Standards against child sexual abuse and exploitation

1. Scope

These standards apply to the wya consumer mobile app (iOS and Android) and to every service connected to it. They are published as required by Google Play’s child safety standards policy, and they bind the operator named in section 8.

Child sexual abuse and exploitation is abbreviated CSAE below. It covers any sexual abuse or exploitation of a person under 18, and any material depicting it.

We comply with the child protection laws that apply to us and with lawful requests from the competent authorities.

2. What is forbidden

The following is forbidden on wya without exception, whether or not anyone reports it and whether or not it is against the law where the account holder happens to be.

• Sharing, requesting, or storing child sexual abuse material in any form, including drawn, generated, or edited depictions.
• Any sexualisation of a person under 18 — in text, photos, videos, stories, event titles and descriptions, display names, or profile pictures.
• Grooming: building a relationship with a minor in order to sexually abuse or exploit them, on wya or anywhere else.
• Sextortion: threatening to publish intimate material in order to extract more material, money, or contact.
• Trafficking a minor, or advertising or arranging sexual contact with one.
• Using wya to arrange or advertise any of the above, or to move it to another service.

3. Minimum age

wya is for people aged 16 and over. It is not built for children and is not directed at them.

We do not verify age at sign-up. If we learn that an account belongs to someone under 16, we delete the account and its content.

4. How wya is built to prevent contact with strangers

Harm of this kind usually starts with an adult being able to reach a child they do not know. wya has no such path — not because it is moderated away, but because the app was built without one:

• There is no user directory and no user search. You cannot browse, search for, or discover other people on wya at all.
• Connections come from the address book on your phone, and a connection only exists when both people have each other’s number. Nobody becomes a contact by finding you.
• A story is visible to your mutual contacts by default. There is no public feed and no way for a stranger to come across what you post.
• Whether you are attending an event is visible to your mutual contacts by default.
• Private events are invitation-only, and there is no list of people to invite a stranger from.
• Public events are published by venues and organisers we have verified, not by other users.

5. How to report

Report anything covered by section 2 to safety@wya.social, with “child safety” in the subject line so it is seen first. Anyone can report: you do not need a wya account, and you do not need to be certain.

Tell us what you saw and where, and — if you have it — the display name or phone number of the account involved. Do not download, copy, or forward suspected abuse material. Send us the reference, never the content.

If a child is in immediate danger, contact the police before you contact us. In Germany that is 110, and 112 anywhere in the EU.

6. What we do with a report

A report of this kind is handled ahead of everything else, and every one is looked at by a person.

• Confirmed content is removed.
• The account is terminated permanently. This is not a warning-first rule and there is no appeal for a confirmed case.
• We preserve the account data and the material as evidence instead of deleting it outright, so that it is still available to the authorities.
• We report the case to the competent law enforcement authority — for us the Bundeskriminalamt in Germany, and NCMEC where a case falls within its remit.
• We answer lawful requests from law enforcement about such a case.

7. What we do not do

We would rather state this than let the sections above imply more than is there. wya is run by a very small team.

• We do not automatically scan uploaded photos or videos, and we run no hash matching against known abuse material.
• We do not proactively read private stories or messages. We act on reports.
• Content is not end-to-end encrypted, which is what makes it possible for us to act on a report at all.

These are limits of what wya does today, not a position we intend to keep. They change nothing about section 2, which applies whether or not we notice a breach ourselves.

8. Contact point

For anything to do with child safety — including requests from law enforcement, from platforms, and from child protection organisations — write to safety@wya.social. It reaches the operator directly:

Lars Schlageter
Wollmatingerstraße 50A
78467 Konstanz

9. Changes to these standards

We update these standards as wya changes. The version on this page, carrying the date above, is always the current one.