A girl sits outside her flooded home on the banks of the River Ganges. | Photo by Sanjay Kanojia/AFP via Getty Images
Google says its flood prediction service, which uses machine learning to identify areas of land prone to flooding and alert users before the waters arrive, now covers all of India and has expanded to parts of Bangladesh as well.
The search giant launched the tool in 2018 for India’s Patna region, but it says it’s been slowly increasing coverage in coordination with local government. In June, it hit the milestone of covering all the worst flood-hit areas of India. The company says this means some 200 million people in India and 40 million people in Bangladesh can now receive alerts from its flood forecasting system.
In addition to expanding coverage, Google is testing more accurate forecasts and has updated how its alerts appear on users’…