Terms & Conditions

Contents

1. Acceptance of Terms

These Terms and Conditions govern your use of the Vanish application and related websites, together, the “Service”. By accessing or using the Service, you agree to be bound by these Terms.

If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not use the Service.

Additional documents that form part of your agreement with us include the Privacy Policy and the Rules & How It Works.

2. Eligibility

• The Service is not intended for use by anyone below the minimum age required by applicable law.
• By using the Service, you represent that you meet the relevant age requirement and have legal capacity to enter into a binding agreement.
• If you use the Service on behalf of another person or entity, you represent that you are authorised to accept these Terms on their behalf.

3. Accounts and Access

3.1 Account types

• Vanish supports temporary accounts and permanent accounts.
• Permanent accounts require only a username, password, chosen country, and chosen city.
• Normal use of the Service does not require an email address, phone number, or payment card details.

3.2 Account security

• You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your login credentials and for activity under your account.
• You must notify us promptly if you believe your account has been compromised.

3.3 Account ownership and transfer

• Your account is personal to you and may not be sold, transferred, or assigned without our prior written consent.

4. Groups, Roles, and Platform Mechanics

Vanish includes group-based platform features that form part of the Service.

4.1 Group roles

• Groups may include admin, elder, and member roles.
• The creator of a group becomes the admin.
• New entrants join as members.
• Promotion from member to elder or elder to admin may depend on group voting rules and eligibility thresholds.

4.2 Group actions

• Admins may kick, mute, promote, and demote, adjust group tax rates, spend group funds, acquire items for the group, and siphon group funds into personal accounts where those features are made available by the Service.
• Elders may initiate no-confidence votes against the admin, apply moderation actions to members, and perform public shaming actions.
• Members may perform actions such as public shaming and no-confidence initiation where those features are enabled and the relevant requirements are met.

4.3 Group governance

• The admin may be protected from no-confidence votes for a limited period after group creation or after surviving a vote.
• If a vote succeeds, the Service may reset roles and run elder and admin selection processes automatically in accordance with platform rules.
• Some governance actions may be subject to system thresholds, timing windows, item costs, or virtual-currency costs.

4.4 Group types

• Groups may be public-invite, public-open, or private.
• Public groups may be listed globally, while private groups may require invitation and may not be listed.

5. In-App Purchases and Virtual Items

Vanish may offer digital items through Google Play in-app purchases.

5.1 Nature of virtual items

• Items such as visibility boosts, sabotages, unread message slots, and conversation-start slots are virtual features that exist only within the Service.
• They do not represent real-world money, financial products, banked value, or property rights.
• You receive a limited, revocable licence to use such items within the Service, subject to these Terms.

5.2 Purchase handling

• Payments are processed by Google Play, not by Vanish directly.
• Vanish does not access or store your bank card details.
• Vanish may retain records of purchases made, items available, and items used for service operation, support, and user reassurance.

5.3 Use and restrictions

• Items apply only within the Service and subject to in-app rules.
• Some items cannot be stacked or repeatedly applied to the same target while already active.
• Virtual items may be lost, limited, or removed if your account is suspended, banned, deleted, or if the Service changes.

5.4 Refunds

• Refund rights, where available, are governed primarily by the relevant app store rules and applicable consumer law.
• Except where required by law or platform policy, virtual items are non-refundable and have no cash value.

6. User Behaviour and Prohibited Uses

You are responsible for your behaviour and content on the Service. You agree not to:

• Engage in spam, scams, phishing, malicious automation, or bot abuse.
• Upload, share, or promote child sexual abuse material, sexual content involving minors, extreme violence, or clearly illegal unsafe content.
• Persistently harass, abuse, or evade enforcement actions.
• Upload, share, or promote content that clearly infringes copyright or other legal rights.
• Use the Service to conduct real-world illegal activity.
• Attempt to bypass suspensions, bans, or technical controls.
• Interfere with platform security, moderation systems, or service integrity.
• Use paid items or platform mechanics as a shield against enforcement.

7. User Content and Licence

7.1 Your content

• You retain any rights you hold in content you submit to the Service, such as messages, images, reports, and group-related content.
• You are responsible for ensuring that your content does not violate law or these Terms.

7.2 Licence to Vanish

• By submitting content to the Service, you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to host, store, reproduce, process, modify where technically necessary, and display that content as needed to operate, secure, moderate, and improve the Service.
• This licence lasts for as long as the relevant content remains on or passes through our systems, subject to retention rules and system operation.

8. Moderation, Enforcement, and Bans

Moderation on Vanish is primarily automated and may rely on user reports, behavioural analysis, honeypot traps, spam detection, and automated model-based assessment.

8.1 Automated decisions

• Reports and certain behaviours may be analysed using automated systems, including third-party moderation models.
• Moderation decisions may include content removal, warnings, suspensions, trust penalties, and permanent bans.
• No formal manual moderation or appeal system is guaranteed.

8.2 Enforcement ladder

• For non-severe behaviour, Vanish may apply progressive suspensions that increase with repeated offences.
• For severe violations, including child sexual abuse material, extreme violence, or clear copyright infringement, Vanish may remove content immediately and permanently ban the account.
• Only in severe cases may Vanish temporarily process device-related or location-related information to enforce a hard ban and reduce evasion, as described in the Privacy Policy.

8.3 Finality of decisions

• Because moderation is automated and large-scale, enforcement outcomes may be final even if no human review occurs.
• You may contact support regarding obvious technical issues, but Vanish does not guarantee reversal or manual reassessment of enforcement actions.

9. Third-Party Services

• The Service may rely on third-party providers, including Google Play billing, hosting and infrastructure providers, and moderation or analytics tooling.
• Your use of third-party services may also be subject to their own terms and privacy policies.
• Where third parties act independently, certain rights or complaints may need to be exercised with them directly.

10. Intellectual Property

• All rights in the Service, including branding, software, interface design, text, and non-user materials, are owned by or licensed to Vanish and protected by applicable intellectual property laws.
• Subject to your compliance with these Terms, you receive a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use the Service for personal, lawful use.
• You must not copy, modify, distribute, reverse engineer, or create derivative works from the Service except where permitted by law.

11. Disclaimers

• The Service is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis.
• We do not guarantee uninterrupted, secure, or error-free operation.
• We do not guarantee that any content, message, item, or platform feature will remain available or unchanged.
• We do not guarantee that automated moderation will correctly identify or remove all harmful, illegal, or infringing content.
• Platform mechanics, including items, groups, voting, and visibility effects, are entertainment features only and not real-world financial or governance systems.

12. Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law:

• We are not liable for indirect, incidental, consequential, special, or punitive damages, or for loss of profits, goodwill, data, or opportunity arising from or relating to your use of the Service.
• Our total aggregate liability to you for claims arising out of or relating to the Service or these Terms is limited to the greater of: (a) the amount you paid to us directly in the twelve months before the claim, if any; and (b) EUR 10.

Nothing in these Terms excludes liability that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.

13. Suspension and Termination

• You may stop using the Service at any time.
• We may suspend, restrict, or terminate access to the Service, or remove content, if we reasonably believe you have breached these Terms, violated the law, or created risk for the Service or other users.
• In some cases, including severe abuse scenarios, we may retain limited information where necessary for enforcement, security, support, or legal compliance, notwithstanding account deletion or access loss.

14. Changes to the Service and Terms

• We may modify, suspend, or discontinue parts of the Service at any time.
• We may update these Terms from time to time to reflect changes to the Service, legal requirements, or operational needs.
• When material changes are made, we may update the effective date and provide additional notice where appropriate.
• Your continued use of the Service after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.

15. Governing Law and Disputes

• These Terms are governed by the laws of Ireland, without regard to conflict-of-law principles.
• The courts of Ireland have non-exclusive jurisdiction over disputes arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service.
• You may also have rights under mandatory consumer-protection law in your place of residence where such rights apply.

16. Contact

If you have questions about these Terms, you may contact:

Email: [Insert contact email]

Website: [Insert website URL]