The ELOC Project
Bioacoustic Monitoring of Elephants and Conservation Threats

Support the ELOC Project
ELOC is a conservation technology project developing low-cost, solar-powered bioacoustic monitoring systems for Asian elephants and the threats they face. By combining field recording devices, real-time data transmission, and artificial intelligence, ELOC aims to detect elephant presence and illegal activities (such as illegal logging) in remote rainforest landscapes.

Why ELOC

Monitoring elephants in dense tropical forest is difficult: animals are often heard rather than seen, and conventional methods - including line transects, dung counts, drones, GPS collaring, DNA analysis, and camera traps - can be labour-intensive, expensive, invasive, or limited in coverage other factors. We´ve tried all of them already. 
ELOC (the “Elephant LOCator”) explores a new and non-invasive way to monitor elephants in these challenging conditions: passive acoustic monitoring. Elephants communicate using a wide range of sounds, including low-frequency rumbles, trumpets, roars, growls, squeaks, and barks. Many of these vocalisations, particularly rumbles, can travel over considerable distances.
Being able to locate and track elephants provides vital information to support elephant protection and human–elephant conflict mitigation teams. Knowing where elephants are likely to raid crops next - and being able to prepare and guard fields before significant damage occurs - can make the difference between successful prevention and costly losses. Likewise, deploying anti-poaching ranger teams to the right place at the right time is often key to effective protection.
Monitoring threats to the habitat of the Sumatran elephant - the highly biodiverse Sumatran rainforest - is equally challenging and important. We have therefore expanded ELOC’s capabilities to detect major threats, such as operating chainsaws, so that forest guards can be sent to the right locations before significant damage occurs. It is often impossible to monitor the large landscapes that elephants inhabit closely and around the clock with patrol teams, while satellite imagery often detects damage only after it has become substantial. ELOC has the potential to change this and turn the situation around. 

Our Approach


ELOC is designed for challenging tropical conditions, where humidity, dense vegetation, and remoteness place high demands on both hardware and software. The system integrates three components into one monitoring system:

    • ELOC recorders — rugged field devices equipped with specialised microphones, GPS, motion detection, Bluetooth connectivity, LoRa communication, solar panels, and rechargeable batteries designed for long-term deployment.

    • ELOC app and web interface — tools for configuring devices in the field, managing metadata, monitoring system performance, and supporting real-time conservation applications.

    • LoRa gateways — network infrastructure that transmits data from remote recorders, enabling near real-time alerts even in areas with limited connectivity.



Since 2021, ELOC has collected and analysed elephant vocalisations and other forest sounds through field studies, student research projects, and partnerships with universities and conservation organisations. The project has built a substantial reference database containing approximately 5,000 labelled elephant vocalisations and more than 30 TB of audio recordings from over 500,000 files.

This dataset underpins the development of machine-learning models that automatically identify elephant sounds and conservation threats. ELOC is developing both cloud-based models and lightweight models capable of running directly on field devices, allowing for real-time detection even in the remotest forests. 

Collaboration - The Key to Success

ELOC is built on collaboration between conservation practitioners, engineers, computer scientists, universities, and local partner organisations.
The core team includes ELOC project leader and chief engineer Mr. Stephan Stange, SECI president and IEP project manager Dr. Alexander Mossbrucker, and the SECI team Dr. Marc Wieland, Dr. Karl Radtke, and Mr. Boris Reichle, working together with research assistants and former SECI Grantees Miss Giot Simanullang and Miss R. A. Nabila (Gadjah Mada University), and other academic and non-academic partners.
Much of the field work is implemented in close collaboration with PT Alam Bukit Tigapuluh (shout out to the field team: Haldo, Agi, Gustri, Dores and others) and their partners in Jambi, Sumatra.
Other key collaborators (past and present) include Dr. Asanka Sayakkara (University of Colombo, School of Computing – Asanka and his team originally coined the name “ELOC” and started related research originally in Sri Lanka), Dr. Daniela Hedwig (Cornell University), Dr. Shermin de Silva (UC San Diego), and Dr. M. A. Imron (Universitas Gadjah Mada). Over the years, the project has been supported by many other kind and knowledgeable people who cannot all be named here - thank you very much - you know who you are! 
The project has received financial support from the International Elephant Project (IEP), the Rufford Foundation and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Asian Elephant Conservation Fund. Thank you very much for your kind support!

A group of around 30 Sumatran elephants move through a field of rubber trees

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