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| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
| Published: |
2026
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.10823 |
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| _version_ | 1866912938276683776 |
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| author | Khamaisi, Karim Rodrigues, Bruno |
| author_facet | Khamaisi, Karim Rodrigues, Bruno |
| contents | Wireless sensing approaches promise to transform smart infrastructures into privacy-preserving motion detectors, yet commercial adoption remains limited. A common assumption may explain this gap: that denser sensor deployments yield better accuracy. We tested this assumption with a 12-day naturalistic study using a 9-node ESP32-C3 mesh (72 sensing links) in a residential environment. Our results show that a single well-placed link outperformed the full 72-link mesh (AUC 0.541 vs. 0.489, Cohen's $d$=0.86). Even a random link selection matched optimized selection ($p$=0.35). The benefit comes from avoiding multi-link fusion, not from choosing the right link. We attribute this to a "dilution effect": links whose Fresnel zones miss activity regions contribute noise that overwhelms signal from informative links. In our deployment, strategic link placement mattered 2.7$\times$ more than classifier choice. We release 312 hours of labeled CSI data, firmware, and analysis code to enable validation across diverse environments. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_10823 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2026 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Less is More: The Dilution Effect in Multi-Link Wireless Sensing Khamaisi, Karim Rodrigues, Bruno Networking and Internet Architecture Wireless sensing approaches promise to transform smart infrastructures into privacy-preserving motion detectors, yet commercial adoption remains limited. A common assumption may explain this gap: that denser sensor deployments yield better accuracy. We tested this assumption with a 12-day naturalistic study using a 9-node ESP32-C3 mesh (72 sensing links) in a residential environment. Our results show that a single well-placed link outperformed the full 72-link mesh (AUC 0.541 vs. 0.489, Cohen's $d$=0.86). Even a random link selection matched optimized selection ($p$=0.35). The benefit comes from avoiding multi-link fusion, not from choosing the right link. We attribute this to a "dilution effect": links whose Fresnel zones miss activity regions contribute noise that overwhelms signal from informative links. In our deployment, strategic link placement mattered 2.7$\times$ more than classifier choice. We release 312 hours of labeled CSI data, firmware, and analysis code to enable validation across diverse environments. |
| title | Less is More: The Dilution Effect in Multi-Link Wireless Sensing |
| topic | Networking and Internet Architecture |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.10823 |