President Joe Biden has signed H.R. 7132 or Safe Connections Act of 2022 into legislation, and it may assist home violence, sexual assault, stalking and human trafficking survivors in the end lower ties with abusers. Under the brand new legislation, customers can ask cellular service suppliers to separate their line — in addition to their dependents’ — from their abusers’ if they’ve a shared contract. That would be sure that abusers now not have entry to their telephone data and may’t get their service lower. Carriers aren’t allowed to cost charges to grant these requests, which they have to achieve this inside do two days.
In addition, Safe Connections Act of 2022 would require the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to create guidelines that will make it simpler for survivors looking for separate cellular plans to enroll in its Lifeline Program for as much as six months. This FCC initiative provides qualifying low-income customers a reduction on telephone companies, to allow them to stay related to job alternatives, mates, household and emergency companies whereas they’re working to get again on their ft. The fee additionally has to ascertain guidelines that will stop calls or texts to hotlines from showing on name logs, presumably to keep survivors safe.
In a blog post, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) celebrated the brand new legislation but in addition mentioned that it could have “preferred a bill that did not require survivors to provide paperwork to ‘prove’ their abuse.” For a request to be legitimate, a consumer must submit “appropriate documentation” to confirm that the individual they’re sharing a contract with “committed or allegedly committed an act of domestic violence, trafficking, or a related criminal act against the survivor.”
Having to offer paperwork will not be simple, relying on an individual’s circumstances, and it may retraumatize survivors attempting to interrupt free from abusive conditions. “However, this new law is a critical step in the right direction,” the EFF continued, “and it is encouraging that Congress and the President agreed.”
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