Tracking system and method for monitoring and ensuring security of shipments

A method comprising:

• receiving, via a network interface device (NID) communicatively coupled to receive location data from a plurality of location tracking mechanisms though one or more communication networks, a plurality of location signals at a computing device, each location signal indicating a location of one of multiple geographically-co-located entities that are being tracked concurrently as a shipment group associated with a specific shipment;
• associating the location tracking signals as a shipment group and assigning a unique shipment tracking identifier (STID) to the shipment group to track movement of the location tracking signals relative to each other;
• presenting, on a display device, the shipment group as a plurality of co-located visual affordances on a shipment tracking user interface (UI), wherein each location tracking signal is represented by one visual affordance from among the plurality of co-located visual affordances;
• receiving, via the NID, updates to the location of one or more of the multiple geographically-co-located entities;
• monitoring the updates to identify unscheduled deviations in at least one of an expected co-location and an expected geo-location of received updates to the location tracking signals within the shipment group;
• and
• in response to detecting an unscheduled deviation:
• identifying a specific type of the unscheduled deviation;
• and triggering a series of responsive actions based on the specific type of the unscheduled deviation.

A mobile communication device comprising:

• a display providing a user interface;
• a memory having stored thereon a shipment location tracking utility (SLTU);
• and
• a processor communicatively connected to the display and the memory and which executes the SLTU to enable the user communication device to:
• track a series of dots corresponding to a shipment assigned to a driver for transporting to one or more respective destinations;
• receive a location signal for each of the shipment and a tractor trailer;
• present, within the user interface, a group of dots representing a relative co-location of each of the cargo and the tractor trailer;
• automatically updating a relative location of each dot within the group to correlate to a current real-time location;
• detect an unscheduled separation of the dots;
• compare a separation distance to a pre-set threshold maximum separation distance;
• determine when a detected separation distance of one of the tracking affordances is greater than the pre-set threshold maximum separation distance;
• and
• in response to the detected separation distance being greater than the pre-set threshold maximum separation distance, generate and issue a notification signal to alert at least one of the operator and a remote monitoring device that an anomaly has been detected with the movement of the shipment that can affect a security of the shipment.