Global Fishing Watch analyzes data from the Automatic Identification System (AIS), which is collected by satellites and terrestrial receivers, to identify apparent fishing behavior based on the movement of vessels over time.
Oceana, Google and SkyTruth have launched their collaboration to end Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing. Global Fishing Watch is a public platform that identifies fishing vessels and analyzes fishing activity to ensure environmental regulations are upheld.
The importance and relevance of today’s announcement at the Our Ocean Conference in Washington, D.C. was underlined by Secretary of State John Kerry.
One of the key technologies enabling this platform is the availability of vessel location information. Vessels above a specified size must transmit Automatic Identification System (AIS) positional data, which is then collected regionally by terrestrial receivers and globally by satellite receivers. Powered by ORBCOMM’s AIS data service, Global Fishing Watch can classify these time-stamped positional vessel data points as either “fishing” or “non-fishing” activities, and can offer a near real-time and historical global view of fishing activity.
