Where Is Awarded The ?Mother Of All Geofencing Patents?

Just as geo mobile services are taking off, the U.S. Patent Office has awarded an extremely broad patent on "Location-based services" to Where. Patent No. 7,848,765 covers 31 claims ranging from sending an alert to offering a coupon when somebody crosses a geofence with a mobile device. Where CEO Walter Doyle calls it the "mother of all geofencing patents."

A geofence is a predefined boundary on a map. For instance, it could be a two-block radius around a business. When somebody crosses into that area, they could be offered a geo-targeted ad or coupon. The patent also defines a geofence as possibly being "associated with a moving location that is associated with a portable electronic device." In this case, the geofence is placed around individual users and moves with them. The patent seems to describe practically every mobile app with any kind of geo-trigger, from simple "location-based alerts" to "verifying transactions and tailoring information to the behavior of a user."

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