As well as enjoying a secure experience when visiting our website, Carlile Dowling has added another layer of privacy through the Shielded Site project, developed by Women’s Refuge.

Domestic violence is out of control in New Zealand

Unfortunately, domestic violence in this country is at unacceptable levels. On average Police are called to domestic violence situations every seven minutes, and they believe only around 18% of domestic violence is reported. 84% of people arrested in domestic violence cases are male and 16% are female. Each year 14 women, six men and 10 children are killed by a family member.

When a partner is living in fear, suffering from an abusive relationship, they sometimes seek outside help. The Internet is often the first port of call, to find resources to help extract themselves from their abusive situation. However, technology has extended the reach of dominant and abusive partners who keep tabs on their partners by monitoring all kinds of
activities like a phone’s GPS location, a victim’s email or banking passwords, and their web history. This makes it harder than ever for those looking for help, to find it.

Why have we joined the Shielded Site project?

To respond to this increasing threat, Women’s Refuge created a web tool called Shielded Site, which allows website owners to add computer code to their sites to protect a person’s browsing history and provide information about getting help. That way, an abusive partner would never see that their partner visited a website like Women’s Refuge or a family or divorce lawyer’s website. Otherwise things could go from bad to worse real fast.

We believe in human rights, the pursuit of happiness and privacy, so joining this initiative was a no-brainer for us.

How a Shielded Site works

When you visit our website you will notice a shield device above our company logo (top-left of our website). It doesn’t matter what device you use to visit a Shielded Site website because the tool is designed to work on desktop, tablet and mobile. Not only is your browsing history hidden from prying eyes, but clicking on the shield makes it easier to ask safely for help.

Once the shield is clicked, a powerful resource to help end domestic violence is presented to the viewer. This includes:

• What to do when In Danger
• Ways to get help
• How to prepare to get out of a toxic environment
• Making a safety plan
• Online safety
• Common FAQs.

With the Shielded Site project, any website can become a place of refuge. Women’s Refuge is 50-60% funded by government, with the rest of their income coming from fundraising, events, philanthropic trusts and bequests. They also rely on generous donations from members of the public, businesses and other private funders and trusts.

More businesses are joining forces with Women’s Refuge: You can too.

Today they are working with a growing list of NZ industry and business leaders to stand up against domestic violence. Accessing a shielded portal website makes it easier to safely plan to exit a violent environment.

Their goal is to make any website a place of refuge. You can join them by adding the Shielded Site to your website like we did and help victims living with domestic violence.

We invite you to get involved with this great initiative. You can learn more about Shielded Site at https://shielded.co.nz/. You can also donate to Women’s Refuge, volunteer, organise fundraisers and more. Join us in standing up against domestic violence and making more
places of refuge across the internet.