If you’d like to feel safer
and secure, whether on a social, college campus or at home, there are new apps
that may be able to help. Using mobile technology like GPS, app developers are
able to connect potential victims of violence to support systems when they feel
they're in danger.
Thankfully though, there are a lot of personal safety apps
developed to help tackle this issue. We have here a list of 5 apps built with personal
safety for you. Most of these apps are free and a few have paid
premium features that may help save a life. In any case, having these apps on a
phone may be more important and helpful than having any other game of the week.
Watch Over Me is an
app that lets your contacts follow you on your journey remotely. The app lets
you specify how long you
want it to track your GPS location, until you check in from your intended
destination. If you fail to do so, it sends an emergency alert to your
chosen contacts. Alternatively, in case something bad happens, you can shake
your phone to trigger an emergency alert, and your phone’s camera will turn on
automatically and start recording.
The app also informs you if you’ve entered a high crime rate area. It is
available in 7 cities, for now.
If you are a parent who has a feisty
kid, or one who has to watch over a teenage sibling who has an issue with
"personal space", this may be the locator app you need. The app picks up your exact GPS location and shares the location to the group. Of
course, the person whose location is being shared can choose when their
location can be disclosed but the app also keeps track of all previous
locations and will let users send an SOS message alert when necessary.
Circle of 6 is a unique app that lets you connect to up to 6
close contacts. The app has
different notifications that the user can tap on to alert their circle. If you need a safe ride home or for a
familiar face to turn up and take you away from a strange environment, this app
will help send an alert to any of your 6 chosen contacts. On top of that, the
app can connect you to
the proper authorities for
an emergency, or even just for relationship advice.
4. bSafe
bSafeis an another app that connects users to friends for
safety purposes, but takes the GPS element a step further by showing a user
where those friends are on the map at any given time so the user can know how
close he or she is to help. Like many of the apps in this list, bSafe also
allows the user to tap a button to activate an alarm, notify contacts of his or
her location and record audio and video evidence, which is sent to a secure
server
5. MyDistress
When
in a scenario such as kidnap, where you could not speak or communicate your
movement, therefore you could not alert the rescue team of your movement for
rescue operation. When in distress, you could be too traumatized to speak or
for individuals with hearing or speech impaired, it is a challenge to
communicate calmly to the rescue team.Hence, with MyDistress, you could alert
the police department, Polis Diraja Malaysia (PDRM) of your emergency situation
with just a click.
These Application may help you safe all the way and all the times.
Do download one of them and try it out!
Do download one of them and try it out!
By
Lee Chen Yee
Students of Bachelor In Public Relations (Honours)
Faculty Social Science, Arts and Humanities
Tunku Abdul Rahman University College
Tunku Abdul Rahman University College