Abortion industry insiders have begun to implement a quick exit button on their websites which will redirect a potential abortion client’s browser to an innocuous page (like Google or the Weather Channel) — and in some instances, will even delete the user’s browser history. The move comes amidst a litany of legislation recently enacted to shield abortion providers from various criminal charges, following the overturning of the Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court in the June 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case.
These quick exit tabs, sometimes referred to as “panic buttons” or “quick escape” buttons, have become useful on websites which advise domestic violence victims. According to the SafetyNet Project, the buttons “allow someone to quickly leave the website if she or he is concerned that it could be an issue should someone know that they are seeking this kind of information.”
But quick exit buttons — abortion advocates allege — can in some instances erase browser history from a users’ electronic device. These also reinforce the false notion that pregnant women seeking abortion are somehow being targeted by law enforcement for criminal investigations.
Abortion Facilities Utilize Quick Exit Button
Live Action News discovered that several abortion related website exit buttons were rerouting their users to Google search pages. These include the Preterm abortion facility in Ohio, which recorded 4,572 abortions in its 2022 annual report (and where Lakisha Wilson died in 2015 after a second trimester abortion), as well as the Detroit-based Scotsdale Women’s Center in Michigan. Its website claims the abortion facility commits abortions up to 15 weeks, 6 days.
Aria Medical’s website claims to “provide timely medication abortions in Kansas for people traveling from any state” and is open Sundays “going forward.” The website specifies that “Aria Medical Foundation is an internal nonprofit project of The Giving Back Fund, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization.” Aria’s quick exit button will reroute users to weather.com when clicked.
In Maine, the Mabel Wadsworth Center, which provides the abortion pill as well as in-clinic abortions up to 14 weeks (overseen by Julia McDonald, DO, MPH), also redirects users to a blank Google search when the quick exit button is pushed. The Maine Family Planning abortion facility, which commits abortions up to 14 weeks and prescribes the abortion pill, redirects user browsers to weather.com when their exit button is pushed.
In Virginia, the Falls Church Healthcare Center abortion facility reroutes users to News.Google if the quick exit button is clicked. That abortion facility commits abortions up to 15 weeks and prescribes the abortion pill. The DuPont abortion facility, which states that “Abortion is legal in all trimesters in Washington, D.C.,” reroutes its users to a “pretty orchids” google search page when their quick exit tab is clicked.
Abortion website quick exit button redirects browsers to Google searches
Live Action News has documented how the abortion industry has a terrible record of protecting patient privacy, while a recent review of abortion business websites revealed that “99.1% of US based abortion clinic web pages include third-party tracking, transferring user data to a median of 9 unique entities.”
Abortion Referral Sites Utilize Quick Exit Button
The abortion referral website Plan C, which instructs users how to lie to obtain abortions, added the quick exit button last year and redirects the browsers of their users to the WeatherChannel when clicked. A cached page of the website reveals that the button did not exist prior to July 25, 2022, indicating that the feature was added following the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade.
PlanC quick exit tab erases cached
Gynuity Health Projects’ (GHP) Teleabortion.org website also utilizes the quick exit button, which reroutes users to weather.com. GHP is behind multiple clinical trials on abortion.
MayDayHealth, which recently erected abortion billboards promoting “abortion options” in states that restrict abortion, has also implemented the cache erasing tab, redirecting the browsers of users to the WeatherChannel when clicked. MayDay is one of the few that published the quick exit tab when their website went live online June of 2022.
MayDayHealth has quick exit tab that erases cached
Montana Family Planning will refer users to multiple abortion facilities in the state. Its website has published a safe exit bar at the top of the page, instructing users to “[t]ap this bar at anytime to immediately close this page and check the weather.”
When users visit the website, AbortionOnOurOwnTerms.org, which partners with multiple pro-abortion groups, they are shown a pop up screen which tells them, “To escape this page quickly please hit the ‘QUICK EXIT’ button or your ‘ESC’ button on your keyboard at anytime to leave immediately. You will be rerouted automatically to weather.com without our website showing in your browser history.”
The group then instills fear in their visitors by claiming, “Today, the greatest risk of self-managing an abortion with pills is arrest and criminalization, not medical safety.”
AbortionOnOurOwnTerms website quick exit tab erases cached
VeryWellFamily.com, which claims to offer “reliable, compassionate, and up-to-date information on the pregnancy and parenting topics” and also advises those seeking information about abortion, tells viewers to their website that “If you don’t have access to a personal computer, use a public computer (such as in a library) in private mode or with DuckDuckGo. On a public computer, a quick exit button on websites is helpful.”
Abortion Funding Groups and Universities
Abortion funding groups like the Susan Wicklund Fund are also utilizing the feature. Their “safety exit” button reroutes users to a Google search page. The Blueridge Abortion Fund website, Abortion Fund of Ohio’s website, and the Reproductive Freedom Fund’s website also reroutes users to a standard Google search page when quick exit buttons are clicked. Meanwhile, Abortion Fund of Arizona’s website reroutes users to a Google “home decor” search.
The abortion funding group Midwest Action Coalition (MAC) reroutes users to a “funny owl” Google search when their quick exit button is clicked, writing online, “You may have noticed we have a quick exit button on our website. What’s this? A way to quickly exit our site (and erase it from your browser history) if you are concerned about somebody looking over your shoulder.
“If you click on the ‘Quick Exit’ button, your browser will open a new table with a google search for cute animals and replace this page with a google search for cute owls. This allows you to quickly navigate away from our site if you are worried about abuse from a partner, family member, housemate, etc.
“Note: this functionality has made it such that clicking the back button on your browser will always take you away from our site. Though this affects usability of our site, we think the trade off in safety for people needing privacy is worth it.”
Midwest Access Coalition website quick exit tab erases cached
In addition to abortion facilities, some universities have also implemented the button, possibly due to the high instances of sexual and domestic abuse. These include Northwestern University’s abortion information page as well as a similar page at Tufts University, which reroutes users to Google search pages when clicked.
PregnancyAtWork.org, which according to the website is “a project of the Pregnancy Accommodation Working Group, an initiative of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law,” gives advice about abortion and miscarriage, and also utilizes the feature.
Legal Assistance Groups
Repro Legal Help Line, operated by If/When/How, has a quick exit button rerouting users to DuckDuckGo when clicked. The website claims online to offer “clear, understandable answers about legal rights” about abortion law.
Abortion website quick exit button reroutes browsers to DuckDuckGo
On a separate webpage, If/When/How published detailed instructions on “safe browsing” and explains that on their website the browser history is not deleted when a user presses their “Escape button.”
“When you leave our site — whether it’s because someone came into the room or because you are done — we recommend that you use our escape button, by pressing the escape bar on the screen or by pressing the ESC button on your keyboard. When you use the escape button, a new browser tab opens and goes to Weather.com, and this browser tab is redirected to Google.com.
“Note that your browser history is NOT erased by clicking the escape button. After you escape, we recommend closing the Google.com tab and deleting the wiki from your browser history,” the site says, while directing users to instructions for how to delete a site from browser history.
