Countrywide population movement monitoring using mobile devices generated (big) data during the COVID-19 crisis

Countrywide population movement monitoring using mobile devices generated (big) data during the COVID-19 crisis

Mobile phones have been used to monitor mobility changes during the COVID-19 pandemic but surprisingly few studies addressed in detail the implementation of practical applications involving whole populations. We report a method of generating a “mobility-index” and a “stay-at-home/resting-index” base...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Scientific reports Vol. 11; no. 1; pp. 5943 - 9
Main Authors: Szocska, Miklos, Pollner, Peter, Schiszler, Istvan, Joo, Tamas, Palicz, Tamas, McKee, Martin, Asztalos, Aron, Bencze, Laszlo, Kapronczay, Mor, Petrecz, Peter, Toth, Benedek, Szabo, Adam, Weninger, Attila, Ader, Krisztian, Bacskai, Peter, Karaszi, Peter, Terplan, Gyozo, Tuboly, Gabor, Sohonyai, Adam, Szoke, Jozsef, Toth, Adam, Gaal, Peter
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 15-03-2021
Nature Publishing Group
Nature Portfolio
Subjects:
639/705/258
692/699/255/2514
692/700/459/1748
Big Data
Cellular telephones
Computers, Handheld
Contact Tracing
Coronaviruses
COVID-19
COVID-19 - epidemiology
COVID-19 - prevention & control
COVID-19 - virology
Geography, Medical
Humanities and Social Sciences
Humans
Hungary - epidemiology
Mobility
multidisciplinary
Pandemics
Public Health Surveillance
SARS-CoV-2
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Smartphones
Social Mobility - statistics & numerical data
Telemedicine
Hungary
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Description
Summary:Mobile phones have been used to monitor mobility changes during the COVID-19 pandemic but surprisingly few studies addressed in detail the implementation of practical applications involving whole populations. We report a method of generating a “mobility-index” and a “stay-at-home/resting-index” based on aggregated anonymous Call Detail Records of almost all subscribers in Hungary, which tracks all phones, examining their strengths and weaknesses, comparing it with Community Mobility Reports from Google, limited to smartphone data. The impact of policy changes, such as school closures, could be identified with sufficient granularity to capture a rush to shops prior to imposition of restrictions. Anecdotal reports of large scale movement of Hungarians to holiday homes were confirmed. At the national level, our results correlated well with Google mobility data, but there were some differences at weekends and national holidays, which can be explained by methodological differences. Mobile phones offer a means to analyse population movement but there are several technical and privacy issues. Overcoming these, our method is a practical and inexpensive way forward, achieving high levels of accuracy and resolution, especially where uptake of smartphones is modest, although it is not an alternative to smartphone-based solutions used for contact tracing and quarantine monitoring.
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ISSN:2045-2322
2045-2322
DOI:10.1038/s41598-021-81873-6