If you want to track someone’s whereabouts, you can do something sneaky like put a bug on their car, or hack their cellphone, or just stalk them. On the other hand, you could take the easy route and just give them a stylish pair of Aetrex GPS tracking shoes. Before you get too confused, these shoes were designed with a very specific purpose in mind, keeping tabs on those individuals suffering from Alzheimer disease or dementia. They aren’t for spying; they are not nearly suave enough for that.
The shoes cost $299.99 plus a monthly fee for tracking. With that relatively high price, however, comes some useful functionality. Users, by which I mean the people doing the tracking, can set up what amounts to an electric fence for trackees. If trackees travel outside of it, trackers can be notified by any number of methods. Kind of like house arrest. The shoes can also be set to update location in 10 minute or 30 minute intervals, depending on how much you want to pay for that monthly tracking fee.
Of course, these shoes need to be charged so they do require a certain amount of maintenance, presumably done by a caretaker; if you’re worried enough to buy someone GPS shoes, chances are you don’t trust them to charge them. When you get a pair of these shoes for someone, you are required to confirm that you are the trackee’s designated caretaker, but I’ll be surprised if someone doesn’t try to misuse these somewhere down the line. Then again, they are far from sneaky. I mean, besides a subdermal implant, GPS tracking shoes are about as blatant as you get.
“Oh, you’re going back into the office to work late again, honey? Okay, just don’t forget to charge your shoes.”
(via AllThingsD)
- The Supreme Court recently ruled that GPS tracking requires a warrant
- By 2018, every single cell phone will need to be GPS enabled
- GPS tracked this penguin as he swam to Antarctica
Published: Jan 30, 2012 02:06 pm