New guide to tackle tech-based abuse launched in Cork 

AN ONLINE course on technology-facilitated domestic abuse will soon be launched in UCC, building on new national guidance about how to identify and respond to abuse and coercion perpetrated using technology.

Technology-facilitated abuse is any kind of abusive behaviour using technology. It can include things like harassing a victim on social media, ‘bombing’ someone’s phone with excessive calls and texts, or accessing someone’s personal accounts without their knowledge or consent.

Safe Ireland in association with the National Cyber Security Awareness Taskforce on Wednesday launched a new safety guide titled ‘Supporting Women: Responding to Technology-Facilitated Domestic Abuse’.

The booklet was launched at the Cyber Ireland National Conference in Cork on Wednesday, and follows a two-week billboard campaign in Cork raising awareness about the red-flags which signal technology-facilitated abuse.

Mary McDermott, CEO of Safe Ireland, said that the safety guide will be a “powerful” tool for frontline domestic abuse responders; Gardaí, doctors, nurses, social workers, pharmacists, healthcare professionals, and even friends and family of a person at risk, to enable them to identify and support victims of technology-facilitated abuse.

Lisa Culloty from the West Cork Women Against Violence Project said that technology-facilitated abuse is something that they have seen “an awful lot”, and can be particularly difficult for women in a rural setting.

“We’ve seen a lot of cases where abusers will post on social media accounts, posts that are very offensive and defamatory. This really has a huge impact on any woman, but particularly how these posts are portraying women in a rural setting, in a small close-knit community,” she said.

Deborah O’Flynn from OSS Cork, a city centre resource for domestic violence victims, said that technology-facilitated abuse has always been in the background, but has really accelerated in the past five years.

“Before we would have seen it was younger people with social media posts, and that’s still very much the case… but now it’s gone into the middle age range with surveillance, and more recently with older adults, their children are adults and are gaining control over PIN numbers and passwords and exerting financial abuse. So different age ranges are availing of different kinds of abuse through tech,” she said.

Users of the booklet will also have access to a number of support-training initiatives including free Cyber Security Essentials Training webinars provided by Hewlett Packard Enterprise and a series of informational videos created by security software development company Trend Micro.

Both the booklet and training can be accessed on the Safe Ireland website safeireland.ie.

This will be further supplemented later in the year by access to a new online accredited course in technology-assisted abuse which is currently under development at University College Cork.