A new way has been devised by Stanford researchers to track earthquakes real-time by using Twitter information. The information is collected from its active users in regions where earthquakes are reported often.

There is enough data available on sites like Google and Twitter. This data is used by researchers to track emergency responses as a result of a disaster. But now, the addition of ShakeMaps will help researchers to track earthquakes in real-time.

The Earthquake Hazards Program of the USGS (US Geological Survey) has created ShakeMaps, which will use recordings and other information like ground motion prediction and geological data. Also, more information provided by witnesses through online surveys will acts as a supplement.

Researchers have said that Twitter can be a great help in getting information on several key factors like faster detection of an earthquake and estimation of the size of the affected area.

It would be possible to collect the data at fastest possible time since people can instantly create and share ideas and information through Twitter, which could be useful for people to know about post-earthquake events such as aftershocks and tsunamis.

"We used all geo-tagged Tweets around the world containing the keyword 'earthquake' or 'tsunami' in several languages that occurred in the first 10 minutes following Japanese earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater from 2011 to 2012", said Reza Zadeh wrote on Twitter's engineering blog.

The team hopes that analysis of tweets can lead to development of highly-accurate ShakeMaps. Technology website TechCrunch said that researchers usually use social media for tracking diseases and different disasters, but it will be the first time to track earthquake using social network data. Twitter and Stanford have announced that they are looking forward to share their research in July at the National Conference on Earthquake Engineering.