Tracey Koos knows what it's like to hand over the car keys to a teenager.

"When they first start driving, that first year is very scary," she told Local 6. "When they walk out the door the first couple of times, you're on pins and needles."

Her 17-year-old daughter, Shelby, senses this.

"When I go out, they're up waiting for me," she said.

In the interest of calming each others nerves, Tracey and Shelby agreed to give Speedbump a test drive. Speedbump is a computer-based application for Android phones that lets parents set speed limits whenever their teenagers take the car.

Tracey went to the Speedbump website, opened an account and registered her phone number as well as Shelby's. Once registered, Tracey chose speed limits for Shelby on three specific road types: local, secondary and highways. If Shelby were to drive over those set limits, Tracey would get an email or text message alert.

Speedbump essentially syncs with both phones, and while it works with the GPS built into Shelby's phone, it is not a tracking device. Parents only get alerts when Speedbump detects a speed that is over the limit for the road type the parent specifies. The exact location is identified, but there is nothing in the program that allows a parent to initiate tracking.

To demonstrate, Shelby took her mother's car and went for a drive on Brooks Road in Oviedo. Shelby drove 35 miles-per-hour, but Tracey had set the speed at 25. Sure enough, Tracey received an alert.

"She's going 36.23 miles an hour on a local road," Tracey told Local 6.

Next, Shelby went for a drive on State Road 417. Her mother had set the speed for highway driving at 55 miles per hour. Shelby's top speed reached 66. Her mother promptly received an alert.

"I absolutely love this application," Tracey said.

And she's not alone. Even teenagers have good things to say about a device that restricts their own driving.

"It's something that establishes trust between a parent and a teen driver," says 19-year-old Tyler Kraus, who runs Reynolds Right Hands, a safety advocacy group for teens.

In fact, it was a teenager, Jon Fischer, who developed Speedbump.

"I was 17 when I created the original algorithms to determine safe driving speeds in certain road classification," Fischer said.

Fischer said Speedbump can calculate a driver's speed by the minute, and because it goes everywhere the teenager's phone goes, the application also lets parents monitor speed when their kids are driving with friends. Parents will also get an alert if or when

• The teenager turns the phone off
  
• The teenager uses the phone to text
  
• The teenager uses the phone to talk while driving
  

"I feel like it is a bit too restrictive on the monitoring speed side, but I like it on the texting side," Shelby said.

Her mother, meanwhile, explained that restrictions are a balancing act.

"We don't sit awake at night thinking of ways to drive our children insane and make them miserable," Tracey Koos said.  "We set rules and boundaries for their good and the good of the community. I set them so she doesn't kill someone else. Besides, it took me a long time to bring her into this world. I want to keep her here a long time."

Family plans start at $9.99 per month for up to six phones. Speedbump plans to introduce an iPhone version next year. For more information, go to SpeedbumpGPS.com.