Facebook updates its safety-focussed Crisis Response and Blood Donation features

Facebook is bringing updates to two of its safety driven features. These include Crisis Response and Blood Donations. The updates were announced during the social networking giant’s annual developer conference, F8 on 1 May. [caption id=“attachment_4453665” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Crisis Response feature. Facebook.[/caption] According to Facebook’s blog post, the Crisis Response  was introduced as a feature to Facebook in 2014 where people could be given help in case of calamities such as an earthquake, flood, cyclone or emergency situation such as mass shootings. This information collected is used to localise the impact of an emergency. It is also used to seek help from the Facebook community and generate Fundraisers as well. With this new feature, whenever a person marks herself or himself safe during a crisis, the concerned person is enabled to give a first-hand account or information regarding the crisis. This information includes real-time updates such as road closures, damaged photos or videos. This feature is likely to launch by the end of 2018. The second feature is Blood Donation . This feature was introduced in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh for people to mark themselves as donors. The new update goes beyond that, informing you about the nearby donation camps, requests for blood donations, and blood banks from one dedicated place. It is expected to roll out in the coming weeks. It is not known if Facebook has collaborated with hospitals or blood banks for people to donate their blood. It is not known how helpful these tools prove to be in crisis, but considering its reach it can create awareness among people by providing them a platform to address concerns.