A Kenyan innovator says he has built a system that turns a stolen phone into a loud alarm. Eliud Gilisho calls it Afande. It started as a remote and is now a watch. When the owner presses it, the phone starts shouting "uuui huyu ni mwizi", Swahili for "this is a thief", Citizen Digital reported on Tuesday.
Gilisho says the idea grew out of a robbery in 2025. He was walking home from his office in Nairobi's Kiliman area when thugs on a motorbike stopped him. They stabbed him and took his phone and laptop. He told Citizen Digital that he lost all his contacts and documents, and vowed to find a solution.
To create the alarm, Gilisho took a group of women from Kibra to a studio and recorded their screams. According to Gilisho, a thief cannot switch the phone off or turn the volume down once the alarm starts. The phone goes off only when the battery dies. If the thief charges it, the alarm starts again at 1%. He says it keeps ringing even with earphones plugged in.
The system runs on GPS, so the owner can see the thief's location and distance, much like a taxi-hailing app. Gilisho says the phone also records video of its surroundings. If the thief takes both the phone and the watch, the owner can enter a unique code, similar to an M-Pesa PIN, to trigger the alarm from another phone.
Gilisho says the same tool can help victims of gender-based violence. A user can set a keyword such as "usiniue", meaning "don't kill me". When the system senses danger, it sends the user's location and a video to relatives. The phone looks switched off but keeps recording in secret. He says police could be linked to the system later.
Gilisho told Citizen Digital he chose the name Afande so users feel they have a personal bodyguard. He said he wants a safe country. He believes the tool could also boost tourism, because visitors would trust that their phones will not be stolen in Kenya.