Privacy notice

Browsing the site

The pages are static files. We run no advertising and no tracking cookies. Each page sends our own server one tiny message saying which page was opened, so we can see which parts of the site are used. It carries no name, no cookie and no referrer, and the count itself has nothing in it that lasts: the server counts one visitor per day by hashing your connection address with a key that changes daily, so it cannot be traced back to you or joined across days. The message does carry one thing, and only for one purpose: the random id your browser was given for the safety check above. The server hashes it, asks whether it belongs to somebody who is signed in at that moment, and then drops it. If it does, the address of the page is added to a list kept against that account (Pages you have opened, below). If it does not — which is everybody who has not made an account, and everybody who has signed out — it matches nothing and is thrown away without being written down anywhere. The id is never stored on the page count itself. Pressing one of a handful of buttons sends the same kind of message: the name of the button, and the event it belongs to if it was on an event. That is how we can tell that a calendar file was downloaded, which otherwise happens entirely inside your browser and we would never see. Those messages keep no identifier at all, not even the daily hash, so they are a count of how often a button was pressed and nothing more. Your browser keeps a short-lived copy of the events list in its own session storage so pages load faster; it is cleared when you close the tab. The site loads fonts from Google Fonts, the map library from cdnjs and map tiles from OpenStreetMap; those services see your IP address when your browser fetches from them, under their own privacy terms.

Email and WhatsApp updates

What we keep: your email address or, if you chose WhatsApp, your phone number; how often you want updates, how far ahead, and the towns and interests you chose.

WhatsApp: updates on WhatsApp are sent through Meta's WhatsApp Business Platform, so your number and the messages pass through Meta under WhatsApp's business terms. We send nothing until you tap Confirm on the first message. Replies are handled automatically and not read by a person; reply STOP or tap Unsubscribe at any time and your number is deleted.

Why: to send you the digest you asked for. Nothing else. We only start sending after you click the confirmation link we email you (double opt-in).

How long: until you unsubscribe. An address or number that is never confirmed is deleted after three days. Every email has an unsubscribe link and every WhatsApp update an Unsubscribe button; using either deletes your record outright.

Adding a listing or event

What we keep: the listing or event details you give us, plus your name and email address so we can confirm the submission came from you and ask about details.

What is published: the listing or event only. Your name and email address are never shown on the site.

How long: your name and email are removed from our records 90 days after we approve or decline the submission. Submissions that are never confirmed by email are deleted after three days.

If you send us a poster: you can upload a picture of a poster and we will read the event off it to fill the form in for you. The picture is not kept. It is read on our own server, by our own software, and thrown away in the same breath — it is never stored, never published, and never sent to anyone else. Only the words it fills into the form are kept, and only if you go on to submit the event.

Private events

What they are: an event a member starts for the people they invite. It is not on the site or in the app's lists, search engines are asked not to index it, and we do not check it before it goes up. It can only be opened with its own link, which the member shares, usually on WhatsApp.

What people with the link see: the event details, the organiser's first name, and how many people are coming (a count, never names). If the organiser turns on the WhatsApp button, anyone with the link can also see and message the organiser's verified mobile number. The organiser sees the names and contact details of the people who say they are coming, only so they can tell them if the event moves or is called off.

How long: a private event and its guest list are deleted 90 days after the event ends, or when the organiser deletes it or their account; the guest list goes with it at once when they delete their account, and in the nightly clean-up when they delete the event. Anyone with the link can report a private event to us. A report keeps the reason given and a one-way hash of the reporter's address, so one person cannot send the same report over and over.

South Africa only (the app)

The app is for people in South Africa: accounts are South African mobile numbers, and the app’s server only answers connections from South Africa. To tell, it looks up the country of the address your phone connects from in a list of South African address ranges kept on our server. The address is looked up and not stored for this. The list is IP Geolocation by DB-IP, used under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence.

Which version of the app you have (the app)

When the app opens, and when you come back to it, it asks our server whether there is an update. With that question it says which version it is and whether it came from Google Play or from this site, and the update check that Android apps make sends a random id the app made for itself. We use these only to count how many phones run each version, so we know when an old one needs replacing, and to tell an old Play version to update. Each phone is counted once a day under a code that changes every day, the same way the site counts visits, so the count cannot be traced back to you or followed from one day to the next. The random id itself is never stored.

Asking to join a WhatsApp group (the app)

When you ask in the app to join one of the community’s WhatsApp groups, the person who runs Helderberg Social sees your name, your mobile number, whether you have proven it is yours, when you joined, the groups you asked for and the note you wrote. We send these to them as a WhatsApp message from the Helderberg Social number, and they answer yes or no. If they write a reason for a no, it stays with them and is not sent to you. Your request is kept for a year after it is answered, and deleted with your account. Joining a group then happens in WhatsApp itself, where the group’s other members see your number as WhatsApp always shows it.

Vetting and proof of residence

What we ask for: when you create an account we ask for your first name(s), surname, age (in years), email address, mobile number and your home address: street, suburb, town and postal code. The address is your proof of residence. We do not ask for documents.

Why: the community’s WhatsApp groups are for people who live in the Helderberg, so somebody checks that you do before you can ask to join them. Nothing else: the address is never shown on the site, in the app or in the groups, never used for marketing, and never sold or shared.

Your member number: you get a five-digit member number. You give it to a community admin, a member the person who runs Helderberg Social has asked to help vet new joiners.

Who sees your details, and how often: the community admin who vets you types in your number and sees your name, surname, home address, mobile number and email address once only. That one look is recorded, and from then on nobody can open your details again from a community admin account, not even the same person. They accept or decline you there and then, or leave it for the super admin. After that, only the super admin who runs Helderberg Social can see your details. Community admins can look up only a few numbers a day, so numbers cannot be guessed, and every look-up is recorded. Your address is stored encrypted.

Your consent: we record when you agreed to this and which version of this notice you agreed to. Without it we cannot vet you, and you cannot ask to join the groups; the rest of the site and the app still work.

Correcting it: you can correct your details yourself under Your details on the site, or on your account in the app, until a community admin has opened them. After that, use the form on the site.

How long: for as long as you keep your account. If you are not accepted, your surname and address are deleted 30 days after the decision. Deleting your account deletes them at once: how to delete your account. If you no longer want to be part of the community, that is all it takes.

Get-togethers, contacts and your calendar (the app)

What they are: a member picks an event and invites friends to go with them. Everybody in a get-together sees the others’ names and whether they are coming, and never anybody’s number. Anyone with its link, which has 128 random bits in it, sees the event, the organiser’s first name and how many are going.

Your contacts: only if you tap Look in my contacts and allow it. The phone numbers in your contacts are sent to our server once, compared with the members who switched on Let people who have my number find me and have proven their number, and then dropped. They are not stored or logged, on the phone or on the server. The names in your contacts never leave your phone. Nobody can find you this way unless you switch that on, and you can switch it off at any time.

Proving your number: you send a one-time code from your own WhatsApp to the Helderberg Social number. WhatsApp shows us which number it came from; we record that the number on your account is proven, and nothing else from the message.

Your calendar: only if you allow it, get-togethers you are going to are written into your phone’s calendar, and moved or taken out when the plan changes. That happens on the phone; we do not read your calendar.

How long: a get-together and its list of people are deleted a year after it was made, or when the organiser deletes their account. Leaving one removes you from it straight away.

Member accounts

What we keep: if you create an account, your name and surname, your age, email address, mobile number, your home address as proof of residence (see Vetting and proof of residence) and a scrambled form of your password (we cannot read it back), the date you joined and last signed in, a masked form of the address you signed up from, and the events you post. Your age is used only to see who the site is for: nothing is restricted by it, it is never shown on the site, and other members, moderators and community admins never see it. You can change or remove it under Your details on the website or on the account screen in the app. Sign-ins are remembered with a cookie that only works on the account pages.

Why we ask for both: an account is one account whether you made it here or in the app, and each half is the way back into the other. The number is how the app signs you in; the email address is how we send you a code if you forget your password. Neither is shown on the site, except that if you start a private event and turn on its WhatsApp button, your verified number is on that event's page for the people with its link. We do not use the number for marketing. Once the WhatsApp code step is switched on, proving your number sends a one-time code as a WhatsApp message; codes are kept only in scrambled form and expire after a few minutes.

Pages you have opened: while you are signed in we keep a list of which pages of the site you open, so we can see which parts of it are worth the work and which nobody uses. It is the address of the page and the time, and nothing else — never the query part of an address, so something you typed into a search box, or the secret link to a private event, never goes into it. It is only written while you have a live sign-in: sign out and that same browser goes straight back to being one anonymous tick in the counts above, and if two people are signed in on the same browser at the same time neither of them is named, because there is nothing in a page view to say which of you it was. You can read the whole list, switch it off and erase it yourself under Your account → Pages you have opened; switching it off erases what is already there. We erase it after 90 days in any case, and it goes with your account if you delete it. It is never joined to anything about anybody else, and nobody outside Helderberg Social ever sees it.

What you do in the app: the Android app keeps the same kind of list, so we can see where people get stuck and what to make better. It notes which screen you open (its name, and the event or venue it is showing), the label of a button you press, that the app was opened, put away or opened from a notification or a link, and, for a link out of the app, only the website's name and never the rest of the address. Our server also notes each request the app makes to it: which part of the service was asked, whether it worked and how long it took, and which version of the app asked. All of it is filed under a random number the app made for itself when it was installed, which we store only in scrambled (hashed) form, and a number for each visit; while you are signed in it is also filed under your account. It is never what you type, never a message, a password, a search or a phone number, and never where you are. We erase it after 90 days, and it goes with your account if you delete it. Switching off Pages you have opened under Your account also erases the app's part, and from then on what the app sends is kept only as counts with nobody in them; Erase the list erases the app's part too, including what that phone did before you signed in. Nobody outside Helderberg Social ever sees it.

Older accounts: accounts made before 13 September 2026 have only one of the two, because only one was asked for at the time. Nothing was added to them without asking. You can fill in the other half yourself from Your account on the site, or Recovery email in the app.

What is published: the events only, once we have checked them. Your name and email address are never shown on the site.

What we send you: a confirmation link when you register, a reset link if you ask for one, and a note when an event of yours is published or declined. In the app that note arrives as a notification on the phone rather than by email. When you register, the box Send me the weekly Helderberg events email is ticked for you: if you leave it ticked we send one email a week of what's on, starting once you have confirmed your address. Untick it and you get none. Every one of those emails has a one-click unsubscribe link, and unsubscribing removes your address from the list. Nothing else is sent unless you subscribe separately.

How long: for as long as you keep the account. You can delete it yourself under Account: that removes your details, your sign-ins and any event that is not yet published. Events that were already published stay on the site with your name and email removed from them. Accounts that are never confirmed by email are deleted after three days.

Keeping the site safe

When you use a form we record a one-way hash of your IP address together with the time, so we can rate-limit abuse. The hash cannot be turned back into an address. The mail we send to an address is counted for the same reason. Those records are kept for a few weeks.

Where it lives and who sees it

Subscriptions and submissions are stored on a server we operate in South Africa. Only the volunteer who moderates the site has access. We do not share personal information with anyone, and we do not use it for anything other than what is described here. Emails are sent through a transactional email provider that processes your address only to deliver the message.

Your rights

If you have an account, you can delete it yourself at any time, without asking anyone, and that removes your surname, home address and member number with it: how to delete your account says what goes and what stays. You can see and correct the details we hold for vetting under Your details.

You can ask what we hold about you, have it corrected, or have it deleted. The quickest route is the unsubscribe link in any email, which removes you entirely. For anything else, contact the site's information officer at the form on the site. You can also complain to the Information Regulator of South Africa at inforegulator.org.za.

Last updated 21 October 2026.