New App Allows Brazilian Trans Women To Share Safety Resources

Dandarah seeks to use a crowdsourced approach to curb the nation’s high rates of transphobic violence. 
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Brazil is one of the most dangerous places in the world for trans people, particularly for trans women of color. In 2019, the country had the highest number of murders of trans people globally — at least 130 — according to the Trans Murder Monitoring Project, with almost 40% of trans murders worldwide occurring in the South American nation. A new app is aiming to curb these heartbreaking statistics by helping trans women in Brazil crowdsource information about violence and personal safety.

Named Dandarah (after Dandara don Santos, a Brazilian trans woman who was murdered in 2017), the app works by presenting user-generated maps of major Brazilian cities, showing locations where trans women typically congregate. Users can then communicate with one another in real-time regarding violence on the ground. They can also use a panic button to immediately reach five emergency contacts as well as emergency services.

After receiving initial funding from Jean Wyllys, one of Brazil’s few openly gay politicians (who left the country last year after receiving death threats), Dandarah was developed by a team of Canadian researchers led by Monica Malta, an assistant professor at University of Toronto. The app was not originally meant to be a practical tool: the idea grew out of the Divas study, a 2017 UNESCO project that assessed the danger Brazilian trans women face from transphobic violence as well as ailments like HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis. Surveying nearly 3,000 subjects from Brazil’s urban centers to its most rural villages, Malta and her team found they face “[a] terrible and widespread experience of violence and discrimination.”

Perhaps most hauntingly was the fact that one of those nearly 3,000 trans women interviewed for the project was Dandara don Santos, who would tell Malta, according to VICE, that the main thing she thought her community needed was more safety. Don Santos’ murder inspired Malta and her fellow researchers to create Dandarah, which has been downloaded more than 5,000 times since its release in December.

“Dandara’s killing will never be forgotten,” Malta told VICE. “Our team has been working closely with the trans community before this terrible murder, and will continue to work tirelessly to develop strategies that can help transwomen identify perpetrators, map safe and risk areas, ask for help and find support 24/7.”

Since the app’s release, Malta was awarded a grant from Grand Challenges Canada, funds the researcher plans to use to create another app that addresses the mental health issues associated with Brazil’s high rates of transphobic violence. “We know that violence and stigma is a key predictor for poor mental health, social isolation, depression and suicidality, and that is a great concern,” Malta told Now Toronto.

Dandarah is not the only app to use crowdsourcing techniques to build a safety net for LGBTQ+ people in hostile places. Since 2018, GeoSure has generated travel safety ratings for LGBTQ+ folks in more than 30,000 locations.

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