There are a whole host of gadgets on the market for keeping people safe on the streets - sprays, apps and alarms - but many of them aren’t that easy to use or are inherently indiscrete.
Now a Dutch gadget company has designed a wearable piece of jewellery, that looks a little like a FitBit, to stop would-be muggers from attacking victims.
And the bracelet has a secret power.
Shown at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, the Invi self-defence security bracelet is a totally nonviolent approach to keeping yourself safe as it just uses a repugnant smell to repel the criminal.
The brand say that “throughout evolution smell has proven to be an effective form” of protection (no one is messing with those skunks), and the silver-clasp band uses the same technique.
It works by pressing a safety button on the bracelet, and then the leather strap needs to be pulled with force (like a rape alarm) until it breaks. Obviously this makes it a once use only but hopefully once is enough to deter any danger.
Unfortunately the company were unwilling to unleash the stink bomb on the floor at CES, but the smell was described as a mishmash of your worst nightmares, and was especially designed to “instigate revulsion”.
They say: “It is released to distract and (sexually) demotivate the attacker.”
Invi founder Roel van der Kamp started looking for new self-defence methods three years ago after reading a report on sexual reports in the Netherlands.
The bracelet has been piloted by more than 100 people in Rotterdam in the spring of 2017, and the study found that people felt more empowered and safer during the trial. They invite both men and women to wear the bracelet.
The Invi bracelet comes in two sizes and went on sale today. It retails for around $70 and ships worldwide from the Netherlands.