Tsk!
I think if we fast forward a few years it will be cheap and convenient to validate everyone's ride using GPS. The majority of riders who use gps tracking can simply provide their track to me online. For anyone who wants to use the route sheet, I will be able to provide them with a cheap device that they simply have to carry with them and hand back at the Arrivee! What do people think?
This has obviously been an objective for the last 10 years, but progress has been slow and will continue to be so I think. What AUK has so far:
1. A category of (permanent) event - which seems to have a strong appeal for a small sector of the ridership - where validation is by submitted tracklog only. This category requires the entrant to submit a 'this is what I intend to do' GPX of sufficient distance, and then after the ride to submit a 'this is what I did' tracklog which must match within reason. The route followed is therefore a mandatory one - not advisory as with most other AUK events.
2. A category of event (so far only perms I think, but it doesn't have to be that way) where the entrant is invited to submit a tracklog in lieu of other forms of proof-of-passage. The organiser has defined the (advisory) route in the normal way, that is by means of a series of control locations, and the submitted tracklog must visit these in order, to be valid. You can see this could work for a small calendar event with only a handful of finishers, and possibly better than a postal finish - but of course at the present state of play it has to be an optional thing.
3.
Some Organisers unofficially accept tracklogs as P-o-P if the rider so requests or for example in lieu of a lost brevet card. The AUK Regulations are worded to allow for this, but it is strictly an arrangement between organiser and rider and either of those can refuse if they want.
4. Non-GPS tracking methods such as ankle-tags and control gates may also be used on very large events.
A Tracklog in itself is not an especially strong P-o-P. Especially in group ride situations such as an event - it is too easy for a valid tracklog to simply be copied around between finishers, and would not be at all easy for the finish controller to spot any exact duplicates. In solo Permanent rides where the tracklog is submitted later, it is too easy for a valid tracklog to be copied with falsified datestamps and so re-used on two consecutive weeks for example.
Plus of course a tracklog can be fabricated using software, or can be recorded in a car - for the finish controller or organiser, just displaying a submitted tracklog on a map and seeing that it goes through all the right places, is
no-where near good enough. It needs to be analysed or inspected in detail to see that the timestamps are credible for a genuine 'ridden' tracklog. This takes time. AUK offers software to do all this, but it's far from perfect as yet and development seems slow.
In fact simple addition of a single timed physical P-o-P (card stamp, or till receipt) somewhere around the middle of the ride, hugely increases the strength of any associated tracklog.