Facebook’s Safety Check has notified people that their families and friends are safe more than a billion times across the world. In order to improve its relevance and useful experience in times of crisis, Facebook is set to announce updates to Safety Check.
First, after marking themselves safe, people will be able to share additional information to help reassure friends they are safe and provide more context about the crisis. To make this easier, users can now add a personal note to tell their friends more about what’s happening from within the Safety Check tool. This note will appear in the News Feed story that is automatically generated when people mark themselves safe.
Following a crisis, one way people give and request help is through fundraising. To make this easier, Facebook is introducing Fundraisers in Safety Check. Within Safety Check, people will be able to create or donate to a fundraiser for charitable and personal causes to help those in need. Fundraising provides a way for people who are also outside of the crisis area to offer help. Fundraisers in Safety Check will start to roll out in the coming weeks in the US. It should be noted, though, that Facebook takes a 5 percent cut of any funds donated through the social network.
Since the launch of Community Help earlier this year on iOS and Android, Facebook has been inspired by the offers and requests for help generated by the community and want to make sure that those in need are able to access Community Help through any platform. Community Help will be available in the upcoming weeks on desktop, giving people another way to access the tool. Additionally, Community Help is now available for all crises where Safety Check is activated.
Finally, Facebook is introducing crisis descriptions. When people receive Safety Check notifications, they may have limited information about the crisis. To help provide additional context on crises and make sure people have the information that they need, Facebook has started adding descriptions about the crisis from NC4, a trusted third party global crisis reporting agency.