Physical and sexual violence is a global problem that affects millions of people-especially women, every day. To improve your security, technology has become a great ally. If you want to feel more at ease when you go out, read on and find out about some of the best applications that can be used to protect you or give an alarm if you are in danger.
Life360 is a family locator that locates your near loved ones, including children and older people, but which can also be very useful for women. Thanks to its "Circles" function, you can see where each member of the group is located on a shared map. You can share your location with your partner or your group of friends at any time. Of course, you can choose to show your location also when not in a risky area. It also has a panic button that will send your location by GPS when you press it.
This app is designed especially for women and consists of a map in which users can mark places where they suffered street harassment or any type of abuse. It also allows you to share personal testimonies about the circumstances of the violent episode. In this way, Hollaback! configures a mapping of dangerous or unsafe places, which serves to alert other users.
Safe365 is a familiar GPS tracking app very useful for women who want to keep their loved ones informed of their location. Safe365 includes the possibility to notify other people when you enter or leave a particular area, send reminders to recharge your mobile phone when the battery is running out, choose when you want to share your location, and a panic button to notify others in case of emergency. In addition, Safe365 will notify your chosen contacts if you can't be located.
This app, owned by Google, works similarly to Safe365 and Life360: it is a personal security application that allows you to share information directly with chosen contacts. With it you can share your location, send your last location after a defined period (even without internet connection or battery), and even schedule location alerts in the future. In this way, your contacts will be able to see the status of your phone's activity and they will know automatically if you are ok, their creators explain. As it is integrated with the Google Maps location sharing feature.
This function is integrated into iPhone phones (as of iOS 11 version) and allows you to make calls to the local emergency number regardless of the country in which you are. Depending on your location, the phone may ask you to select between different services. To activate it, you just have to press the power button 5 times in a row and the “SOS Emergency” option will appear on the screen. It also allows you to add emergency contacts to whom your iPhone will alert with an SMS after making your alert call and send them updates about your location. To add emergency contacts, go to the iPhone Health app > Medical data > Edit > Emergency contacts.
SOS for Android
Again, it is not an app, but a function of the operating system. If you want to activate it on your Android phone, you must go to Settings > Security and screen lock > Emergency rescue > Add your secure contacts. Once configured, to send SOS messages you just have to press the power button three times in a row and a message will be sent with your location. It also allows you to include photos and videos taken with the front or rear camera, and even 5-second voice messages.
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