uSafe: A privacy-aware and participative mobile application for citizen safety in urban environments

Recent mobile applications empower citizens to monitor noise pollution or report on features of their urban environment. One important aspect of urban life has, however, not been sufficiently addressed, namely the citizens’ safety. We present a privacy-aware application called uSafe, in which users indicate how safe they feel in geographical locations. These feelings are then consolidated into summary maps accessible by other users and urban planners. We evaluate our concept with a questionnaire-based study involving 183 participants. The results confirm the utility of uSafe and show that privacy protection is a decisive factor in their decision to contribute to it.