Verity Protect

An independently built call-screening product that gives older adults and caregivers a simpler, harder barrier against scam calls.

I created Verity Protect as a personal startup and passion project after my grandmother was personally scammed by a phone call. Existing spam blockers did not provide the hard barrier I was looking for, so I designed and built a call-screening system for older adults, caregivers, and family members setting up protection for someone else. I worked independently across product strategy, UX, UI, branding, marketing, frontend, backend, and launch, using Figma to make the design decisions and Codex as an implementation partner. The design direction, interaction logic, and accessibility choices remained mine throughout. The core experience lets a user create a PIN and add trusted people through the native contact picker. Trusted callers are recognized and connected without friction, while unknown callers are required to pass the PIN before reaching the user. An optional hard-block mode allows only trusted contacts through. To avoid blocking legitimate calls from doctors and other professionals, I also added an allowlist for medical and other trusted phone numbers. Caregivers can review messages left by callers who failed the screening step, while connected-call recordings are not retained, keeping the system useful without creating unnecessary privacy exposure. I designed the onboarding and controls around low cognitive load, readable screens, clear status information, and Apple platform conventions, with accessibility-informed decisions throughout. The most difficult technical challenge was learning VoIP call bridging and building the Twilio flow reliably across many moving parts, including onboarding, trusted-contact routing, alerts, blocked contacts, message handling, and caregiver access. The app is live and stable on iOS, has been used by my grandmother for more than eight months, and has reached over 100 installs, 20 active protected users, and more than 400 screened calls.

Tools: React Native, Supabase, Render, Twilio