Google Maps is one of the first things that comes to our mind when we are lost. Have you ever wondered who is the female voice behind the GPS systems that calmly guide you? Singer, motivational speaker, voiceover artist and songwriter Karen Elizabeth Jacobsen is behind the voice that never leads us astray.

54-year-old Karen jokingly says that she is the only woman men would take directions from. Known as GPS Girl, Karen's voice has been used since 2002. She was first approached by a company called Garmin.

In 2000, Karen came to New York with a dream of becoming a big pop singer. Having had the opportunity to work with many musicians, Karen's voice was chosen as the Australian English option for GPS's text-to-speech system.

It soon grew to billions of GPS and smartphone devices. Karen recorded more than 50 hours for the first GPS voice system that day. Karen says that the GPS engineers were satisfied after she repeated the word 'approximately' 168 times in a row.

Karen was also used as the Australian voice of Apple's Siri application from 2011 to 2014. She had returned to Australia with her husband and son in 2020 in the wake of Covid.