Talking about gender empowerment and gender equality is different, and practicing it in real life is different. There are various challenges a woman has to face throughout her life. A new app called ‘Smashboard’ is striving to address at least some of those hurdles through technology.

Noopur Tiwari, the founder of Smashboard, says, “The idea of smashboard came out of a need for uniting survivors and their allies, people who are battling trauma to do certain things with ease. Here you can find experts that you need for your mental health, lawyers, and journalists. 

The idea, on the one hand, is to keep the agency with the survivors and on the other hand, is to create a social media network where we recognize that there is something called patriarchy and that there are tons of people out there doing the labor of fighting patriarchy. This app is to make messy and risky tasks easier.”

With features like a timestamped journal and enlisted mental health and legal practitioners, Smashboard’s primary aim is to make recording a sexual crimeless traumatic for the victim by using blockchain to create a private, online, and encrypted ledgers of the assault. 

“Seeking help can be dangerous for survivors, and there are consequences of revealing one’s identity. Often, survivors have undiagnosed post-traumatic stress disorder that comes in the way of seeking help,” explains Tiwari. The app curates articles from feminist writers, journalists covering gender violence, and publications like ‘Bitch Media.’

Smashboard also allows survivors to reach out to established journalists, if they want to expose their sexual abuser, or if the officials don’t take their grievances seriously. These conversations are encrypted over a guarded server.

Smashboard’s advisory board consists of, ‘Urvashi Butalia,’ CEO of Zubaan Books, and ‘Christina Thomas Dhanaraj,’ co-founder of the Dalit History Month, a project chronicling neglected histories of marginalized communities.

Background

While the idea for this platform was developing in 2016, #MeToo gave Tiwari and her team the drive their work needed. Assembling a small team in Spain, Tiwari was all set to launch the app in 2018, when one of her team members protested about being sexually harassed by the Spanish coders developing Smashboard. 

“The coders who were working for us pulled out of the project because a tech-bro of theirs abused one of our team members. Our ‘punishment’ for speaking out against this supposed hero was them trying to tank our project at the last minute and leaving us without any code,” Tiwari recalls.

But finding forces again, Smashboard’s team got to work yet again.

As of now, it is self-funded, and the founding team, which has ‘Monica Narula’ as the director of operations, and ‘Mridul’ as the director of technology, will soon launch a crowdfunding campaign to raise money.

An Online Ally With Blockchain

A lot of Smashboard’s features developed from Tiwari’s experiences with helping survivors of sexual assault. It becomes challenging to find the appropriate allies, mainly if the accused is from a politically well-connected family. Other times, it was merely exhausting for a survivor to continually repeat the timeframe of her assault every time she met a new lawyer or mental health practitioner.

“We allow pseudo-anonymity to the users so that they can have initial conversations from the comfort of their beds if need be, before they feel comfortable enough to work with, say a therapist or share info with a journalist or a lawyer. Survivors will know the tremendous value of this kind of space,” explains Tiwari.

And this anonymity is guaranteed with the use of blockchain. The technology also helps women record the events of their sexual assault, with a permanent timestamp, which would help them while dealing with the police and judicial authorities.

Gendered technology

Blockchain would enable Smashboard to launch a coin offering called SMASH, a cryptocurrency to battle patriarchy. But this would happen when the Indian government regulates and legalize cryptocurrencies.

In principle, such a currency could be used to support feminist campaigns, grassroots initiatives, and digital tools, from investors who are aligned to the cause. “Ethical investing should be encouraged in the crypto world. Right now, it’s too murky and too sexist,” she explains.

Limitations

However, Smashboard does have some limitations. Smashboard currently is limited to those who have a smartphone and are fluent in languages like English, Spanish, and French. Tiwari believes that once the team expands, Smashboard can cast it’s net farther to non-English speaking audiences in India.

Smashboard is being endorsed by ‘Eve Ensler’ of ‘The Vagina Monologues’ fame, who launched ‘One Billion Rising 2020,’ a global campaign to stop rape and sexual violence against women in India this week.