It doesn’t sound like this is a dead man switch, sounds more like a panic button?
Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
21–30 of 118 posts
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#22At the risk of sounding insensitive - I don't understand what this is. I know what a dead man's switch is, of course - maybe an app that emails your next in kin your email password or cryptocurrency private key if you haven't checked in for a few months. But what would this do? SMS the hospital/police if it's been 24 hours since you played hangman? What is an actual example of intended use? I know it's probably not t…
I was also confused, but I think it probably isn’t a dead man switch at all, maybe it’s a panic button.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#23Something physical would be interesting. Putting on the pink lipstick triggers the alarm. Because, of course, an abusive partner may take away the phone.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#24At the risk of sounding insensitive - I don't understand what this is. I know what a dead man's switch is, of course - maybe an app that emails your next in kin your email password or cryptocurrency private key if you haven't checked in for a few months. But what would this do? SMS the hospital/police if it's been 24 hours since you played hangman? What is an actual example of intended use? I know it's probably not t…
This is a classic fallacy in regards to abusive relationships. Something along the lines of "just leave the relationship", or, "just press charges for past abuses before the next one comes and have him taken away".
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
This isn’t mine, but the number of my users with js turned off isn’t worth the effort. You guys make a lot of noise, but not a lot of traffic.
This. Without JS the base expectation should be a blank page. Not even an error message.
That's a bizarrely vindictive attitude.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#26At the risk of sounding insensitive - I don't understand what this is. I know what a dead man's switch is, of course - maybe an app that emails your next in kin your email password or cryptocurrency private key if you haven't checked in for a few months. But what would this do? SMS the hospital/police if it's been 24 hours since you played hangman? What is an actual example of intended use? I know it's probably not t…
So in the cases of domestic abuse, the victims usually contact a charity that organises a way for them to escape safely. That means setting them up with a new place to live, a job so that they can afford to live (as usually victims will be dependent on their partners), etc. This takes a bit of time and the victims usually stay in their abusive environment if they can (due to over capacity of shelters and other reasons, I'm not the most knowledgeable about all this). But a support network will be available and they'll have a number to call, or friends and family that they can call instead.
The problem is that even though this support network exists, victims often have their phones taken away from their abusers so they end up stuck. If friends and family go round to the house, their abusers can refuse entry and say that the victim is fine or sleeping when in fact they're in danger. This app does not intend to phone authorities, it is down to the individual support network to organise that as they see fit, this app only intends to reach out to the support network as fast as possible when it is needed. If there is a true emergency and they can call emergency services then they can do so, emergency services are set up to handle this. In the case that the victims only want to notify their support network then they can do so from the app using the panic button.
It might be the case in the future that I build contacts with emergency services for a more involved response but I simply do not have the contacts at this point in time.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#27Something physical would be interesting. Putting on the pink lipstick triggers the alarm. Because, of course, an abusive partner may take away the phone.
> Because, of course, an abusive partner may take away the phone.
That's the point of the app, isn't it? If you don't use the App for some amount of time, the alarm gets triggered.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#28It doesn’t sound like this is a dead man switch, sounds more like a panic button?
Did you read the beginning? This is an extension to an existing dead man switch app whose only purpose is to hide the fact that it's a dead man switch. The underlying app is indeed a dead man switch.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#29At the risk of sounding insensitive - I don't understand what this is. I know what a dead man's switch is, of course - maybe an app that emails your next in kin your email password or cryptocurrency private key if you haven't checked in for a few months. But what would this do? SMS the hospital/police if it's been 24 hours since you played hangman? What is an actual example of intended use? I know it's probably not t…
So in the cases of domestic abuse, the victims usually contact a charity that organises a way for them to escape safely. That means setting them up with a new place to live, a job so that they can afford to live (as usually victims will be dependent on their partners), etc. This takes a bit of time and the victims usually stay in their abusive environment if they can (due to over capacity of shelters and other reason…
Constructive feedback: All the copy on both your website and in the app store assumes that one knows what a dead man's switch is in general, and what it means in this context in particular (ie, what you wrote above).
I had to use wikipedia to even (sort of) understand what you were selling.
Re: Show HN: Discreet dead man's switch for victims of domestic abuse
#30At the risk of sounding insensitive - I don't understand what this is. I know what a dead man's switch is, of course - maybe an app that emails your next in kin your email password or cryptocurrency private key if you haven't checked in for a few months. But what would this do? SMS the hospital/police if it's been 24 hours since you played hangman? What is an actual example of intended use? I know it's probably not t…
So in the cases of domestic abuse, the victims usually contact a charity that organises a way for them to escape safely. That means setting them up with a new place to live, a job so that they can afford to live (as usually victims will be dependent on their partners), etc. This takes a bit of time and the victims usually stay in their abusive environment if they can (due to over capacity of shelters and other reason…
Thanks for explaining. So basically - this app acts like a concealed/plausibly deniable dead-man's switch with the capability of contacting third parties who might be able to help if the phone is taken away/destroyed by the abuser. And the reason the action isn't taken immediately is that it can take some time to set up a proper "escape" - but if critical, this can be expedited.
That makes sense now. It's not immediately obvious to a newcomer.