Experience with the mobile4D disaster reporting and alerting system in Lao PDR

Abstract

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is used to support developing countries in many different ways, such as poverty reduction, public services enhancement, and disaster management and recovery. Mobile4D is a software framework that applies the crowdsourcing paradigm to facilitate information exchange between people during disaster situations. It acts as a disaster reporting and alerting system as well as an information sharing platform. Mobile4D facilitates rapid communication between local citizens and administrative units. Moreover, it allows exchanging experience and knowledge between people to reduce poverty and increase living standards. The Mobile4D framework has been deployed in a pilot study in three provinces in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR). The study was limited to report particular types of disasters, however, it revealed further use cases and identified the required extension of Mobile4D to cover the entire country. This paper presents a report about Mobile4D: initiative, challenges, status, and further extensions.