Another app for woman safety

If a woman was to meet a stranger for a business meeting, it will always be in a place which is crowded, with lots of people around in case the man decides to misbehave. Being amongst people is a safe feeling and there is now an adroid app which capitalizes on exactly on this sentiment.

Known as Safetipin, it helps you know what areas can be avoided at a certain time, and what are the safer ways to travel to a place. You can immediately know the security levels of your place, and can engage with others living in the neighbourhood. This app is developed by a social researcher and entrepreneur in collaboration with NIIT, looks at crowd-sourcing information to mark locations as safe or unsafe for women. Like the way we get traffic updates from people on the road, this app too gets updates based on uploads from others. It gives information and photos of incidents of harassment, hazards and places of help—hospitals, police stations or emergency homes—at or near a location. Each time something new is uploaded, a pop-up screen will alert the user to it.

Though the app is good for the safety of citizens and increases awareness on security, its biggest strength of community participation can also be a weakness. The app's success depends on an individual's interest in interacting and in building a safer environment.  However, this app can be useful for the police, non-government organisations and the government.