Google Location Tracking Spreads to GMail

When traveling and sending emails, one of the most asked questions by friends and family will be, Where are you? If this is you, then Google Labs has a solution for you called, Signature Locations.

The new experimental Gmail Labs feature detects your location and appends the city region and country names to your signature in the following fashion: "Sent From: Dublin Dublin City Republic of Ireland."

You can turn on this new Gmail feature by going under the Labs tab under Settings within your Gmail account and then go under signature preferences. Next, check the box that says; "Append your location to the signature".

It'll use your public IP address to determine your location, so it may not always be that accurate. For example, if you're at Heathrow airport, IP detection may put you in Germany. If you want more accurate location detection, make sure your browser has a version of Gears that supports the location module. That way, Gears can make use of wi-fi access point signals to recognize that you're actually in London.

You'll always be able to disable the option or just delete your location from specific emails whenever you want.

If you have a mobile device, you can also use Google to track you via GPS using Google Maps, as we reported last week.