Related articles:

High-tech tags may track kids in TUSD

General
CORT
Warehouse Supervisor Construction
Komatsu Equipment Co
Mechanic Health Care
Rio Salado College
PA's/Online Instructors General
CORT
WAREHOUSE/DRIVER Education
Assessment Technology, Inc
Social Studies Content Writer

A long list of new products that help parents keep tabs on their children is hitting the market, including one-touch phones and even electronic tags that can be sewn into clothing.

Some technology-based trackers have been available before, but many of the previous products have required parents to be sitting at a computer. The latest services offer more mobility.

Sprint Nextel Corp. recently launched its "Family Locator" service, which enables parents, using their cell phones, to pinpoint the location of their child's mobile phone. It costs $85 for the handset (with a one-year contract) and $9.99 a month for unlimited location requests.

Another company, Wherify Wireless Inc., plans to begin selling a mobile phone in August, called Wherifone, that will have a one-touch "find me" button to reach a parent instantly in an emergency (it sends an instant message to the parent's phone). The phone will be priced at $99.95 with a one-year contract, and service will cost $19.99 a month for 100 requests.

Knowing where your children are is an age-old parental challenge. The proliferation of cell phones among teens and preteens in recent years has been a huge advance, enabling parents to stay in contact with their children wherever they are. But cell phones merely allow parents to speak to their children, not to pinpoint precisely where they are. Moreover, toddlers and other younger children are too young to have a mobile phone.

In part to address that gap, other companies are rolling out tracking products that work over short distances and don't require cell phones.

SmartWear Technologies LLC in San Diego, which uses the radio frequency identification technology that Wal-Mart Stores Inc. relies on to manage its inventory and that cities deploy to read water meters wirelessly, plans in the next few months to begin selling RFID tags that can be sewn into children's clothing or embedded into a wristband. Using a reader, parents can keep track of their children's movements as much as 600 feet away. The whole package costs $260.

The new services are being introduced as wireless carriers such as Sprint and Verizon Wireless struggle to meet new federal regulations that will make it easier for police and other safety agencies to pinpoint the location of cell phones.

Sprint and Verizon Wireless didn't meet the Dec. 31, 2005, deadline for 95 percent of their customers to have the right type of handsets. Industry analysts say the companies are hoping that, by offering added features, more customers will upgrade to phones enabled with Global Positioning System technology, a requirement for the new features.