Build your personal safety plan: a step-by-step guide

A personal safety plan is a simple, practical set of decisions you make in advance so that if a difficult moment comes, you already know what to do. It takes the pressure off the moment itself. You do not need to live in fear — you just need a plan.

Step 1: Know your emergency contacts

Choose two or three people you would want alerted in an emergency. Add them to Athena as emergency contacts with their phone number and email. Make sure they know you have added them, and tell them what to do if they receive an SOS — for example, call you, then call 999 if you do not answer.

Step 2: Learn your tools

Spend ten minutes practising each feature before you need it:

• SOS — know how to trigger it and what your contacts will receive.
• Live Sharing — know how to start and stop a tracking link.
• Safe Journey Mode — know how to set a destination and arrival time.
• Evidence Vault — know how to record discreetly.
• Personal Alarm and Torch — know where they are and how to switch them on.

Practising in a calm moment means your hands will know what to do in a stressful one.

Step 3: Plan your regular routes

Think about the journeys you make often — to work, to home, to the places you go at night. For each one:

• Note the well-lit main roads and late-opening shops along the way.
• Identify a "safe stop" you could head for if you felt uneasy.
• Decide who you would message, and at what point.

Step 4: Set up your phone

• Add biometric lock so only you can open Athena.
• Consider disguise mode if you want Athena hidden behind a recipe page or calculator.
• Keep your phone charged before you go out, and carry a small power bank if you can.

Step 5: Agree check-in habits with your circle

Decide with a friend or partner that you will message when you are home safe after a night out, and that they will check on you if they do not hear. Safe Journey Mode automates this — but a simple agreement works too.

Step 6: Review it regularly

Your life changes, and so should your plan. Every few months, look over your contacts, routes, and tools, and update anything that is out of date.

A plan is not paranoia

Building a safety plan is like keeping a first-aid kit at home. You hope never to need it, but its presence lets you relax. With a plan in place, you can move through your life with confidence — knowing that, whatever happens, you and the people who care about you already know what to do.