Acceptable Use Policy and Messaging Guidelines

Last updated 6 November 2026 · Owner: Koana Works administrator · Reviewed at least once a year

Contents

1. About this policy
2. Using Koana
3. Messaging Guidelines
4. Enforcement
5. Organizations and officers
6. Koana Works administrators
7. Changes and contact

1. About this policy

This policy applies to everyone who uses Koana: organizations and their officers, members, invited guests, and Koana Works staff. It sets out what is and is not acceptable, how we look after Messages, and what we may do when the rules are broken. It supports section 4 (Acceptable use) of our Terms of Service and works with our Privacy Policy.

The Messaging Guidelines are section 3. They are the part members read most, and the page the “Read the Messaging Guidelines” link in Koana opens.

We wrote this to be read, not to catch anyone out. Where something depends on context we say so, and we ask you to use judgement: would the people in the conversation, and your organization, be comfortable with it?

2. Using Koana

Use Koana for your organization's legitimate activities.

Access and security

• Do not try to reach another organization's data or bypass permissions, and do not share your sign-in with anyone.
• Do not probe, scan, scrape or overload the service, or reverse-engineer it, without written permission. Good-faith security reports are welcome at security@koanaworks.com.
• Do not upload malware or links meant to harm a device or steal a sign-in.
• Do not impersonate another person, an officer or Koana.

Content

• Do not upload or share unlawful content, or content you have no right to share, including material that infringes someone else's copyright or trademark.
• Child safety. Content that sexualizes or exploits anyone under 18 is never allowed. We remove it, close the account, and may report it to the authorities.
• Do not use Koana to deceive people, for example fake fundraising, false claims about who you are, or misleading records.
• Do not use Koana Commons or connected social accounts for spam, harassment or misleading content.
• Do not use Koana's AI features to produce content that this policy forbids.

Personal information

• Do not share personal information about members beyond what they agreed to, and do not sell or share members' details with others.
• Use members' details only for the organization's own purposes.

3. Messaging Guidelines

3.1 What Messages is for

Messages is where the people of an organization talk with each other: the members' lounge, groups, direct messages and project discussions. It should feel like a respectful room of people who work together. Disagreeing, criticizing an idea and friendly teasing are all fine. Attacking a person is not.

3.2 What we ask of everyone

These six areas match the reasons Koana shows when a message is not sent.

Respectful language

• No harassment, bullying, name-calling aimed at a person, or pile-ons.
• No slurs, and no attacking or demeaning someone for who they are, including race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability or age.
• No repeated unwanted contact after someone has asked you to stop.
• Strong language that is not aimed at anyone is not an offence in itself. Where Messages checks are on, it may be shown with letters replaced by stars (for example f**k). Language aimed at a person is not allowed.

Threats and violence

• No threats of harm to a person or a group, and no encouraging, praising or making light of violence.
• No encouraging anyone to hurt or kill themselves.
• If someone is in immediate danger, contact your local emergency services first, then tell an officer. If someone in a conversation seems to be struggling, reach out to them or to someone they trust.

Sexual content

• No explicit sexual content, and no unwanted sexual messages, requests or comments.
• No sexual content involving anyone under 18, ever. Photos follow the same rule.

Private information

• Do not post other people's home addresses, phone numbers, identity or account numbers, financial or medical details, or private photos without their agreement.
• Do not use Messages to expose or track someone, or to share a private conversation in order to embarrass them.

Spam and scams

• No unsolicited promotion, chain messages or repeated copies of the same message.
• No phishing, fake links, or requests for money or sign-in details under false pretences.
• No pretending to be an officer, another member or Koana.
• Your organization's own fundraising and notices, posted where its officers allow them, are fine.

Anything else

• Nothing unlawful, and nothing that infringes someone else's rights.
• Do not try to get round the checks, for example by disguising words so they are not recognized.

3.3 Photos

Photos follow the same rules. A photo may be checked by the automated check before others see it. A photo that is held back is not shared; you can remove it and send a different one. Asking a person to review a held photo is not available yet.

3.4 Your organization's own rules

An organization may add its own rules for its groups. They can ask for more than this policy but cannot allow what it forbids. Officers decide who belongs to the organization and its groups. Officers are not moderators of private messages, and Koana's checks do not show officers a message that was held back.

3.5 How Koana checks messages

Where Messages checks are switched on for an organization, text messages and photos may be checked by an automated system before other people see them. What happens depends on what is written:

• Koana's own check comes first. It reads each text message against a list of words and phrases and the way they are used. Only if that check fails to run, or for photos, which a word list cannot read, does Koana ask a third-party automated service, OpenAI's moderation service (see Vendors). Only the message or photo being checked is sent: not the rest of the conversation, and not who else is in it.
• If both checks fail, nothing is approved by accident. The message waits and is tried again.
• People do not read your messages as a matter of course. A person at Koana sees a message only if you ask for a review or a report is made, as described below.
• What Koana records. The check records the kind of problem it found (for example “harassment”) and the decision, not a copy of the message in its own records.
• Automated checks make mistakes. They can miss things and they can hold back something harmless. A flag is a reason to look again, not a finding that you did something wrong. They are also not a promise that every message in Messages has been looked at: you remain responsible for what you send.

3.6 If your message was not sent

• Only you can see it. In the conversation it shows “Message not sent. See why?” Nobody else received it.
• See why? explains this and offers Edit message (your words go back into the message box so you can change them and send again), Request review, and Close.
• This is different from “Couldn't send. Try again.” That means your connection failed. It has nothing to do with a check.

3.7 Asking for a review

If you think the check was wrong, choose Request review. Before you do, the screen tells you what will be shared:

• A person at Koana reads that one message. They see your name, your organization and the kind of conversation (and its name unless it is a direct message).
• They do not see the rest of the conversation or who else is in it.
• Reviewers are Koana staff signed in with two-step verification. Every time a review is opened, and every decision, is recorded.
• You can ask once per message. Reviews are for text messages for now.

You will be notified when there is a decision. The message then shows one of:

• Review requested. Waiting. It is still hidden from everyone else.
• Ready to send. The reviewer decided it is fine. It has not been sent yet: you press Send and it is posted then, as a new message at the end of the conversation, so an old message never turns up unannounced.
• Message can't be sent. With a short reason and the part of these guidelines it relates to. You can edit it and send a changed version.

3.8 Reporting a message or a person

If something in Messages breaks these guidelines, or someone is being targeted, tell an officer of your organization. You can also write to support@koanaworks.com with the organization, the conversation and roughly when it happened. A person at Koana reads reports and replies to the person who sent them. We keep who reported something confidential as far as we can. Messages does not yet have a report button; until it does, email is the way. For a threat or anyone in immediate danger, contact local emergency services first.

4. Enforcement

We would rather help someone fix a problem than punish them. We also have to protect other people and the service. We may:

• hold back or remove a message, photo or other content that breaks this policy;
• limit a feature, for example sending messages, for a person or an organization;
• suspend or end access for a person or an organization, and tell the organization why.

What we do depends on how serious it is, whether it looks deliberate, the context, whether it has happened before, and the risk to others. We act straight away, and may report to the authorities, for child safety, credible threats, and security attacks. We have no duty to monitor Messages, and we do not guarantee that a message will be delivered.

If you disagree with a decision about a held message, use Request review as described above. For any other decision, write to contact@koanaworks.com and a person at Koana will look at it again. We may share information with the authorities where the law requires it or to prevent serious harm.

5. Organizations and officers

• Make sure the people you add to Koana have agreed to be added and know what their organization keeps and why.
• Tell members about these guidelines, and set any extra rules for your groups in plain words.
• Act on reports from your members. Remove people from your organization's groups when that is right, and tell us if something serious happens.
• Do not use an officer's access to look at members' information for any reason other than the organization's own business.

6. Koana Works administrators

• Use only your own accounts, with multi-factor authentication.
• Look at customer data only to provide or support the service, or when the law requires.
• Open a message review only to decide that review. Do not copy, keep or discuss the message anywhere else, and judge it only on what you are shown.
• Never copy customer data to personal devices or unapproved tools.
• Report suspected incidents immediately, and escalate anything dangerous, such as a threat of violence or a child at risk, rather than only declining a message.
• Keep devices used for administration updated, screen-locked and protected.

7. Changes and contact

We will post changes here and tell organizations before important changes take effect. The date at the top shows when this page last changed.

Questions: contact@koanaworks.com · Help and reports: support@koanaworks.com · Security: security@koanaworks.com