Personal Safety Application

Type: Bachelor thesis
Status: finished
Student: Leon Wolf
Tutor: -
Supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Andreas Schrader 

 

Research Area

The research topic of the working group Ambient Computing at the Institute of Telematics is the development of interactive, context-aware ubiquitous systems. A major application area is the so called Ambient Assisted Living (AAL), which focus on age appropriate assistive technologies as solutions for the challenges imposed by the ageing societies and the demands for an autonomous living at age.

 

The Thesis Topic

The events of Cologne have heightened the awareness of personal safety in Germany, with the sales of pepper spray and other legal self-defense products skyrocketing in the first week of 2016. Although these can be effective means of defending oneself in dangerous situations, these products may also be used against victims trying to defend themselves, ultimately harming them even more. Even though there is no 100% guarantee against becoming a victim of violent crime, there are ways to protect oneself. But even then, there are situations where only the police or other emergency response services can help.

 

We are looking to develop a Personal Safety App that alerts local emergency authorities when users find themselves in dangerous situations and the App is activated. Activation might be active by the user itself or passive using appropriate sensor functions. This is a joint project with the University of Kiel, Department of Technology Management (Professor Dr. Carsten Schultz) which recently concluded a project analyzing innovations in the nonprofit sector of victim services in Germany. Further potential project partners are currently being contacted.

 

This thesis should:

• Develop a system design in a user-centered-design process with professional partners and via online surveys.

• Design and implement the App (on iOS and Android), a respective server-backend, and a Web cockpit for emergency centers, respectively.

• Evaluate the results in simulated emergency situations with test participants.

 

Requirements

Skills in Java programming for mobile devices. Design experiences for a simple and intuitive GUI would be ideal but are not mandatory. Supervision is organized partially in English. Therefore, the thesis should be ideally performed in English as well. It is foreseen to use the resulting application in cooperation with an external partner afterwards.

 

Small print

After introduction into the topic and implementation of the required tasks, a solid documentation has to be performed. The implemented code has to be completely commented. License decision will be based on legal agreement with cooperation partners. The rules for Writing Scientific Theses at the institute have to be followed.