Keeping Kids Safe

I was watching beyond tomorrow today and there was one segment on the invention of the ‘kinderguard’. It is a GPS device invented by a father of three, living in Belfast. His invention was inspired by the famous kidnapping and murders of young girls Holly Wells and Jesse Chapman, and is primarily aimed to deter child kidnapping. The GPS device entails a built in simcard – like the one we find in our mobile phones – and using global positioning it sends data from the device back to a central server. It works using censors on the skin of a child’s wrist and allows parents to track their child’s moves. Like all GPS devices it has a way of knowing where you are but the unique aspect of this invention is it knows exactly who you are. Therefore parents can detect when the device has been passed on to another person or taken off the child’s wrist. The ‘Kinderguard’ also has an application known as the ‘curfew zone’ so a parent knows when their child strays from a safe area. Other features allow the central server to send messages to the device if a child is late for an appointment or simply late home, this acts as a reminder and the child can than respond using the buttons on the device. The press of the first button tells the parent they are ok. Pressing both buttons at the same time alerts the parents they are in trouble and need urgent help.
It is said such device will be available world wide in the next three years. Further improvements of this device will include embedding the technological device in jewellery and clothing, which is said to be more suitable for children. Other ideas extend to using similar devices for people on parole but at the moment it is said to be a means of keeping kids safe.

Are the advances in our technology allowing the invention of extreme devices, extreme measures and invasions of privacy? ‘Kinderguard’ simply believe such device keeps kids safe and merely alerts parents when they are not.

In my opinion this is a fantastic method for keeping young children safe if it is used on suitable people at suitable ages or in suitable circumstances. It is a big world out there and there are some nasty people, if this device was available would such children as Holly Wells and Jesse Chapman still be alive... Would there or wouldn’t there be a Madeleine McCann case?