BY: VANESSA NIGRO
One of my earliest memories is of my cautious mother warning me of what perils may ensue if I kept refusing to wear my helmet when riding my bike.
A few years later I was warned of the menace that is “stranger danger”, with the classic example, “If an unfamiliar face tries to convince you to get in their car, do not follow, no matter how cute of a puppy they promise waits behind those windowless van’s doors.”
As Millennials ascended into adolescence, parents’ worries only grew stronger. Except now, instead of “Don’t take candy from a stranger,” parents are warning their children of the dangers of unsafe sex, leaving their drinks unattended, and accepting beverages from strangers. But in such a hyper-sexualized and alcohol-obsessed society can you blame them?
Twenty five percent of all sexual assaults against women are enabled by alcohol or date rape drugs. With unnerving statistics such as this one, and many others like it on the rise, it’s no wonder that innovators are coming up with new ways to ensure that this generation is the last to deal with the dilemma of date rape.
“Our intention is to build a better mouse trap. Something that is easy to use and affordable, something that can empower users and ensure men and women of all ages are safe against the effects of sexual assault by way of date rape drugs,” says David Wilson.
Wilson is the Toronto-based creator of the pd.id, a pocket sized device that can detect date rape drugs, along with many others, in any type of liquid. This device is for date rape prevention.
Pd.id, which stands for “personal drink identification”, works by collecting a small sample of the drink in a tiny reservoir located at the bottom of the device. It then performs three comprehensive tests on the liquid. The results are then compared to a database of preloaded drug profiles, and if the device detects any foreign substance in the liquid, two tiny LED lights will flash alerting you that your drink has been compromised— all this in a matter of seconds.
The database that stores the drug profiles will be updated constantly, which means as new drugs emerge, pd.id will be right behind them, adding them to their database so they can be detected. David Wilson’s goal is to take the technology that drug enforcement agencies have been using for years, and make it affordable, discreet, and readily available for public use.
On July 15th, 2014, pd.id launched a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo to Kickstarter. Their efforts have attracted private investors along with raising just under $20,000— nearly half way to their end goal of $50,000. If you’d like to see this product brought to life to spare potential victims the threat of life-long nightmares, donations can be made to the project until August 29th, 2014.
In modern society like our own, in which human ingenuity has cured diseases, got feet on the moon and created more post-secondary graduates than ever before, it is almost parody that some still can’t grasp the simple concept of consent. Luckily, technology moves faster than our evolution.
