Imagine for a moment that you and a friend are on a day hike in a remote area. You get disoriented, and can't find your way back to the car. After a few hours you are really lost, darkness is starting to fall, and you start to panic. You've long since run out of water, you have no food, you haven't seen anybody else all day, and you're not dressed for the cold night temperatures. Now imagine that you have an escape route. A way to tell people exactly where you are, and that you are in trouble and need help.
That is the kind of useful technology that Isaac Daniel hopes will save people's lives. Because of an incident with his 8-year old son being reported as missing, he has created a line of sneakers with a built-in GPS tracking. They allow you to push a button on the sneaker, and send a wireless alert is sent to a monitoring service. In some emergencies (such as a lost child or missing Alzheimer's patient), a parent or guardian can ask the monitoring service to activate the GPS remotely in order to find the missing person.
What's next? This shoe is meant for emergencies, but I imagine that in the near future we will have more of these types of products around for everyday use. So for example, you will be able to create a "virtual fence" area from which they can't leave without triggering an alert to you. So if you child goes outside the neighborhood when they are supposed to be at home, you get a text message. Or if they leave school grounds during school hours (possibly due to an abduction), you get instant notification. It is always better to know about a possible abduction right away, rather than waiting a few hours until the child doesn't show up on time. It could literally mean the difference between life and death.
Read the article on CNN.com
