Marine Traffic AIS

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mikejbuk

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Am I alone in thinking that marine traffic finder websites are intrusive? I would like to choose when the general public can view my vessels position (it also bugs me that the information is used for financial gain, but not to the same extent). I obviously use AIS for safety reasons and cannot see a way round the intrusion.

Mike
 
I fear this is not the answer you want, but......Turn off your active AIS and just use the passive mode. If all leisure boats used active AIS the screen would become pretty impossible.
 
A friend has just been delivering a boat from Turkey to Sicily in the blow last week. One of the crews wives emailed in panic because it had disappeared from marinetraffic. And she assumed something bad had happened.

They had just gone out of range.

Constant comms and technology like this and mobiles bring their own problems.
 
I'm afraid that your AIS transmissions, like all VHF transmissions, are all-informed. You can't determine what other people do with them. On the other hand, if you or I hear a marine radio transmission our radio licences require us to keep our own counsel, i.e. we're not to discuss what we hear with others. Of course, some people don't have licenses and others take great delight in discussing what they hear. As the previous Forumites have said, if you want to remain passive you should switch off your AIS transmitter.
 
Um, switch it off?

the only time you need it is crossing the shipping lanes or in fog, I think.
 
Whatever people may wish, yachts switching to silent mode except as described is not going to happen. I went into silent mode when passing through the Solent last year but generally leave mine transmitting. Although my primary purpose is to make my boat more visible to other vessels and the authorities, an added bonus is the interest and reassurance it gives to friends and family, who seem to know where I am before I do.

If sailors are really bothered by a cluttered screen and unnecessary alarms, all they have to do is switch off AIS, change the scale or change the alarm settings. I can't imagine a yachtsman relying on an AIS alarm when crossing the Solent anyway.
 
It must be state the obvious week. Revolution, I can turn it off?? Thank you all for this help.

Perhaps an example...

When encountering busy shipping in force 9 a few weeks ago, at night, in Biscay- being able to hail a vessel directly by name to ensure they could see me before having to tack and prat about the AIS proved very useful!
Collision avoided, my gin and tonic not spilt during an un-necessary tack in a bit of weather, but my details are appearing on a website used for commercial gain.
“Yes I know I can use radar and do, but yet to see mmsi details pinged back”
 
mikejbuk said:
It must be state the obvious week. Revolution, I can turn it off?? Thank you all for this help.

Perhaps an example...

When encountering busy shipping in force 9 a few weeks ago, at night, in Biscay- being able to hail a vessel directly by name to ensure they could see me before having to tack and prat about the AIS proved very useful!
Collision avoided, my gin and tonic not spilt during an un-necessary tack in a bit of weather, but my details are appearing on a website used for commercial gain.
“Yes I know I can use radar and do, but yet to see mmsi details pinged back”
Click to expand...

If you are in the middle of Biscay, Marine Traffic will not show your position because you are out of reach of the land based aerials that collect AIS signals and then feed them to the site. So, you can still have it on "at sea" but turn if off in coastal waters to maintain privacy.
 
You think the website is intrusive!!!
I show up on it and then one day found that there was a photo of the boat as well... strange... I wondered which of the crew might have taken a photo and uploaded it to Marinetraffic...
Upon viewing the photo I see that it was taken by and is copyright by Marinetraffic.com...
It is a nice hi res photo but strange that someone I don't know could see that I was always transmitting but didn't have a boaty photo and upload one anyway. Weird!
 
as to reception whilst out of sight of land...aren't some satellites now listening on the vhf frequencies and re-transmitting ship positions back to ground stations.
 
Martin_J said:
You think the website is intrusive!!!
I show up on it and then one day found that there was a photo of the boat as well... strange... I wondered which of the crew might have taken a photo and uploaded it to Marinetraffic...
Upon viewing the photo I see that it was taken by and is copyright by Marinetraffic.com...
It is a nice hi res photo but strange that someone I don't know could see that I was always transmitting but didn't have a boaty photo and upload one anyway. Weird!
Click to expand...

Someone put up a nice photo of my boat. I managed to get the copyright owners details from marinetraffic and he was kind enough to send me a nice digital copy.
 
JumbleDuck said:
I am horrified to learn that people are doing anything with position information being publically broadcast by boats.
Click to expand...

You hadn't heard of Marine Traffic before, then? It's been around for yonks.

One of my colleagues acquired some fame (not really sure why, it's hardly a grand technical challenge) for setting up a system by which the arrivals and departures of the Red Funnel ferries were posted on Twitter to help passengers know whether to rush or dawdle towards the terminal. That pulled its information from AIS.

Pete
 
prv said:
You hadn't heard of Marine Traffic before, then? It's been around for yonks.
Click to expand...

Damn. Either sarcasm is hard to pull off in text, or I'm just not very good at it myself. Probably the latter.

OK, straight version. I don't think anyone who is broadcasting their position to the world is in a position to control, or complain about, what is then done with that information.

Marine Traffic was one of the first apps I got for my Android phone, years ago, and it's still a favourite.
 
JumbleDuck said:
Damn. Either sarcasm is hard to pull off in text, or I'm just not very good at it myself. Probably the latter.
Click to expand...

Option three - there are some terminally clueless people on this forum, so one can't assume that that kind of remark is obviously a joke :). Sorry for doubting you :D

Pete
 
Better paint out your vessel's name on the stern as well- I have heard of a secret organisation called Coastwatch that have operatives stationed around the coast of the UK, who watch shipping through binoculars and write down what they observe!
 
NorthUp said:
Better paint out your vessel's name on the stern as well- I have heard of a secret organisation called Coastwatch that have operatives stationed around the coast of the UK, who watch shipping through binoculars and write down what they observe!
Click to expand...

My phone number's in the book, and blessed if some chap didn't take advantage of that to ring me up the other day. Confound his impudence.
 
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