With FBI estimates showing as much as $6 billion of the $80 billion in government funding for reconstruction after Hurricane Katrina having been lost to insurance fraud, efforts to detect fraud are of considerable importance. To help combat this problem, San Francisco-based company Planet is proposing using their network of approximately 380 satellites, according to Pacific Standard magazine. These satellites offer complete coverage of the globe, and are constantly capturing high-resolution imagery, from 3 meters per pixel, down to 0.8 meters per pixel. Using these high-resolution images, Planet states it is possible for them to review areas subject to natural disaster, and determine whether and how severely an area was affected, and confirm what damage has occurred – whether flooding, road blockages, fires or other natural disasters.
Says Andrew Zolli, vice president of global impact initiatives at Planet, “These satellites are continuous, and they tell the truth. What we see coming is a world in which the combination of very sophisticated analysis and continuous data feeds allows people to take some categories of fraud and make them so difficult to perpetrate that they cease altogether.”
Source:
https://psmag.com/environment/new-satellites-can-help-foil-fraud-in-disaster-insurance
