This 'shadow boyfriend' helps protect you from stalkers

Who needs a real boyfriend to protect you from perverts when you can have a virtual “shadow boyfriend” to do that?

A Japanese company has created a device that offers a sense of security for women who live alone, by projecting a moving shadow of a man onto a window curtain.

In Japan, many working adults move out of their parents’ home and live alone, or relocate from the countryside they grew up in to work in the city. While there are people who can afford places with better security, most just make do with an apartment that’s reasonably-priced with a less-than-ideal location. But as safe as Japan may be, there are still reports of perverts around, which you can tell from this interactive crime map.

In order to help protect women from creepy stalkers, Leo Palace 21 recently announced a possible solution “Man on the Curtain”. With just a smartphone and a projector, a silhouette of a man moving will be projected on the window, with the curtain acting as a screen. From the outside, it would seem as if a guy is in the room, which creates a facade that you are not living alone.

There are a total of 12 types of silhouettes to choose from: a strong-looking man doing shadow boxing, karate, yoga, weight training, exercise, or swinging the bat; or a family-oriented guy vacuuming the floor, reading the newspaper, changing clothes after arriving home from work, playing the electric guitar, doing the laundry, or wandering around the room pondering over something.

In the video in the tweet by Leo Palace 21, it was mentioned that Tokyo is one of the cities in the world that has the most number of women staying alone. Japanese criminal psychologist Professor Yasuyuki Deguchi also highlighted that criminals tend to find these women easy targets. But with “Man on the Curtain” projecting incredibly realistic and animated shadows of actual actors, if the criminals were brought to believe that a guy lives in the apartment, it can effectively deter them from committing a crime.

While “Man on the Curtain” is a really interesting idea, Leo Palace 21 has yet to put it up for sale.

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