Privacy Policy

MzansiShield is a community safety, service-delivery and utilities-information app for South Africa. We process your personal information in line with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA). This policy explains what we collect, why, and the choices you have.

1. Who we are

MzansiShield is operated by SysRely. We are the responsible party for your personal information. Our Information Officer can be reached at consulting@sysrely.com.

2. What we collect

• Account details - your email address or phone number and your display name (for sign-in), and an optional profile photo.
• Content you create - the reports, confirmations, replies and photos you submit.
• Location - the location you attach to a report or utilities check, and, if you choose to use live location or SOS, your real-time position while sharing is active.
• Technical data - your IP address, device type and similar data, used for security, abuse-prevention and to make features work.

3. Why we use it

To create and secure your account and send one-time sign-in PINs; to publish the content you choose to submit; to show local information such as load-shedding, water status and nearby alerts; to deliver notifications you have enabled; to prevent abuse and keep the community safe; and to comply with the law.

4. What's public and what stays private

Your posts are public. Reports, alerts and comments are visible to other users, along with your display name and the location you attach to them. Please don't post personal information - yours or others' - that you don't want shared.

Your email and phone number are never shown publicly. They are used only for sign-in. Your IP address and device data are never shown publicly and are visible only to our moderators for safety and abuse-prevention.

5. Location, live location & SOS

Location is only collected when you use a feature that needs it - attaching a location to a report, checking utilities for an area, or sharing live location.

Live location and the SOS beacon are always opt-in and time-limited. When you activate them, your trusted circle, the nearest registered responders and moderators receive your exact real-time position so they can assist you; nearby members see only the approximate area (about 500 m) unless MzansiShield enables exact positions for verified members. Only signed-in members can see an SOS. Every view of an SOS is recorded - who opened it, when, how, whether they saw the exact or approximate position, their approximate area (never their exact location) and their device type - and kept for 180 days to investigate misuse, then deleted. If the person who viewed it deletes their account, the record stays with their name removed. When an SOS ends, or at most three hours after it started, its exact position and street address are removed and only the approximate area is kept. A visible LIVE indicator stays on your screen the whole time, you can stop instantly, and sharing ends automatically after the period you chose. When a share ends, your position stops updating. We do not track your location outside a share you have started. For a child or youth account, an SOS and live location are shared only with the trusted circle and the nearest registered responders - never with nearby members of the public. An adult can choose the same restriction in Settings.

6. Anonymous reporting

You can report incidents and confirm others' reports without an account; such posts appear as "Anonymous" and hide your name and handle from other users. For community safety and to prevent abuse, we privately record the device (and the posting account, if you are signed in) with every report. This information is used only for moderation and lawful requests, is never shown publicly, and anonymous reporting is rate-limited per device.

Crime reports (once crime reporting is switched on - it is off today). Signed-out visitors see only a crime report's type, area, time and approximate location. Signed-in members see the full report with the approximate area only; the reporter is shown as "A member nearby", or "Anonymous", unless they chose (in Settings, or for that one report) to show their name to their trusted circle, to people they follow and who follow them, or to everyone nearby who can see the report - an anonymous report shows no name to anyone. Reports of sexual assault, domestic violence, child abuse or human trafficking are private: members and visitors never see them; only the reporter, verified SAPS covering the area, registered responders covering the area (sexual assault and domestic violence only), the reporter's trusted circle if they chose that, and MzansiShield moderators can open them. If the reporter asks to warn their community, a separate alert showing only the type, suburb and date is published after a moderator has checked it. "Wanted person" notices can only be posted by verified SAPS members and official accounts, must link to the notice on saps.gov.za or carry a SAPS case number, and are checked by a moderator first; members cannot post that a person is wanted. The exact location goes only to the reporter, registered responders whose area covers it, the reporter's trusted circle if they chose that, and MzansiShield moderators, and is reduced to the approximate area after 30 days unless a SAPS case is open. Reports that may identify a person, and reports with photos, are checked by a moderator before they are published. SAPS responders verified by MzansiShield receive a reporter's display name and verified phone number or email only for a report with an open SAPS case (with its case number, for up to 180 days) and never for an anonymous report; the reporter is told unless MzansiShield records a reason not to. A shared crime report's public link shows only its type, area and time (a private report shows nothing). Every time a report's exact location or its reporter's identity is shown to anyone other than the reporter, we record who, their role, what and when; that record is kept for 180 days.

7. Notifications

If you enable notifications, we register a push subscription for your device so we can alert you to reports near you, SOS beacons in your area, and new app updates - even when the app is closed. If you enable location alongside notifications, we store your approximate location with your subscription so alerts can be limited to your area. You can turn notifications off at any time in the app, which removes the subscription.

8. Who we share with

We share personal information only with service providers who process it on our behalf under contract, and only for the purpose named. POPIA section 18 requires that you are told who receives your information, so this list names every one of them rather than stopping at the comfortable half - grouped by what of yours goes where, because "we share with partners" tells you nothing you can act on.

• Photos, videos and voice notes you post are screened before publication by OpenAI and Sightengine; the text of every post, reply and private message is screened by OpenAI before it is published or delivered; and video is hosted and streamed by Cloudflare Stream - including live broadcasts.
• Your phone number goes to Twilio when we send a sign-in code, alert a trusted contact by SMS, or place a fake call you booked.
• Your email address goes to Microsoft 365 and Resend to deliver codes and alerts.
• Your device's notification token goes to Google (FCM), Huawei (Push Kit) or Apple (APNs) - whichever your phone uses - so an alert can reach you.
• Coordinates you look up go to OpenStreetMap, Photon, Nominatim, OSRM and Open-Meteo for maps, addresses, routes and weather, and a post you choose to translate goes to Google Cloud Translation.
• Hosting, storage and the database are Netlify and Neon (PostgreSQL), currently in the United States and moving to Frankfurt, Germany; bot-protection, network relay and page analytics are Cloudflare; error diagnostics are Sentry; the Huawei app's push service is Huawei AppGallery Connect (Germany); load-shedding and water data come from EskomSePush.

Some of these providers are outside South Africa - mainly in the United States and Germany. Every such transfer is made under section 72 of POPIA: the recipient is bound by a law (the EU's GDPR) or a binding agreement providing protection substantially similar to POPIA. Our PAIA manual lists each recipient, its country and the basis relied on. We do not sell your information, and we do not use it for advertising. We may disclose information where the law requires it, or to protect the safety of a person or the public.

9. Retention & your control

We keep your information while your account is active. Sign-in codes expire after 10 minutes and are deleted when used; a code that is never used is removed within 24 hours. Live-location positions are transient and stop being updated once a share ends. The record of who viewed an SOS is kept for 180 days. Sign-in codes are stored only in scrambled (hashed) form. You can edit or delete your posts, remove your photo, or delete your profile and all its data at any time from within the app - Settings → Delete profile permanently. Your profile is hidden immediately and everything is erased after 7 days; signing in during that week cancels it. If you have already uninstalled the app you can request deletion by email instead - see our account deletion page, which also lists the few things we are obliged to keep. You can request a copy of the personal data we hold about you at any time.

10. Security

We use HTTPS, one-time PIN sign-in, signed sessions, access controls, content moderation and rate-limiting to protect your information. No system is perfectly secure, but we work to protect your data and to limit what is collected in the first place.

11. Children

MzansiShield offers accounts for minors only with the consent of a parent or guardian acting as the competent person under POPIA (sections 34-35). There are two kinds:

Child safety devices. A parent can set up a spare phone as a child's emergency device. It provides only an SOS button and Walk-with-me, and no feed, messaging or other features. We process the child's name, sign-in credential and - only while a share is active - their location, so that SOS and Walk-with-me can alert the parent-managed trusted circle and registered responders. A managed child's location is never shared with nearby members of the public, and any parent-initiated location check is always shown on the child's own screen while it is active. The parent can switch the device off at any time.

Youth accounts (13-17). A teenager may hold a full account only once a parent or guardian has given permission in the app. Youth accounts receive a youth-safe experience - graphic or adult-only content is withheld - and the guardian remains on the trusted circle. A guardian can manage the account, revoke consent, or return it to a simple safety device.

We do not knowingly create an account for anyone under 13 except as a parent-provisioned safety device. Content that sexualises, abuses or endangers a child is strictly prohibited, removed, and reported to the South African Police Service and the Film and Publication Board as South African law requires - our Child Safety Standards set out what is banned, how to report it, what we do about it and who to contact. A parent or guardian may request access to, or deletion of, their child's information at any time.

12. Your rights

Under POPIA you may access, correct or delete your information, object to processing, or withdraw consent. Contact us at consulting@sysrely.com. You also have the right to complain to the Information Regulator (South Africa) at POPIAComplaints@inforegulator.org.za.

13. Contact us

We may update this policy from time to time; material changes will be reflected here with a new "last updated" date.