The project TOURISTA 24/7 focuses on the development, intellectual property protection, and commercial exploitation of an innovative real-time personal safety application for tourists (both Greek and foreign) traveling to Greece or Cyprus, whether for business or leisure (alert247.gr). Leveraging the capabilities of modern smartphones and telecommunications, the application offers a comprehensive solution to alert users about health issues or personal threats.

The application also detects falls, road accidents, and other potential dangers based on the user’s profile.

The innovative design and combined services of TOURISTA 24/7 provide a complete personal safety solution for tourists, families, and tourist groups, regardless of the season or destination. The product, which combines security services, personalized tourist profiles, and smart device applications, is available in eight languages (Greek, English, Russian, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Bulgarian). The devices are connected via GPRS and voice to a multilingual Signal Reception Center (SRC) for incidents requiring human intervention, offering various support options and personalized responses.

The TOURISTA 24/7 application not only serves individual tourists but also offers additional “smart” services for families and tourist groups. Family members or group members receive alerts for individual distancing, member location tracking, group message services, and notifications of risks.

The project also emphasizes two innovative functions: detecting user falls (e.g., elderly people, hikers) or collisions (e.g., traffic accidents) and automatically sending a danger signal when the user strays beyond a preset distance from a supervising “master” user (e.g., tourist from guide, student from companion, child from guardian).

While some similar applications in the U.S. and India serve users globally, they do not provide an integrated personal safety environment, nor do they offer specialized security solutions tailored to the user’s profile and the specificities of each country. In Greece and Cyprus, despite the large number of tourists throughout the year, these services are remarkably absent.

Expected outcomes of the project include significant improvements in the safety of tourists, contributing to the balanced development of remote or less popular tourist destinations and enhancing Greece and Cyprus’ positions in the global tourism scale. The TOURISTA 24/7 project also contributes to the development and promotion of open-source software for all its components (server-side, website, mobile application, tourista control center – signal reception management app) and the development of open geospatial data (security and health infrastructure in Greece and Cyprus).

TOURISTA 24/7 is implemented under the RESEARCH – CREATE – INNOVATE Action and co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) of the European Union and national resources through the Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship & Innovation Operational Programme (EPANEK), with project code T1EDK-01167.