SimpliSecure

Give new life to old androids by turning them into security devices. This has the advantage of adding to your security compared to being without a security system, essentially for free.

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Inspiration

I just bought a new phone and didn't feel like throwing away my old phone just because it now has bad battery back up and an older processer.so, I sought out a way to make it more useful and this is my project.

What it does:

This app currently has two modes. Both solve the same problem of getting a home security device with little to no cost. This project consists of an Android app along with an optional ability to connect with a PIR sensor for working in the dark.

  1. Standalone Mode: This uses the phone's camera to monitor for movement. If found, It will check for and faces in it using a face detection AI program. This extra step of face detection is to eliminate false positives(if any) and help keep the app's data folder uncluttered.

  2. ESP-01 Mode: This mode requires an additional hardware component which allows this to work in the darkness unlike the standalone method. The hardware consists of an ESp-01 connect to a PIR sensor. The ESP will connect to the same network as the phone to send a request to capture images. The hardware setup, although having the extra hassle of buying them, can drastically improve the detection accuracy as it is portable when connected to a power bank. An example is when securing a room, the PIR could be near the door while the phone will be facing the door from a corner of the room, capturing the whole scene.

For How to use, checkout the Readme on the Github link!

How we built it:

We built the android app in Android studio Using Java while we used Arduino IDE for programming the ESP-01 while using the Arduino Uno as a programmer.

Challenges we ran into:

  1. We initially planned on using audio data and sound classification to know when some one is present.It turned out to be a lot bigger challenge than expected. But, as that was our plan for making it work in the dark, we had to replace it with the ESP mode to cover this down side.

  2. This was our first time Working with the camera2api and camera X so it was quite a learning curve to say the least.

  3. As this phone was designed to work with old phones, we needed to keep the old storage method for saving images while also writing a code for the new scoped storage introduced in android 10 and 11.

  4. The power supply for ESP was tricky to say the least. We had to make a 3.3 v Voltage regulator as the usual power supply we use(the arduino uno) couldn't supply enough power to the device making its performance unstable.

Accomplishments that we're proud of:

We felt very proud that the motion detection based on camera performed way better than we expected.

What we learned:

we learnt a lot about adapting to the things we had at hand. We almost gave up at the sound detection not working, but we pushed trough to finish this project and we are glad that we did.

What's next for SimpliSecure:

We have many plans for the project.

  1. we will be trying to make it work based on sound so it can be truly standalone and cost next to nothing.
  2. we are thinking of making better use of other sensors on the phone like accelerometers to increase accuracy.
  3. we are thinking of adding G-drive backup to the application.
  4. we could also add other hardware to the system as the base(ESP-01) is already laid out.
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