A High-Tech Bike Lock That Can Let Strangers Take a Ride
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Franz Salzmann’s bike had just been stolen. His friend, Daniel Zajarias-Fainsod, had found his own bike filched two days earlier. Over coffee, the friends and students at Oxford University decided it was time to build a better bike lock. “We were very annoyed,” says Salzmann. “Locks today are so bad!”
That was in 2012. After extensive research on bike-theft techniques and existing locks, the entrepreneurs have introduced their solution: Lock8, a keyless smart lock with a GPS tracker, motion and temperature sensors (in case a burglar tries freezing the lock), and a “painfully loud” alarm that goes off if someone cuts the lock cable or so much as moves the bike.