Easy Rescue's New Chatbot Offers Support and Guidance for Women

Vodafone Turkey Foundation continues to develop the "Easy Rescue" app,- launchedeight years ago to protect women from violence- and has recently addedan AI-powered chatbot called "Rescue" to the application. This new feature will guide women on their way to professional help.

Striving to be a leader in social change and development, Vodafone Turkey Foundation continues to add new features to the "Easy Rescue" app, which was launched 8 years ago with the goal of protecting women from violence. An AI-based chatbot has been added to Easy Rescue, which allows women to swiftly reach the police or their relatives in a moment of violence and has been downloaded by 372,000 users until today. The robot, called "Rescue", will support women in matters they are afraid to ask others. Created to increase women's awareness of gender equality and guide them on the way to professional help, "Rescue" will provide information to women about the types of violence with multiple choice questions and enable them to reach the right addresses regarding the actions to be taken.

Making a statement on "November 25, International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women", Vodafone Turkey Foundation President Hasan Süel said:

"Violence against women is a crucial global issue. We believe that the power of technology can be used to more effectively combat violence against women, which is a severe social issue and major violation of human rights. With this vision, we developed the 'Easy Rescue' application, which allows women to swiftly reach the police or their relatives in a moment of violence. Until today, 'Easy Rescue' has been downloaded 372,000 times, reaching 1,000 monthly active users. We constantly update our application based on user reviews and feedback. Many women are hesitant to speak about the violence they have experienced, which keeps the issue a taboo. We integrated an AI-based chatbot into Easy Rescue to help address the challenges women face and offer them a tool to learn about their rights. 'Rescue' presents a non-judgmental space for women to seek support and enables scalable, informative conversations. With this service, we aim to guide women who are subjected to violence and inform them about the steps they can taketo protect themselves and seek help. With 'Rescue', women will be able to access information and guidance through chat -especially in moments of psychological distress or when they are unsure whether what they have experienced qualifies as violence.

Emergency numbers can be dialed with one click

The "Easy Rescue" app aims to provide first aid to victims morequickly and easily,thereby serving a preventative role . The application also lets users register three contacts to be reached in an emergency with just one click, allowingwomen who have been abused to easily alert their loved ones. The app can also send an emergency SMS that shares the users’ location and alerts contacts that they are in danger. With the application, Alo 183, 155 Police, 156 Gendarmerie and Domestic Violence Emergency Hotline emergency numbers can be dialed with one button. Moreover, the application displays the addresses and telephone numbers of the nearest Centers for Prevention and Monitoring Violence, operating under the Ministry of Family and Social Services, via the map. Women can also access information about what to do when exposed to violence. Android users can pin the emergency SMS and call functions to their phone's home screens. Therefore, they now have a single button to touch whenever they need to access these functions. Visually impaired women can also use the app. The accessibility options of Voice Over for iOS users and Talk Back for Android users have been added to the all functions of Easy Rescue. This new add-on allows reading an item selected by touch and provides voice feedback. "Easy Rescue" also raises women's awareness of the types of violence with the Violence Awareness Test and educational videos on gender equality. You can download the "Easy Rescue" application for free from Apple Store and Google Play.

Vodafone's Awareness campaign

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, a woman or a girl is killed by an intimate partner or a family member every 11 minutes in the world. Based on this data, Vodafone launched a communication campaign to raise awareness to fight against violence against women. As part of the campaign, Vodafone will launch a series of initiatives on November 25 to highlight the scale of violence against women, including posting on social media every 11 minutes throughout the day . Influencers and social media accounts that advocate women's rights and raise awareness about violence against women will also support the campaign. Moreover, this data will be shared through outdoor media to further raise public awareness.