Data With Purpose: Signals for safety

From location pings to biometric readings, in a world filled with digital signals, data shapes our everyday movements. And yet, for millions of women around the world, the most urgent data is the one that remains unrecorded: the ones produced during a moment of fear, danger, or vulnerability. Technology has grown amazingly fast, while the safety of women has not moved at the same pace.

This gap must be addressed: Data with Purpose, a frame of thinking that can change information from commodity into a means of protection and dignity. For women, this shift matters deeply. And safety can't depend on complicated interfaces or technology that demands clarity at the moments when fear clouds thoughts and even movement.

For many decades, traditional safety tools have assumed that an emergency app, a location-sharing feature, or a panic button is within free reach of a woman and instantly accessible at the moment of a threat. In real-life emergencies, that hardly ever happens. Hands shake, phones drop, speech falters. A few seconds make all the difference between whether help arrives or her story goes untold.

Data with Purpose responds to this reality by focusing not on constant collection but on purposeful, situational, ethical data that activates only when needed. Rather than surrounding the woman with surveillance, it offers her privacy and safety as well. Rather than watching, it protects her.

I envision a tiny wearables device which is integrated into life something like a ring, a bracelet, a pendant, or something clipped on that should remain silent until a woman needs it. No fumbling to unlock screens, no scrolling through apps. Instinct alone. A whispered code word, sudden cries recognized through acoustic patterns, or a quick squeeze will be sufficient to trigger the device. In that instant, the device emits only real time signals: location coordinates, short audio clips that capture context, motion data showing whether she is running, falling, or being forcibly moved, and, if possible, short video bursts to have a further insight of what is happening.

But this is often misunderstood in discussions about safety in tech. Many fears such devices could turn into tools for control or unwanted monitoring. But the fact is that modern communication systems—LTE-M, NB-IoT, and low-bandwidth 4G/5G channels—are designed not for surveillance but for routing, moving encrypted packets from one point to another without ever analyzing or storing the woman’s private life without her consent.

These protocols do not track her daily routines. They do not establish patterns in her behavior. They do not study her motion history. Their purpose is singular: to carry emergency signals securely and efficiently to the people she trusts. As soon as the data leaves the device, it gets encrypted, split into packets, and forwarded via the shortest protected path until it reaches the chosen contacts only.

In this architecture, data is a shield, not a spotlight. The system supports her without needing to see her beyond that particular moment of danger; it allows her not to sacrifice autonomy for safety. To keep the technology from becoming just another mechanism through which women are controlled or monitored ethical data should be practiced.

This is where the work of women engineers becomes indispensable. Women in telecom, data science, cybersecurity, and hardware design understand that safety is not just a technical challenge, it is rather a lived experience. They know what it means to angle keys between their fingers at night, to share a live location “just in case,” to pretend to be on the phone while walking past a group that feels unsafe.

Our perspective shapes the technology we build. We're not designing abstract systems, but we're designing for realities that we know inside out. Women engineers bring a lens of empathy, cultural awareness, and practical foresight. We ask:

• Will this tool respect her privacy?

• Will it protect her sans exposure?

• Will she trust it?

• Could it ever be used against her?

These are questions that cannot be answered by technical skills alone; they require lived understanding.

Purposeful data carries emotional weight. Behind every signal is a story that may never be spoken aloud. Behind every packet is a moment where silence could cost a woman her safety or her life. Crisis-ready data gives presence when she is unable to speak, and evidence when her truth needs to be heard.

As we envision the future, it would not be to create technologies that watch women but tools that stand beside them, respectfully, and only when invited. It is to the future where safety devices are not symbols of fear but instruments of empowerment. Where the data women generate is theirs, controlled by them, and designed for their protection alone.

Data of itself has no intention. It is human values that ascribe to it meaning. When women engineers are given the opportunity to lead innovation, we make sure that the purpose of data is protection, and dignity. And when society chooses technologies rooted in empathy rather than surveillance, we move closer to a world where every woman is able to move freely, supported not by surveillance systems, but human-centered systems that uphold her right to feel safe on her own.

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         The Writer's Profile

Verona Obeid

Electronics and communications engineer

Damascus university, Syria

Author's Bio:

Verona Obeid, Syria - Electronics and Communication Engineer and Front-End Developer with a deep interest in how people connect, communicate, and learn. I focuse on exploring and teaching modern communication technologies, with a mission to make tech more accessible and empowering for women and communities.