for individual counties.

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Source:: Slashdot