Online Dating Safety Policy

This policy explains The Counsel's member-safety rules, reporting process, identity and age checks, enforcement, appeals, member-notice practices, and safety resources. It is designed to address requirements including Colorado's Online Dating Services Safety Act and Connecticut's online dating safety-center and harassment-report requirements. It applies to all members.

Contact: thecounseldating@gmail.com | The Counsel Social LLC, 502 W 7th St, Ste 100, Erie, PA 16502-1333

THE COUNSEL DOES NOT CONDUCT CRIMINAL BACKGROUND SCREENINGS OF ITS MEMBERS.

1. Prohibited content and conduct

Members may not use The Counsel to harm, exploit, deceive, or endanger another person. Prohibited conduct includes misconduct that threatens public or personal safety, including:

• homicide, threatened homicide, assault, kidnapping, stalking, harassment, involuntary intoxication, robbery, theft, sexual assault, or other violence or attempted violence;
• threats, bullying, intimidation, hate speech, or targeted abuse;
• sexual conduct without consent, unwanted sexual content, prohibited nudity, or commercial sexual or escort services;
• conduct involving or exploiting minors, or using the Service while under 18;
• fraud, scams, money or investment solicitation, identity deception, or impersonation;
• revealing another member's private information, sexual orientation, gender identity, health information, location, or use of the Service without permission;
• attempting to determine another member's exact location from distance or other signals;
• pressuring a person to move off-platform or disclose contact information, spam, or unauthorized promotion;
• ban evasion or serious manipulation of reporting, ratings, accounts, or safety features; and
• false reports or reports submitted for malicious, retaliatory, discriminatory, biased, or other illegitimate reasons.

The full Community Rules are in Section 3 of the Terms of Service.

2. Criminal background screenings and convictions

We do not conduct criminal background screenings of our members, at sign-up or before messaging. Our Terms prohibit people who have committed, been convicted of, or pleaded guilty or no contest to crimes involving violence, threats of violence, or sexual misconduct, and people required to register as sex offenders. If we learn credible information showing that a member is in a prohibited category, we may suspend or ban the account.

When investigating a report or credible safety concern, we may consult public sources such as sex-offender registries. Those checks are not comprehensive background screenings. Public records can be missing, delayed, inaccurate, or incomplete and can create a false sense of security.

State disclosures. Connecticut users receive the legally required no-background-screening notice before the Service permits them to communicate with another user and the registration safety notice through a legally permitted communication channel. New Jersey members receive the required conspicuous no-screening disclosures in the required number and locations.

3. Identity and age checks

Age. Members must be at least 18 and provide a date of birth. An account entered with a date of birth under 18 is suspended automatically. We may use app-store age information or request additional age information where available or legally required. We do not check every member's age against a government ID.

Identity-related checks. We do not verify every member's identity. A member may complete Selfie Checked, which confirms only that a face was detected in a camera selfie and one profile photo, without comparing the faces or verifying liveness. A member may complete ID Details Matched, which confirms only that name and date of birth read from an uploaded document match the account; the document is not represented as authenticated and its photo is not matched to the member.

Repeat accounts. We use phone numbers, protected device codes, account history, and other anti-abuse signals to detect accounts created after a ban.

4. How to report

Use the reporting option available on a member profile or chat, or report a specific photo, message, prompt, review, Open Invite, event, or Atlas trip. Choose the issue and provide useful details such as what happened, when it occurred, and relevant messages or photos.

Reports are confidential in the sense that we do not tell the reported member who submitted the report except where law requires disclosure. You can review an open report, add information, or withdraw it through Settings > My reports where the feature is available. Withdrawing a report does not require us to delete evidence or stop a safety investigation when we reasonably believe continued review is necessary.

Do not submit a report you know is false, and do not report another member for a malicious, retaliatory, discriminatory, biased, or other illegitimate reason. Abuse of the reporting system can result in enforcement against the reporting account.

In an emergency or if you are in immediate danger, call 911 or the appropriate local emergency number first. The Counsel cannot dispatch emergency services.

5. What happens after a report

Every report opens or contributes to a safety case for review. Reports involving threats, stalking, suspected minors, sexual violence, or other high-risk conduct receive priority. Our systems may alert moderators when a high-risk case is not picked up within an internal target period. Internal response targets are operational goals and are not guarantees of a particular resolution time.

Moderators may review the reported content and surrounding context. Automated tools or AI may assist with triage, pattern detection, or evidence summarization, but people make permanent-ban and appeal decisions.

Temporary limits. While a case is reviewed, automated systems may restrict messaging, media, links, or other features for up to seven days when multiple reports support the same issue or the account has a confirmed prior violation.

Suspension and banning. Depending on severity, evidence, history, and risk, we may warn the member, remove content, restrict features, reduce visibility, suspend the account, or permanently ban it. Permanent bans are decided by an authorized human moderator. Ban-evasion accounts may be banned or made invisible to other members.

Law enforcement and child safety. We disclose information when law requires it or when a legally permitted disclosure is reasonably necessary to protect someone from a serious safety threat. We report apparent child sexual abuse material to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children when required by law.

6. Appeals

Members can view disclosed restrictions in Settings > Account status and appeal within six months unless a shorter or longer period is required by law. Every appeal is reviewed by a person; AI does not approve or deny appeals. A member who cannot access the account may email thecounseldating@gmail.com. We may limit the details we disclose about anti-fraud methods where necessary to prevent circumvention, subject to legal disclosure obligations.

7. When we notify other members

We do not automatically notify other members merely because someone filed a report. We may provide actual notice to members who had contact with the reported member when:

• law requires notice, including qualifying fraud-ban notices under New York or Vermont law;
• we determine there is a credible and material risk of fraud, violence, stalking, sexual assault, or another serious safety threat and warning affected members is reasonably necessary; or
• another legally permitted safety purpose makes notice appropriate.

A safety notice may state that we received a report, that an account was restricted or banned, the category of concern, and practical safety guidance, while minimizing unnecessary personal information and protecting the reporter's identity.

Fraud-ban notices

For New York and Vermont members covered by their statutes, a qualifying fraud ban notice is sent to members known to have received and responded to an on-site message from the banned account. The notice identifies the profile, explains that the ban involved possible false identity or a significant risk of financial fraud, warns the member not to send money or financial information, and links to fraud-prevention guidance. We send the notice within 24 hours unless applicable law permits later timing based on an analysis of effective messaging, and never later than the maximum period permitted by law. We may send similar or broader warnings to additional members when reasonably necessary for safety.

Report updates. A person who files a report receives an update when review is completed or when we can provide a meaningful status, but privacy, safety, legal, and anti-abuse considerations may limit what we can disclose.

8. Harassment reports

We maintain a harassment-report policy for reports by or between members. A reporter can block the other member immediately. Blocking hides the accounts from each other in the areas described by the app. A moderator reviews reported content and relevant context. We retain copied report evidence for the period stated in the Privacy Policy, ordinarily at least 180 days after a case closes, while the written safety record may be retained longer.

Depending on severity and history, harassment can result in warnings, restrictions, suspension, or permanent ban. Threats of violence, stalking, and serious sexual harassment are treated as high-priority safety matters. We tell the reporter when a report has been reviewed and do not disclose the reporter's identity to the reported member unless law requires it.

9. Consent

Engaging in sexual conduct with another person without that person's consent violates this policy, is against the law, and may result in criminal or civil liability.

10. Safety measures

• Automated and human-assisted screening for scams, money requests, threats, harassment, prohibited contact-sharing, and other abuse patterns.
• On-device nudity detection before some media is posted and server/provider screening for violence where described in the Privacy Policy.
• Recipient permission before in-chat photos or videos from a sender are displayed.
• Optional Selfie Checked, ID Details Matched, and Booking Checked badges with narrow, explicit descriptions of what each check does and does not establish.
• Reporting and blocking tools available from profiles, chats, media, reviews, events, and trips.
• Legally required fraud-ban notifications and additional safety warnings where reasonably necessary.
• Ban-evasion detection using protected device, phone, and account signals.
• Limits on unreviewed matches and a review system designed to reduce manipulation and retaliation.
• Atlas trip tools including emergency contacts, check-ins, expected-return time, and a private trip-plan link.
• Approximate distance rather than exact location display. Rounded coordinates are not delivered to another member's device; members see only an approximate distance.
• A Safety Center with reporting guidance, safer-online-dating information, meeting-in-person tips, domestic-violence and sexual-assault resources, and romance-scam education.

11. Getting help

12. Connecticut-specific safety center and notices

For Connecticut users, our Safety Center explains the reporting mechanism for harmful or unwanted behavior, provides safer online and in-person dating guidance, links or phone numbers for domestic-violence and sexual-harassment resources, and educational information about romance scams. The Service also delivers the required registration communication containing the no-background-screening and safety-awareness notices and provides the no-background-screening notice before a Connecticut user is first permitted to communicate with another user.

13. Colorado publication and annual reporting

The public version of this policy must be linked in the Colorado-required locations. The Counsel will submit the policy URL and any updated URL to the Colorado Attorney General within the applicable statutory deadlines and will submit the required annual safety report by the date required by Colorado law and implementing rules. These filing obligations are internal compliance duties and do not create a promise that every report or safety case will have a particular outcome.

14. Changes

We update this policy when our material safety practices change and provide member notice where required. If a change affects a state-required safety-policy filing or URL submission, we will complete the required update process.

Contact: thecounseldating@gmail.com | The Counsel Social LLC, 502 W 7th St, Ste 100, Erie, PA 16502-1333