A television monitor shows how a new social network site Gypsii, launched this week at the Mobile World Congress, allows users to locate their contacts owing to new technology that uses the mobile phone as a tracking device in Barcelona.

(AFP/File/Josep Lago)

BARCELONA, Spain (AFP) - Users of social network sites like Facebook will soon be sharing their exact whereabouts with their friends in real-time, owing to new technology that uses the mobile phone as a tracking device, experts say.

A new social network site, Gypsii, which launched this week at a phone industry trade show in Barcelona, allows users to search for and identify their contacts, be they in the neighbouring street or across the ocean.

"Look, that's Bill, my friend in New York. He's 3,800 miles away," explained Toon Wee, a director of Gypsii, as he pointed to a coloured pin in the middle of a map of Manhattan while explaining the product at the Mobile World Congress in Spain.