Effective as of 25 November 2024

Welcome to BUZ! We are excited to have you!

We at BUZ believe in transparency, and have an open and honest dialogue with our users. We believe that you are the cornerstone to our success, and we aim to always put our users first.

We strongly urge you to:

• Respect each other
• Be honest
• Respect Buz

For us to maintain that open and honest communication, we need to work together to make Buz a safe and inclusive environment for all of our users to enjoy.

Best Practices

1. Communicate with known contacts: Send messages to those in your address book, those who have contacted you first or have requested you contact them on Buz using their contact number or Buz user name. You may only share information that you are comfortable sharing with the public.
2. Ask for permission: Obtain permission before you add any person or AI Character into a group chat.
3. Careful sharing: Think carefully before you upload anything onto Buz or share anything with your Buz contacts. Consider whether you would want others to see what you've sent. They may be able to share these messages with others without informing you. You should only share your information with people you trust. Your User Content should not contain any visible logos, phrases, or trademarks that belong to third parties. Do not use any User Content that belongs to other people and pass it off as your own; this includes any content that you might have found elsewhere on the Internet. If anyone contributes to your User Content or has any rights to your User Content, or if anyone appears or is referred to in the User Content, then you must also have their permission to submit such User Content to Buz.
4. Careful forwarding: Think carefully before forwarding messages. If you are unsure whether the contents are true or the contents are from an unknown source, do not forward the message. Do now unknowingly spread misinformation.
5. Act appropriately: All of your Services activities must be venue appropriate, as determined by us. Be respectful of others' opinions and comments so we can continue to build communities for everyone to enjoy. If you think your User Content might offend someone or be embarrassing to someone, then chances are it probably will and it doesn't belong on the Services. Cursing, harassing, stalking, insulting comments, personal attacks, gossip, and similar actions are prohibited. Your User Content must not threaten, abuse, or harm others, and it must not include any negative comments that are connected to race, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or handicap. Your User Content must not be defamatory, slanderous, indecent, obscene, pornographic, or sexually explicit. Your User Content must not exploit children under the age of 18 or under the age of majority in your jurisdiction.

Practices to Avoid

1. Unwanted messages: If a person asks you to stop contacting them, you should refrain from sending them messages again.
2. Automated or bulk messages: Do not bulk message or auto message using Buz. Do not create accounts or groups in an unauthorised or automatic ways, or use modified versions of Buz. You may not use Buz for a commercial purpose.
3. Unknown contacts: Do not use information obtained from unknown or unlawful sources to message other Buz users. Do not publish, distribute or share others' contact numbers or user IDs or personal information without permission.
4. Harvesting personal data: Do not extract other users' personal information such as contact number, user ID, profile picture or chat contents without permission.

Prohibited Behaviour

Other than best practices and practices that we discourage, you must not distribute via Buz or upload any content that we absolutely do not tolerate:

1. abusive, bullying, intimidating, libelous, embarrassing or otherwise harassing other Buz users, or any other specific individuals or groups
2. pornographic, obscene or indecent, or any adult content
3. violent or promoting violence
4. disrupting to national or social order, or violates any public order, moral or social norms
5. spam, junk mail or other unsolicited advertisement
6. exploitative, endangering or abusive of young children
7. confidential, sensitive or personally identifying information (e.g. first and last name together, password, phone number, address, credit card number, medical information, email address, or other personally identifiable information or contact information) of yourself or others without permission
8. to be depicting, encouraging or assisting suicide or self-harm
9. hateful, insensitive, inappropriate, demeaning or offensive speech, including any content that promotes prejudice, discrimination, racism, terrorism, ageism, sexism or violation of legal rights against other Buz users, or any other specific individuals or groups
10. profane, blasphemous or any content that may offend people of certain faith, or otherwise related to religion
11. fraudulent, deceptive or misleading, including impersonation or claiming false affiliation (including usage of bots)
12. rumor, false or misleading information
13. related to gambling, counterfeits, fraudulent products or services prohibited by law, abortion, human trafficking, weapon, or other highly explosive subject matter
14. promoting criminal acts
15. promoting illegal or inappropriate use of alcohol or tobacco
16. to infringe on or misappropriate third party's intellectual property or other proprietary rights
17. protected health information defined under the HIPAA Privacy Rule (45 CFR Section 164.051)
18. harmful to the reputation and credibility of Buz
19. other contents that in our judgement, are harmful or negative contents or otherwise not suitable for distribution
20. that violates our Terms of Use

You should also carefully read Section 6 of our Terms of Use.

If you see any member of the Buz community engaging in intolerable behaviour, we encourage you to take steps to protect yourself and our community.

What can you do to protect yourself and our community?

1. DO NOT ENGAGE with the perpetrator
2. Block offensive contacts users and/or delete offensive messages
3. Report the offensive users and/or messages within the Buz app
4. Alternatively, screenshot the offensive content and upload via the Buz report system / feedback system in app
5. You may also choose to send the information to [email protected]

We are asking for your help. If you, or anyone you know in our community is ever threatened, or made to feel unsafe, please reach out to us, the authorities or the community admins

How do we protect our Buz community?

We rely on all available unencrypted information such as user name and community description, as well as user reports to take appropriate action. When we become aware of any Buz users behaving in a way that is not acceptable, and depending on the violations, we may do 1 or more of the following

1. Issue a warning
2. Suspend the Buz account temporarily
3. Ban the Buz account permanently
4. Remove offensive content
5. Make a police report

At Buz, we take the safety of our community and our employees incredibly seriously. Your safety and privacy are our highest priorities.

If you think your account was banned by mistake, please email us or tap request a review in the app and we'll look into your case. We'll get back to you as soon as we complete our review.

Additional safety resources

If you feel you are or anyone else is in immediate danger, please contact the police, your local emergency services or other local authorities.

If you believe someone wishes to hurt themselves and you're concerned about their safety, please contact your local emergency services or a suicide prevention hotline.

If you receive or encounter content indicating that a child is being abused or exploited, please contact the local children protection authorities. You can also report the user.

These guidelines will continue to evolve over time. This means we may take action against a user, server, or content that violates the spirit of these guidelines when we encounter a new threat or harm that is not explicitly covered in the current version.

We will always make our best effort to notify you when we update these guidelines, but it is up to you to follow the spirit of them: keep Buz safe and a place for everyone to belong.

Thank you for doing your part.

– The Buz Team