The Women's Center

Internet & Computer Safety

If you are in danger, please

• Call 911,
• Call your local hotline, or
• Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at: 1-800-799-SAFE.
• Email is not a safe or confidential way to talk to someone about the danger or abuse in your life, please call a hotline instead.
• Traditional ''corded'' phones are more private than cell phones or cordless phones.
• There are hundreds of ways that computers record everything you do on the computer and on the Internet.
• If you are in danger, please try to use a safer computer that someone abusive does not have direct access, or even remote (hacking) access to.
• It might be safer to use a computer in a public library, at a community. Technology center (CTC) www.ctcnet.org (national directory), at a trusted friend's house, or an Internet Café.
• If you think your activities are being monitored, they probably are. Abusive people are often controlling and want to know your every move. You don't need to be a computer programmer or have special skills to monitor someone's computer activities - anyone can do it and there are many ways to monitor.
• Computers can provide a lot of information about what you look at on the Internet, the emails you send, and other activities. It is not possible to delete or clear all computer ''footprints''.

If you think you may be monitored on your home computer, you might consider no home Internet use or ''safer'' Internet surfing. Example: If you are planning to flee to California, don't look at classified ads for jobs and apartments, bus tickets, etc for California on a home computer or any computer an abuser has physical or remote access to. Use a safer computer to research an escape plan.

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