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Community & safety

Child Safety & Acceptable Use

Brass bands bring adults and young people together. These are the rules everyone agrees to when they use BandHQ, and how we keep young members safe.

1. Who this applies to

This policy applies to everyone who uses BandHQ — band members, band administrators, and anyone they invite. It sits alongside our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Breaking it can lead to content being removed and accounts being restricted or closed.

2. What isn't allowed

Don't use BandHQ to post, share or do any of the following:

  • Anything involving the sexual abuse or exploitation of children. We have zero tolerance — see section 5.
  • Anything illegal, or content that encourages or helps others break the law.
  • Bullying, harassment, threats, or targeting someone to upset or intimidate them.
  • Hate speech, or content that promotes violence or discrimination.
  • Sexual content, nudity, or content that is inappropriate for the young people who may see it.
  • Grooming, or trying to build an inappropriate relationship with a young member.
  • Sharing someone else's personal information without their consent, or impersonating another person.
  • Spam, scams, or trying to break, misuse or get around BandHQ's security or features.

3. Protecting young members

BandHQ is designed so young members can take part safely:

  • High-privacy by default for under-18s, with data kept to the minimum needed to run the band.
  • Invite-only. A young person joins a band because a band administrator adds or invites them — there is no public discovery of bands or members.
  • No advertising, no behavioural profiling, and we never use members' content to train AI.
  • The band is responsible for who is in it, and for having the right consents for any members under 18 (see the Privacy Policy).

4. Band administrators & safeguarding

Band administrators run their band on BandHQ. If your band includes young people:

  • You decide who joins, and you're responsible for having appropriate consent for members under 18.
  • We recommend your band has a named safeguarding contact and follows any safeguarding rules your band or federation already has.

5. Child sexual abuse material — zero tolerance

We do not tolerate any content that sexually abuses or exploits children.

Where we become aware of such material, we will remove it, take the strongest action against the accounts involved, preserve the necessary evidence, and report it to the relevant authorities. If a child is in immediate danger, contact the police on 999.

To report child sexual abuse material or a child-safety concern, use the in-app report tool or contact us at the address below. You can also report directly to the NCA's CEOP service and the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF).

Where we confirm child sexual abuse material on BandHQ, we preserve it, remove access to it, and report it to the National Crime Agency (NCA/CEOP) and the Internet Watch Foundation within 24 hours of that confirmation. We do not open or forward the material, and we do not wait to be asked.

6. Reporting & how we respond

If you see something that breaks this policy, report it — use the report option on the content, or contact us. When we receive a report we review it and, depending on what we find, we may:

  • Hide or remove the content;
  • Warn the member;
  • Temporarily suspend or permanently close an account;
  • Where the law requires or the risk is serious, report to the relevant authorities.

If your account or content is restricted and you think we've got it wrong, you can appeal by contacting us, and we'll review it.

Moderation is both proactive and reactive. Messages are checked automatically as they are sent, and images are checked automatically when they are uploaded. The check runs immediately after the upload rather than before it, so a flagged image can be briefly visible in that channel before it is pulled. Separately, any member can report a message or another member, and any member can block another member. Reports go to a queue that the band's administrators and our own staff can see.

7. Getting help & reporting a concern

If a child is in immediate danger, contact the police on 999. Do not wait for us.

For any other concern about a young person, email safeguarding@usebandhq.com. It is read by Vivid Vision Designs Ltd’s designated safeguarding lead, and we aim to respond within two working days.

You can also report independently of us: CEOP (report abuse online), Childline on 0800 1111, and the Internet Watch Foundation for images. For a concern about a child in your area, your local authority’s children’s services team takes referrals directly.