Terms of Use

What HakkaYin is

HakkaYin helps the Hakka diaspora find and reconnect around their home villages: village pages with photos and maps, member profiles, family trees, and an anonymous diaspora tracker. Villages are run with community leaders, and membership is vetted.

Accounts

You must be 16 or over. Keep your email address accurate — it is how you log in (we send magic links; there are no passwords) and how leaders reach you. Do not share accounts or help others log in as you. We may refuse or remove accounts that abuse the site.

Photos and content you post

• You keep ownership of what you post. You grant HakkaYin permission to store, process and display it (including converting formats such as HEIC to JPEG and making thumbnails) so the site can work.
• Only upload photos you took or have clear permission to share, and make sure the people in them are OK with it.
• Do not upload photos of children unless they are your own family and a parent or guardian knows.
• Do not post other people’s private information without their consent, and do not add someone to a family tree who would not want to be there.
• You are responsible for what you post. If we reasonably believe content breaks these rules we may remove it.

What you may not do

• Harass, threaten, impersonate, or dox other people.
• Post spam, illegal content, or content designed to harm children.
• Scrape or bulk-collect member profiles, photos or personal data.
• Try to defeat the privacy controls (for example, inferring or publishing hidden city or contact details).
• Use HakkaYin to break the law.

Privacy

Our Privacy Policy explains what we collect and the visibility choices you have. It is part of these terms — please read it.

Villages, leaders and moderation

Village membership is granted by leaders and may be revoked. Leaders and site administrators can remove content that breaks these rules. We may warn, suspend or ban accounts that misuse the site, and we keep a record of why. If you see something wrong, use the report tools or the Contact page.

Deleting your content and account

You can delete photos you uploaded at any time. To delete your account, contact us and we will action it, removing the content we can as described in the Privacy Policy.

No warranty

HakkaYin is provided “as is”, run by volunteers on a best-effort basis. We do not guarantee that the site will be uninterrupted or that content is accurate. Content posted by members is their own responsibility.

Liability

To the maximum extent the law allows, HakkaYin and its administrators are not liable for loss arising from your use of the site or from other people’s content. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

Changes

We may update these terms; the current version is always on this page. Continued use after changes means you accept them.