Grand Theft Auto Shanghai? Chinese scientists build a super virtual city – for police
A hyperrealistic rendering of China’s largest city may look like a video game setting, but it has a much more serious purpose
With an accuracy of under 3cm (1.2 inches), this “virtual Shanghai” enables officers to navigate every street, scan interior layouts of skyscrapers and even access real-time data such as property occupancy records – all through a mobile terminal.
Patrol officers can now “enter” buildings virtually, viewing floor plans, tenant registries and utility lines – a capability that blurs the line between physical and digital realms, according to the project team led by government engineer Zeng Lingfang in a peer-reviewed paper published this month in the Chinese-language Journal of Geomatics.
Every alley, every flat, even every manhole cover is mirrored, the researchers said.
