Switching out Waze but let down by government’s TuJu? Try this

A Malaysian developer has launched a free navigation service for motorists, following negative user experiences with the government’s TuJu, an app that Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim declared as a replacement for Waze amid concerns over the latter’s links to Israel.

LAPAN Nav, developed by Leslie Chan, is a free navigation service that can be accessed via its website at lapan-nav.com. In other words, users don’t have to download any app onto their devices.

“Made in Malaysia. Navigation that works,” the service declares on its website.

Chan said he started developing LAPAN Nav on Oct 23.

“I build it alone, and it improves every day from drivers’ reports,” Chan told MalaysiaNow, adding that it cost him “almost nothing”.

“It is built on free and open data (OpenStreetMap and other open sources) with its own search and routing, and runs on pay-as-you-go cloud services capped at a small monthly budget.”

MalaysiaNow, which carried out a quick test of its various features, can confirm that they are functional and that it does the main job of providing road directions, unlike TuJu, the app jointly developed by the Malaysian Highway Authority (LLM) in collaboration with private firm Prosignal Consortium Sdn Bhd, which has only sparked a wave of criticism as well as scrutiny of the parties commissioned to develop it.

Among LAPAN Nav’s features, which Chan said are still a work in progress, are traffic-aware route planning and live traffic information to highlight congestion and faster alternatives.

Like Waze, users can also report accidents, police presence, road hazards, floods, road closures and speed cameras, enabling the system to alert other motorists. It also offers voice-guided directions in four languages: Malay, English, Tamil and Chinese.

‘Waze is good but know who keeps your data’

A main advantage stressed by Chan is that LAPAN Nav is browser-based and does not require users to download an app.

“Because it runs inside your browser, it is walled off from the rest of your phone. It cannot read your SMS, banking apps, contacts or photos. It only uses what you allow – your location for navigation, and your microphone only while you hold the talk button – and you can switch these off any time,” according to its website.

On data security, which is at the heart of the government’s argument for ditching the Google-owned Waze, Chan acknowledged the concerns.

“Waze is a very good app. The concern is not the app itself but who controls the data: where Malaysian drivers go, every day. My advice: know who holds your location data and under which country’s laws.”

He said that while LAPAN Nav shares data with a few companies, which it has disclosed on its website, none of them is Israeli.

“One exception, only if you send feedback: its words (with emails, phone numbers, IC numbers and plates removed first) are sorted by Google’s free Gemini service, which doesn’t promise which country it uses,” its website explains.