Sophia – the domestic violence chatbot

As a second-order consequence of Covid-19, domestic violence (DV) is a pandemic within the current pandemic. There is a consensus amongst experts that DV increased with the stay-at-home orders, while survivors encountered additional barriers to safely connect with trustworthy support services. As a digital assistant in chatbot form, Sophia bridges the gap between survivors in need of assistance and providers of care because it is accessible on any internet device via any messaging app. Unlike an app, which can be found by the abuser, Sophia leaves no digital trace once the conversation is erased. Sophia's responses can be easily adapted to different locations, making the project immediately scalable. Currently there is no known solution which can provide all these services to DV survivors worldwide, discreetly, anonymously and at no cost to the user. 

Domestic violence is a universal health crisis affecting 1.3 billion women and many millions of men. The consequences of DV are severe on the individual and her/his family members (death, grave bodily harm, long-term psychological suffering) and on the societal level (lost productivity, economic, health care costs). The costs of DV in the US alone amount to 11 billion annually. Sophia aims to aid survivors suffering from DV by empowering them with the tools to learn about their rights and take action. The pandemic and subsequent lockdown restrictions have had ripple effects, including trapping DV survivors at home with their abusers, while also restricting the possibility of reaching out for help. This has resulted in a dramatic rise of DV – 30% in some locations – to already high rates. At the same time, public service providers – already working under financial constraints – are at a reduced capacity to cope with the increase. Preparing for future pandemics in addition to the current one involves imaginative thinking on how gender equality and DV are public health issues while also properly funding solutions. As a global issue, Sophia presents a global, easily scalable solution. 

Sophia provides qualitative assistance to users with any device with internet access via popular messenger apps such as WhatsApp and WeChat. With Sophia's automated responses, the users are guided through a process we call G.A.L.: Gather potential evidence; Assess their rights as survivors; and Learn about their options, including local shelters and organizations that can provide assistance. Users simply access their internet device, open a messaging app, search for “Sophia,” and begin chatting as easily as one does with a friend. When the user decides to end the conversation, the conversation can simply be deleted and there is no trace of Sophia left on the device. Through a partnership with Silicon Valley software giant Zendesk, we have received free usage of their Sunshine Conversations technology to run Sophia on any messaging app, free use of server space for perpetuity, and access to technical support. Our completion of Sophia’s backend infrastructure and “default” English-language version means that translation into local languages and the inputting of local laws and information about on-the-ground organizations can easily be accomplished with the right local connections and funding sources.

Domestic violence is a massive global problem that crosses social class, race, ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, national borders, and ability. It affects not only the “domestic” realm but many other areas of the survivor’s life as well. It impacts an individual's physical and mental health and in turn may result in lower productivity and decreased economic autonomy outside of the home. Considering how DV has been an underfunded and understudied topic, we have built Sophia from the ground up with the input of DV survivors and DV advocates. Furthermore, for the purposes of beta testing in Switzerland, we have formed partnerships with the national umbrella organization for DV shelters and will institute feedback loops through which the chatbot can constantly be updated based on the needs of survivors and advocates.

Sophia empowers survivors by allowing them to gather potential evidence of the abuse in a secure way, the lack of which is often a barrier to leaving. They upload their documentation to a secure GDPR-compliant vault-server in the Swiss mountains, where it is kept under lock and key until they decide to take action. This ability to consistently document the abuse allows the survivors to escape the situation sooner and with more security, and achieve their full potential in other areas of their lives as well. By some accounts, 80% of survivors do not go to the police and 60% do not seek help at all. Sophia serves survivors of DV by aiding them to learn about their rights and the local organizations that can help them take action. By a large margin, women are the primary victims of DV and thus those who we mainly aim to target, though the service is available to any survivor and will also lower the threshold for men to seek help. By being an anonymous chatbot, we hope to lower the threshold for reaching out for help in general.

Finally, Sophia aids local organizations that, while knowledgeable about regional laws, cultural practices and the needs of local DV survivors, have an overwhelming workload and constant lack of funds. Sophia will assist these organizations with increasing their ability for outreach and connecting with all survivors who desperately need help. Our aim is to connect the dots between such survivors and the organizations who can provide that assistance. We work directly with the on-the-ground organizations and Sophia, in turn, informs the DV survivors about the local resources available to them. We will reach survivors by using targeted ads on social media and networks already built by DV organizations. 

Disease outbreaks lead to isolation at home and in cases of DV, this traps the survivor with the abuser. This, plus the stress of economic struggles due to pandemic shutdowns, can exacerbate abusive relationships, resulting in increased risk to survivors of DV at home, which worsens survivors’ mental health issues. While DV organizations and shelters work at the forefront of prevention and aid, during pandemic-induced shutdowns even the most knowledgeable of social workers may be blocked from providing service. Sophia fills that gap by reaching vulnerable DV survivors discreetly in their own homes 24/7 on any internet device. 

As a non-profit organization based in Switzerland but with a global outlook/reach, we are currently in the testing phase with Sophia in Switzerland. Via a number of hackathons and strategy work with 60 volunteers with expertise in technology, law, and DV advocacy, we finished the English-language “default” version of Sophia and are currently in the process of translating the bot into French, German, and Spanish. More importantly, we have solidified partnerships with the Swiss umbrella organization for DV shelters throughout the country --  thus ensuring rural/urban and linguistic diversity -- and their support means we will be able to begin testing the prototype nationwide in fall of 2021. Based on feedback from those key locations, we will adjust and improve the bot’s text and plan on further expansion in Switzerland and beyond.

Sophia’s innovation is: its ability to leave no digital trace; its adaptability and scalability; its low-cost model; the non-profit use of server space; and its potential for AI development. Until now, technologies aiding DV survivors have been isolated to apps and websites. While these provide useful aid, they pose multiple risks, including being found by a survivor’s abuser. Sophia, on the other hand, is completely discreet and anonymous. A user can find Sophia by searching her name in a messenger app, and start a conversation, without leaving a digital trace. Second, the chatbot can readily be adapted to any local need, with text translation and local laws easily integrated into the chatbot’s infrastructure designed for effortless contextual adaptation. Third, with the documented weaknesses of DV apps in the Global South due to high storage or data usage, expensive extras, or other issues, chatbots are a more affordable and accessible alternative. This argument is born out by the rapidly increasing use of chatbots, particularly in the Global South. As a non-profit organization offering server space for free to DV survivors, Sophia is innovating upon how technology can aid in evidence collection. Finally, with the right funding model and support, we aim to input AI capabilities into Sophia, including NLP and voice-to-text technologies.

We are currently in the final stages of finishing Sophia’s second prototype and its translation and therefore have no active users at the moment. We aim to launch a testing phase of Sophia in the fall of 2021 in concert with local DV shelters in Switzerland with whom we’ve already established partnerships. Then, within the following six months we plan on launching nationwide in Switzerland and reaching approximately 2,500 users by then. In five years, we aim to have up to 500,000 users via implementation of Sophia in 10 countries. We plan on doing this by key partnerships with DV organizations, supportive financial institutions, hiring key staff members, and targeted outreach. 

By focusing on addressing UN SDG 5, our project Sophia address all SDGs indirectly, as violence against women and inequality directly affects all 17 SDGs. In addition, Sophia directly addresses the following UN SDGs: SDG 3 (Good Health and Wellbeing), target 3.d “Strengthen the capacity of all countries, in particular developing countries, for early warning, risk reduction and management of national and global health risks” and UN SDG 5 (Gender Equality), target 5.2 “Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation” and 5.b “Enhance the use of enabling technology, in particular information and communications technology, to promote the empowerment of women.” We are measuring our current progress in developing our chatbot prototype from the feedback from our board of directors, partner organizations, and DV advocates. We will measure our success at meeting these goals by keeping track of: visits to Sophia’s website, number of users of the server space, reports from DV shelters and organizations including advocates and survivors, numbers of users who have received help and witnessed tangible improvement in their situation, and potentially anonymized data from Sophia users.

The combined number of full-time staff, part-time staff, and volunteers numbers at 60. The founder, Rhiana Spring, serves full time, Director Dr. Deniz Daser and Project Manager Clarina Bianchi serve part-time, and 60 volunteers – including professionals in IT, cyber security, and DV assistance – offer their expertise part-time.

Kona’s founder, Rhiana Spring, is an award-winning international human rights expert and entrepreneur. With the United Nations, the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and diverse NGOs and legal teams, Rhiana has defended the most vulnerable individuals and spearheaded multinational human rights projects across Africa, Asia, South America, and Europe. Until recently, Rhiana served as a Legal Policy Advisor to the African Union’s Peace and Security Department in Ethiopia. She speaks five languages and holds three law degrees from the London School of Economics and Oxford Brookes University. After having learnt various programming languages, Rhiana set up her first IT business aged 17 and now has brought Kona Connect and sister company Spring Tech to life.

Kona’s Director, Dr. Deniz Daser, holds a PhD in anthropology from Rutgers University and has spent more than a decade conducting ethnographic research with transnational migrants and political refugees across the globe. Her research on migrant labor, insecurity, and citizenship has focused on how marginalized groups organize politically for safe workplaces and the right to remain. This professional experience has aided in developing outreach to DV organizations and shaping Sophia to best serve the needs of individuals facing vulnerable situations.                       

Sophia’s project manager, Clarina Bianchi, holds a Master’s degree in Social Work and has multiple years of experience in gender equality and project management, with a focus on gender-based violence (GBV). Amongst others, Clarina has trained police forces across India on GBV with the UN. She currently serves as Program Officer for a GBV-project in Albania with the non-profit organization IAMANEH Switzerland, and as the Co-Founder of the project Glocal Steps, supporting refugees with their job market integration and education in Zurich, Switzerland. She also has many years of experience managing volunteer recruits in the non-profit field.

Kona was founded by women and is currently run by majority women from diverse nationalities, abilities and expertise, though among our diverse staff are male volunteers and advisory board members. We proactively empower women to take up leadership positions by fostering the space and training to advance women into team leader and management positions. Additionally, Kona’s organizational culture actively provides a safe space for women to improve negotiation and other crucial skills needed in the economic sphere. 

The collaborative opportunities afforded by the MIT Solve program are unmatched for an organization like Kona Connect. Specifically, the potential with MIT Solve to globally scale Sophia and thus empower individuals facing DV to improve their lives is profound. Not only would the funds themselves aid us in implementing Sophia as soon as possible, but the 9-month program would allow us to network with like-minded individuals, receive mentoring from experts in the field, and develop our social business model for Sophia and other Kona projects in the pipeline. 

The interest in Sophia has grown faster than we expected and we now urgently need your help with improving our pitching to potential philanthropic investors as well as sourcing talent and developing our board. The word has rapidly spread throughout Switzerland and beyond and we have been contacted by multiple organisations around the world about implementing Sophia in different countries. The need to address this global issue is urgent. For us to be able to first launch Sophia securely and then safely scale to different countries, we would love support in getting the best people on board in addition to the opportunity to further develop our technology to reach more segments of our populations and all corners of our world. Furthermore, to ensure Sophia’s highest standards, we would be grateful for assistance in monitoring and evaluating the data we receive to measure and increase Sophia’s impact, thereby helping more people in need.

The MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab would be a key partner in developing Sophia’s NLP and other AI capabilities. Having borne fruitful interactions with ETH-Lausanne’s Digital Humanities department, partnering with MIT’s Digital Humanities institute could also provide useful guidance in best developing a technology with which individuals in vulnerable situations are interfacing. In terms of Solve partnerships, Kona sees great mentorship potential with Solvers on issues like AI implementation (Ada Health: “An AI-powered digital decision support platform for community health workers”) and documentation issues surrounding DV (MediCapt: “Transforming the documentation and prosecution of sexual violence”).  

Yes, Kona would like to be considered for the Innovation for Women Prize with its project “Sophia.” As a global public health crisis that overwhelmingly affects girls and women, domestic violence (DV) is ripe for technological solutions that engage a multitude of stakeholders, including DV survivors, public service providers, tech professionals, and non-profit actors. Our chatbot Sophia is designed to empower domestic violence survivors to know their rights, gather evidence & seek help, without leaving a digital trace. By partnering with local service providers like DV shelters, organizations, and governmental agencies, we aim to adapt Sophia to multiple global locations and allow local organizations to better reach survivors. In this regard, female survivors will amplify their voices as they advocate for themselves in exiting from their abusive situation. The support of the Vodafone Americas Foundation would allow Kona to overcome many of the financial barriers to implementing Sophia sooner rather than later, which, in the case of DV, can have life or death consequences.