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Domestic violence and tech-enabled abuse — digital safety for survivors

Physical safety comes first

If you are in immediate danger, contact emergency services before reading on. In Taiwan, call 110 (police) or the 113 Protection Hotline. This page does not replace a trained advocate, and some steps below can be dangerous if done at the wrong moment. The single most important idea is at the bottom of this section: do not act on this page from a device the abuser can reach.

When a partner or family member turns technology into a tool of control, the threat is different from most digital-safety situations. The adversary often has, or has had, physical access to your devices, knows your passwords, shares your accounts, pays your phone bill, and can read your reaction in person. Standard advice like "turn on two-factor authentication" or "delete the tracking app" can backfire here, because a sudden change is itself a signal that you have noticed, and noticing is what triggers escalation.

This page is written for survivors and the people helping them. It covers how tech-enabled abuse works, how to check for monitoring without tipping off the abuser, how to rebuild separate accounts safely, and how to preserve evidence. The hardest constraint runs through all of it: the safest moves are often slow ones, made on a device the abuser cannot see.

The leading specialist resources are English- and European-language only, with no Southeast Asian coverage, so this page tries to be a usable English-language starting point for at-risk readers across the region. For depth, the Safety Net Project (run by the US National Network to End Domestic Violence) and the Coalition Against Stalkerware are the canonical references, and the sections below point to them throughout. For the underlying concepts, see our pages on threat modeling and on the difference between anonymity, privacy, pseudonymity, and confidentiality.

Use a device the abuser has never touched

Before you research helplines, search for "stalkerware," or read any further, switch to a device the abuser has not had physical access to and does not share an account with: a public library computer, a trusted friend's phone, or a work device the abuser cannot see. Anything you do on a monitored device, including searching for help, may be visible to them.1 If you only have a shared device, use a browser's private window, clear history afterward, and assume it is imperfect.

How tech-enabled abuse works

Most of these methods do not require special skill. They use ordinary consumer features that were built for families and couples, turned against one member of the household.

Account access and shared plans

  • Known or guessable passwords: An intimate partner often already knows, or can guess, your email, phone unlock, and banking passwords. Anything that protects an account against strangers does not protect it against someone who watched you type the PIN.
  • Shared Apple ID or Google account: A "convenient for the family" arrangement means messages, photos, browsing history, and contacts auto-sync to a device the abuser holds. iCloud and Google Drive back these up by default.
  • Family plans: Apple Family Sharing and a shared mobile-carrier plan expose purchase history, app installs, and sometimes location. Google Family Link, designed for parents and children, gives the account manager direct controls and location visibility, which an abuser can repurpose against an adult.
  • Recovery routes: Password resets sent to a shared phone number or a shared email let the abuser regain access even after you change a password.

Location tracking

  • Find My (Apple) and Find My Device / Google Maps location sharing: Location sharing that was set up "so we always know where each other is" continues silently. The other person sees your live location without any further notification.
  • Bluetooth trackers: An AirTag, Tile, or similar tracker slipped into a bag, a car, or a child's belongings reports location continuously. Since May 2024, Apple and Google ship a shared cross-platform standard so that both iPhones and Android phones can alert you when an unknown tracker is moving with you over time.2 iPhones detect compatible trackers automatically; Android users can use the built-in "Unknown tracker alerts" or Apple's Tracker Detect app.
  • Connected-car apps: Many vehicles have an app that shows the car's live location and trip history to whoever controls the account.
  • Shared calendars and photo geotags: A shared calendar reveals where you will be. Photos posted or synced often carry GPS coordinates in their metadata, which can pinpoint a new, supposedly secret, address.

Stalkerware and spyware on the device

Stalkerware (also called spouseware) is an app installed on your phone, usually during a moment of physical access, that secretly forwards your messages, call logs, photos, browsing, and location to the abuser.3 It can run with no visible icon. Possible signs include the battery draining faster than usual, the phone running warm when idle, unexplained data usage, or the device behaving oddly. None of these is conclusive, and the most reliable sign is often the abuser knowing things they should have no way to know.4

Smart-home and shared devices

  • Smart locks, cameras, doorbells, and thermostats: Whoever holds the controlling account can watch a camera feed, see when doors open, or lock you out. After separation, these often stay linked to the abuser's account.
  • Voice assistants: Shared Alexa or Google Home accounts can expose routines, reminders, and in some setups recorded interactions.
  • Shared streaming and "find my friends" style apps: Watch history, login locations, and contact-sharing features all leak patterns of daily life.

Checking for monitoring without alerting the abuser

This is the part where caution matters most. Removing or disabling monitoring can itself be dangerous: if you delete a stalkerware app or switch off a location share, the abuser may be notified instantly, and the response can range from an argument to physical violence.5 Treat detection and removal as two separate decisions, and make the second one only as part of a safety plan, ideally with an advocate.

What to do, in order:

  1. Do the checking from a safe device where possible. If you suspect your own phone is monitored, research first on a device the abuser cannot reach.
  2. Look, do not yet touch. On your phone, you can quietly review which apps have location and accessibility permissions (Settings → Privacy on both iOS and Android), which devices are signed into your Apple ID or Google account, and what is sharing your location in Find My or Google Maps. Note what you find. Do not change anything yet.
  3. Assume removal is visible. Deleting a stalkerware app, signing a device out, or turning off a location share may alert the abuser. The Coalition Against Stalkerware is explicit that you should only attempt removal if you believe it is safe, and that you should make a safety plan first.5
  4. Talk to an advocate before acting. A domestic-violence advocate can help you sequence changes so that the abuser does not notice until you are safe. In Taiwan, the 113 Protection Hotline offers anonymous consultation and referral. International digital-safety help is available from the Access Now Helpline.
  5. Consider a clean device as the safer path. Rather than cleaning a compromised phone, it is often safer to obtain a new, inexpensive device the abuser has never seen and never had access to, set up with fresh accounts, kept somewhere they cannot find it. This sidesteps the "they will know I removed it" problem entirely.

For step-by-step detection guidance, the Safety Net Project's spyware and phone surveillance pages and the Coalition Against Stalkerware's survivor information are the references to follow.

Separating accounts and passwords, safely

Rebuilding a private digital life means new accounts that the abuser has no path into. The trap is doing it visibly or too early. Sequence and timing matter as much as the technical steps.

Build the new identity off to the side

  • Create a fresh email account on a device and network the abuser cannot see, and do not link it to your existing phone number or recovery email. Use it as the recovery anchor for everything new.
  • Get a phone number the abuser does not know about. A prepaid SIM or a second number kept on a separate device keeps your real-time location and call records away from a shared carrier account. Note the regional constraint below: in much of Asia-Pacific, SIM registration is tied to a real identity by law.6
  • Use a password manager so the new accounts have strong, unique passwords you never have to reuse or remember. See Privacy Guides — password managers for options. Set the manager up in the new identity, not the old one.

Replace accounts in priority order

When you are ready, and ideally with a plan in place, change credentials in this order, because the first two are the keys that unlock everything else:

  1. Email and cloud account (the recovery anchor). Change the password, remove the abuser's devices, and replace any shared recovery phone or email.
  2. Move two-factor authentication off SMS. SMS codes go to a number the abuser may control or be able to read. Switch to an authenticator app (Aegis on Android, 2FAS or Raivo on iOS) or a hardware key.
  3. Banking and financial accounts, watching for shared statements and joint cards that reveal new purchases or a new address.
  4. Social media, then shopping and streaming.

Leave shared accounts last, and carefully

Signing out of a shared Apple ID, leaving a family plan, or removing a location share are all visible actions. Where possible, do them after you are physically safe, or as a coordinated set of changes timed with your departure, not as isolated moves that announce "I am preparing to leave."

Documenting evidence without tipping off the abuser

Evidence supports protection orders, custody decisions, and criminal complaints. Collect it in a way that does not itself become a risk.

  • Preserve, do not delete. Threatening messages, location-tracking screenshots, and call logs are your evidence later. Do not mass-delete harassment to "clean up," and do not delete the original messages.
  • Capture full context. Screenshot the message, the sender, the timestamp, and any surrounding thread. Where the platform allows it, export the original. A photo of one screen taken with a second camera is better than nothing.
  • Store it off the shared cloud. Do not back up evidence to an iCloud or Google account the abuser can see. Keep it on a device or storage they cannot reach, or send it to a trusted person or advocate.
  • Keep a dated log. A simple running record of incidents, dates, and what happened is itself useful in legal proceedings, and is easier to maintain than perfect screenshots of everything.
  • Get advice before confronting. Showing the abuser that you have collected evidence can escalate the situation. Share it with an advocate, lawyer, or the police, not with the abuser.

The safety-planning principle: leaving is the highest-risk moment

The most important thing on this page is not a technical step. The period around leaving an abusive relationship is the most dangerous time, and digital changes that are safe in the abstract can be the trigger that exposes a plan. This is why advocates emphasize safety planning: sequencing every move, including the digital ones, so that the abuser does not learn you are leaving until you are safe.

Practical implications:

  • A sudden flurry of password changes, a deleted tracking app, or a new phone discovered in your bag can read as "they are leaving." Time these to your plan, not to whenever you happen to read this page.
  • Keep the new email, the new number, helpline contacts, and any saved evidence on a device the abuser cannot find.
  • Plan around physical access. Anything the abuser can pick up and unlock is not private, no matter what software you run on it.
  • Do the safety planning with a trained advocate where you can. The technical steps support a safety plan; they do not substitute for one.

Regional context

These notes cover practical realities across Sinophone Asia-Pacific that change the advice above. This is general framing, not legal advice; consult a local advocate or counsel for your situation. The specialist English-language resources have essentially no Southeast Asian coverage, so local helplines below are the realistic first call.

Real-name SIM registration

Across much of the region, prepaid SIM registration is tied to identity by law (Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines under its 2022 SIM Registration Act, among others).6 A "new, secret" number is therefore still registered to a real person, and in a household where the abuser handles paperwork or shares an account, a new line may be discoverable. This does not make a separate number useless, but it means the separation it gives you is operational rather than absolute, and it argues for help from an advocate who knows local carrier practice.

Shared devices and extended-family dynamics

Multi-generational households and shared family devices are common, which widens the set of people with legitimate physical access to your phone, accounts, and router. Abuse is not always a single partner; in-laws and other family members may also monitor or control. The "use a device the abuser cannot reach" principle is harder to satisfy when the whole household shares hardware and accounts, so a public-library or trusted-friend device often matters more here than in single-household contexts.

Helplines

  • Taiwan — 113 Protection Hotline: The Ministry of Health and Welfare's nationwide 24/7 line for domestic violence, sexual assault, and harassment. It offers anonymous consultation and social-worker referral, and provides multilingual service (including English, Vietnamese, Indonesian, Thai, and Japanese) by phone and online chat, with SMS access for those who cannot use voice.7
  • Taiwan — emergency protection orders: Under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act, when a court finds a victim is in imminent danger, it must issue an emergency protection order in writing within four hours of the application.8 Applications are routed through the police, social services, or the family court.
  • Taiwan — Stalking and Harassment Prevention Act: In force since 1 June 2022, this law gives criminal recourse against repeated unwanted following, surveillance, harassing communications, and similar conduct, including by electronic means.9
  • Hong Kong — helplines: The Social Welfare Department runs a 24-hour hotline at 2343 2255. Harmony House operates a 24-hour women's hotline at 2522 0434 and a men's hotline at 2295 1386. RainLily, Hong Kong's first sexual-violence crisis support centre, can be reached at 2375 5322. Caritas' Family Crisis Line (向晴熱線) at 18288 provides 24-hour crisis support.10
  • Hong Kong — no dedicated anti-stalking law: Unlike Taiwan, Hong Kong has never enacted an anti-stalking offense; a Law Reform Commission proposal to do so was shelved after it was raised in 2000. A survivor being stalked, or doxxed (publishing someone's personal data without consent and with intent to cause harm, often called "起底" locally), has to rely on civil tort, sexual-harassment law, or a 2021 doxxing offense rather than a purpose-built stalking remedy, which leaves a narrower path than the Taiwan law above provides.11
  • Regional and international: For digital-safety emergencies specifically, the Access Now Helpline provides 24/7 multilingual support and prioritizes at-risk people. For local domestic-violence services elsewhere in the region, Find a Helpline lists vetted hotlines by country.

Where to go from here

  1. Information for survivors — Coalition Against Stalkerware, on using a device the abuser has not had access to when seeking help. ↩

  2. Apple and Google deliver support for unwanted tracking alerts in iOS and Android — Apple Newsroom, 13 May 2024. ↩

  3. Spyware and Stalkerware: Phone Surveillance — Safety Net Project (NNEDV). ↩

  4. What is stalkerware and signs of it — Coalition Against Stalkerware, on the difficulty of detection and behavioral red flags. ↩

  5. Information for survivors — Coalition Against Stalkerware, on the escalation risk of removing stalkerware and the recommendation to make a safety plan first. ↩↩

  6. Mandatory Registration of Prepaid SIM Cards — GSMA overview of identity-linked SIM registration across the region. ↩↩

  7. 113 Protection Hotline — Find a Helpline; and Taiwan's domestic abuse hotline available in 7 languages — Taiwan News, 10 August 2020, on the 113 line's multilingual, 24/7 service run by the Ministry of Health and Welfare. ↩

  8. Domestic Violence Prevention Act — Laws & Regulations Database of the Republic of China (Taiwan); the four-hour emergency protection order in cases of imminent danger. ↩

  9. Stalking and Harassment Prevention Act — Laws & Regulations Database of the Republic of China (Taiwan); in force 1 June 2022. ↩

  10. RainLily services — ACSVAW (Association Concerning Sexual Violence Against Women), in Chinese; and 24-Hour Harmony House Woman Hotline — Find a Helpline. ↩

  11. Stalking — Family CLIC, on the absence of a dedicated anti-stalking offense in Hong Kong and the reliance on civil remedies and the 2021 doxxing offense instead. ↩