Screen lock by Bluetooth proximity: present/absent is not enough

Graduated

An attempt to lock the machine when the device in your pocket walks away; it became the SignalLock menu bar app.

Started: May 2026 — Ongoing

Technologies

Swift SwiftUI CoreBluetooth CoreLocation C# .NET 8

This experiment became a product:

SignalLock

Website Source code

What I tried

An unlocked Mac in a shared workspace is a privacy risk, and remembering to lock it should not be the user’s job. The attempt: treat a Bluetooth device the user already carries (iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods, a BLE tag) as trusted, and lock the screen when it leaves range.

What came out of it

The experiment turned out to be about the signal itself: raw “device present / device absent” is not enough for a proximity decision — signal fluctuation causes false locks. So the core was built on a proximity assessment rather than plain visibility. macOS side in Swift/SwiftUI with CoreBluetooth, Windows side in C#/.NET 8.

Where it ended up

It shipped as a menu bar app, with its product page and download on its own domain. Details in the portfolio.

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