Mobile app
Be Safe
Fighting the issue of domestic violence has never been more challenging than during the pandemic in 2020. Here’s how our team helped an international affairs nonprofit organization to design and develop an app which will help victims of domestic violence and raise awareness.
Background
UNDP works in about 170 countries and territories, helping to achieve the eradication of poverty, and the reduction of inequalities and exclusion. They help countries to develop policies, enhance institutional capacities to assure sustainable development. UNDP also supports CSOs, encourages leadership, partnerships in order to sustain development results.
The idea behind the app is a co-project of the Government of Montenegro, Ministry of the Interior and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Challenges
The COVID-19 pandemic has severely disrupted the normal functioning of populations around the world and threaten the health of all, but women and girls are disproportionately affected. As communities around the world are forced to stay at home, women and girls are at a heightened risk of domestic violence, intimate partner violence, and other forms of sexual and gender-based violence.
Victims of domestic violence are often at times unable to call for help. They need to have a fast and easy way to do that, which should be unnoticed by the attacker and not expose the victim to additional risk. To design an interface that would make the app “hidden” in a certain way is what our team faced as the biggest challenge.
Key Features
Be Safe app enables the victims to immediately send an alarm by only pressing a big-action button which is the first screen when the app is opened. The button signals that they are in danger, instantly reporting domestic violence and getting help. A short message with the exact geo-location is received by the National SOS line for victims of domestic violence, whose activists are responding right away.
The app also features the options for the victims to add phone numbers of organizations or people of trust, whose help they might need in case of danger. Moreover, the app offers a variety of information and other educational content, including all important help lines, practical advice, explanation on victims lawful rights, self-defense video tutorials, as well as all info on the Protocol of action, prevention and protection of domestic violence. This protocol contains all procedures and cross-institutional cooperation regarding the domestic violence and violence of women.
Solution
Working closely with the Government of Montenegro, Ministry of the Interior and UNDP, we developed a mobile application for iOS and Android that provides a platform to help victims of domestic violence and raise awareness. A precisely designed user experience that follows a simple, yet effective interface design, is tailored for the victims of domestic violence to react quickly (one click alert) and provide information on how to act when in danger.
6000+ downloads
Number of potentially all domestic violence cases in the country.
20+ cases
More than 20 cases of domestic violence reported through the app and criminal charges against the attackers.
4.6 star rating
Average rating on download platforms
Achievements
The app received a lot of positive feedback from various government institutions and NGOs who are combating domestic violence. In the early period after the launch authorities already recorded some cases which were reported through the app.
Be Safe is specifically tailored for the victims of domestic violence and violence of women which means that the number of downloads is most likely a good indicator of how many potential cases are out there. Having this number the institutions can analyze it and use it to measure the results of their campaign against domestic violence.
North Macedonia Version
A successful launch of the app in Montenegro got UNDP office in Skopje to contact us for the adaptation of the app to North Macedonia’s market. We had regular online meetings with their work group and have created a similar app, for iOS and Android, which also features a multi language option for the main ethnic group of the country.
TECH STACK
Angular
Capacitor
Ionic
Android
Apple
HTML
CSS
JS
