Good news for travel: Electronic safety system to protect backpackers
Last updated 5/31/2011 12:30:19 PM
Electronic safety system to protect backpackers
It's every parent's nightmare – their son or daughter is off travelling and suddenly the emails and phone calls stop. Have they been injured, robbed, or worse?
Students at the University of Brighton's Brighton Business School have helped develop the Travellers' electronic Safety System (TeSS) that helps trace missing people and could save lives.
It works by travellers sending SMS text messages to the TeSS system and updating their movements and plans including flights, bus trips, directions taken, hotels/hostels stayed at, and cities and places visited and new friends made.
The advantage is that should contact with them be lost then the authorities can use TeSS to short-cut what is often a torturous and lengthy process of tracing their last-known whereabouts. Speed at times like this is critical and by quickening the process, the chances of tracing the traveller is greatly improved and, in cases where the traveller has been injured or kidnapped, the chances of their survival are greatly improved.
Instead of police following cold trails and relying on scant information from families and witnesses, they can tap into TeSS and find the latest information supplied by the travellers themselves. More than 250,000 backpackers and gap year students set off from the UK every year, many travelling to remote and distant places. A small number go missing and, thankfully, the vast majority are traced and found to be safe and well, and for worried families waiting anxiously for news, the shorter the time gap before receiving the good news, the better.
But this new system is not just for gap year students. Figures show that there are almost as many older people who take a year out from work and embark on adventurous travels. This system has been designed to work with any age group, wherever they are travelling in the world.TeSS is set to be launched this spring and the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA), which manages technology and support services to help frontline policing and hosts the National Missing Persons Bureau, has already agreed to provide a central point of access to the system.
Charlie Hedges, NPIA Missing Persons Bureau liaison and support officer, said: "The bureau is pleased to provide a point of access as, sadly, things do sometimes go wrong when people are travelling. On these rare occasions, it is essential that the most up-to-date information is available about their whereabouts. The bureau also has extensive international contacts and links to Interpol which are of benefit in such investigations. It must be remembered that the bureau and Interpol cannot take missing persons reports – these must be directed to a local police force."
The idea for TeSS began four years ago when Dr Roger Saunders, senior lecturer at the university's Brighton Business School, was approached by the Home Office to conduct research on kidnaps for the then National Criminal Intelligence Service, which is now the Serious and Organised Crime Agency.
Part of the research focused on backpackers who go missing and organisations contacted during the study included the Lucie Blackman Trust, formed after the former flight attendant was found dead in a Japanese village in 2000, following a seven-month search.
Dr Saunders joined forces with Brighton friends Nick Johnston, a retired police officer who spent many years with NCIS and Interpol and was a specialist on missing people and child abductions, and Simon Stock, a businessman and chartered accountant.
Mr Johnston said: "Parents often say to their children who are travelling abroad to make contact with them regularly. That works for a few weeks but they soon forget to call or email and worried families will report their loved ones missing. When police officers start investigating they find relatives can provide only limited and often out-dated information. Officers will work with the NPIA Missing Persons Bureau, overseas police services through Interpol and at times through the Foreign and Commonwealth Office but often the trail has gone cold."
Travellers would pay a £20 a year registration fee to gain access to TeSS wherever they are in the world. The information they send is encrypted and confidential and gives the traveller the freedom to put private and confidential information in the vault that they wouldn't necessarily divulge openly to relatives. Only in the event they need tracing will the vault be accessed, and then only by the NPIA Missing Persons' Bureau.
Students at the University of Brighton took part in testing the system and completed a questionnaire and their comments about TeSS helped in the development of the software which goes live in a few weeks' time.
Dr Saunders said: "Students have been very positive about the idea and we were surprised at how many wanted to sign up immediately and how much they would be prepared to pay. There is now a cheap, secure and effective way for regular updates to be sent and stored in the event of the unexpected happening. It also brings peace of mind to those loved ones left behind knowing that in the event of any loss of contact the authorities should now be able to react much quicker."
Martin Clayton, a vice-president of the Brighton Student Union, said: "TeSS could prove an invaluable addition to an individual's travel plans. The peace of mind for both the traveller and loved ones back home is a priceless commodity and, hopefully, this new innovation will allow speedier access to information that may prove vital in finding a missing person. Anything that contributes to a student's safety abroad is always welcomed and, for such a low price, it is difficult to find fault."