Boris takes to the cloud in pre-Olympics grime battle

London mayor Boris Johnson has launched a reporting tool that lets the city's citizens report graffiti, litter and fly-tipping, in an attempt to clean up the capital ahead of next year's Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The Love Clean London tool, unveiled on Thursday, extends a similar scheme that has been run over the last five years in the borough of Lewisham. It lets people submit reports of environmental issues via a web portal, which allows photographs of the problems to be uploaded onto an online map, or using a smartphone app, which uses the handset's GPS capabilities to pinpoint the relevant location. Reports can also be submitted via SMS or MMS.

"Eyesores such as litter, graffiti and fly-tipping are a real blight on our environment," Johnson said in a statement, inviting all London boroughs to join the scheme. "It also costs boroughs millions to clear up the mess of a small number of irresponsible individuals.

"Love Clean London gives people an easy way to report a discarded mattress or an outbreak of graffiti, helping their boroughs to direct finite resources where they are most needed. In tough financial times, this smart use of technology can deliver genuine savings whilst encouraging people to take an active pride in their local environment."

The free smartphone apps for report submissions cover all major platforms, including iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Windows Phone.

The Love Clean London system uses Microsoft's Azure cloud computing platform, and Microsoft partner Bbits also developed the site for the service — the interactive map on the portal needs the Silverlight plug-in and is based on Bing Maps for Enterprise.