Tech2Empower Project: Harnessing the Power of Technology to Assist Victims of Crime

The purpose of this award, funded under the OVC FY 2019 Advancing the Use of Technology to Assist Victims of Crime, is to support organizations that demonstrate innovative strategies to create, expand, or enhance the use of technology initiatives on a national scale or that can be replicated nationally to improve response, services, and access for victims of crime.

The National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) will use this $1,965,037 award to support the Tech2Empower Project: Harnessing the Power of Technology to Assist Victims of Crime (T2E Project) to expand and maintain existing services, apps, and hotlines in order to provide services, referrals, tools, and information to victims of crime; enhance services, apps, and hotlines to address gaps in service provision. In the last year, TechSafety.org, the only source for information on technology safety and misuse that is tailored to the experiences of victims and their advocates, was visited by more than 210,000 people, accessing information and resources through more than 328,000 pageviews. In the last seven months alone, the Safety Net team has responded to 176 requests for assistance from survivors, and each inquiry requires extensive follow-up. Routing these requests through the Email Hotline would streamline this process dramatically by providing a mechanism to standardize responses, track response times, and more. This project to improve the technology available to victims complements the existing work of the National Domestic Violence Hotline, which received over 320,000 calls and 238,000 online chats in 2018. In addition, the T2E Project will increase understanding and education about the use of technology to support victims of crime through coalition-building activities.

CA/NCF