Big news to share from the Nexar team. Today, we’re announcing Nexar LiveMap — a free, interactive digital map available online that allows everyone to see the world in real time.
Nexar LiveMap has the most current frames and information of any mapping tool available today. The images and data are sourced from the Nexar network, where drivers have covered more than 500 million miles. This allows us all to explore every corner of the world as it exists now, including filtering for road blockages, traffic lights and more from Nexar’s automatic detection of images using artificial intelligence. While this is an early-stage product, we are excited about it for many reasons.
Nexar was founded on the promise of eliminating road collisions worldwide by alerting drivers to dangers ahead in real time. When people pair a Nexar-powered smart dash cam with the Nexar app, they join Nexar’s network, where every vehicle is learning in real time about what’s happening on the road thanks to the other vehicles around it. Hard brakes, collisions, oncoming traffic — your car ‘sees’ what all of the others up ahead see. And now that our community is large enough, we’re delivering on our founding promise by alerting drivers before they reach hazards on the road ahead.
We’ve rolled out lane-blocked alerts. Soon, it will be possible for people to preview their drive before they head out the door, look ahead a mile up the road if they’re stuck in a traffic jam, and more. Our community will also be able to access Nexar LiveMap through our smartphone app. In other words, the Nexar network is coming alive for our drivers.
Nexar LiveMap is an important next step in our journey because it takes the benefits of our network and makes them available to everyone. Now, citizens and cities alike can access live insights into where the most dangerous intersections are, roadway collisions, missing road signs, and more. We are realizing the future that we set out to build — a connected network that can actually make our roads more efficient, and save lives.
This is also a huge leap forward for digital mapping. Seeing something that happened minutes ago is impossible with existing mapping solutions. Images found on Google Street View, the pre-eminent digital mapping tool, are often months or years old — making it an outdated source of information. Nexar LiveMap maps our cities in near real time using billions of images and metadata.
We see any number of use cases for this. You can use Nexar LiveMap to check out a neighborhood you’re thinking of moving to, prove a wrongful parking ticket, etc. Cities, municipalities, and mobility and mapping companies can use LiveMap to help make our roads run more efficiently.
Let’s talk about privacy for a minute. Privacy is our top priority — both for our users and also for third parties on the road. All of the images and metadata found on Nexar LiveMap are completely anonymous. We automatically anonymize and aggregate all information so that neither the driver nor any person or vehicle on the road can be identified. We are proud to abide by the EU’s strict GDPR standards for all of our users, regardless of lesser local legal requirements.
More broadly, we believe we are paving the way for a new approach to the challenge of using data for good while balancing the privacy of our users. We pledge to never be in the business of selling a person’s private data. Yet, there is so much to be gained from using completely anonymized and aggregated data for the common good. This driving community is contributing to a future where critical road signs are never missing, where roads and bridges in desperate need of repair are prioritized, and where people involved in a collision get immediate attention.
Nexar LiveMap is available for New York City starting today. In the coming weeks and months, we’ll be rolling out LiveMap in other areas of the country where we have a big enough network — which includes well over 100 cities and counting.
This is just the beginning for LiveMap. Our product team remains heads-down and committed to improving its capabilities and user experience. We’re looking forward to your feedback as we do that.
Still have questions about LiveMap? We have all your answers here.
