CHICAGO — It can be difficult for sexual assault survivors to report their experiences, but a new app aims to make the process less daunting.
"More than 85 percent of victims are not comfortable reporting and then when they go do a report, their credibility is questioned," said Michael Lissack, a spokesman for We-Consent LLC, which released the I've Been Violated app for iOS on Jan. 14.
The app is currently being piloted at college campuses, including one in Chicago (Lissack declined to identify it due to confidentiality agreements), and bills itself as "the first app of its kind to allow a victim of sexual assault to confidentially record contemporaneous evidence (with video and audio) of an incident."
Users can move through a series of simple prompts to record audio and video to document the assault. The victim can name the assailant and the device can record the appearance of the victim. Once recorded, the evidence is double-encrypted and stored offline.
When the victim is ready to report the crime to authorities, the I've Been Violated recording is made accessible to police, court or college investigators. The recording also contains geo-coding technology that shows exactly where the user was when he or she filed the information through the app.
So far, Lissack said its server data shows that nearly 400 videos have been recorded — but it's likely that many of them are just test uploads.
"I suspect all [videos] are users trying out the app. We have not yet received a legal request for a video," Lissack said.
Alison Morano, a founder of Florida-based Affirmative Consent Project, which seeks to get policies about sexual consent adopted at all college campuses, was one of six female advisers who consulted with the app's development team, which is based in Boston.
"You never know how you will feel if something happens, but you always want to be able to get your story down. I'd hate to liken it to insurance companies but they are all about getting your story down right away," Morano said.
Morano added, "Apps are the future of everything, right? If you call 911, you are waiting; why not have something you can press a button right away and have a reference? There is always a wait time. Especially in a state of trauma, you may or may not be able to remember everything. It's a way to feel more secure to tell yourself that it happened."
Chicago Police declined to comment on the app, but emphasized that victims of crimes should report incidents directly to police in order to increase the likelihood the perpetrator is caught and prevented from harming others.
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