Say goodbye to bike theft

If you own a bike and live in a city, chances are you or someone you know has had to deal with bike theft at some point. It's a widespread problem and falls fairly low on police departments' radars. If you are unlucky enough to get your bike stolen, chances are slim that you'll see it again.

A new Kickstarter project called the BikeSpike hopes to change that. The gadget has a built-in GPS and connects to a global cellular data network. What this means is that in addition to locking your bike on the street, you can lock it digitally as well, using the BikeSpike app. If it moves from that space, or is tampered with, you'll receive an alert, so you can track your stolen bike in real-time and alert law enforcement officials to its whereabouts.

In addition to tracking down a stolen bike, the gadget allows cyclists to share ride stats (distance, speed, location) in real-time, even sending alerts in the event of a crash. Watch the video to see how BikeSpike works.

For anyone who's had their bike stolen, this seems like a promising solution. But one doubt remains: as the gadget attaches to the bike frame, what's to keep an enterprising bike thief from simply identifying and removing the BikeSpike before making off with the bike?

The Kickstarter campaign hopes to raise $150,000 by April 9 - at time of writing, BikeSpike had raised more than $37,000.

Photo: BikeSpike

via [EarthTechling]

This post was originally published on Smartplanet.com