Privacy Policy

Effective date: 4 August 2026

Last updated: 4 August 2026

This Privacy Policy explains how Baloch.Net (“Baloch.Net”, “we”, “us”, or “our”) collects, uses, shares, stores, and protects personal information when you visit https://baloch.net, create an account, maintain a member profile, submit cultural material, or otherwise use our services (collectively, the “Services”).

Baloch.Net is a cultural and community platform created to connect Baloch people, preserve heritage, and publish community-contributed stories, photographs, articles, Balochi Batals (proverbs), gallery material, and related cultural information.

1. Who is responsible for your information?

Baloch.Net is responsible for deciding how personal information collected through the Services is used. Privacy questions and requests may be sent to privacy@baloch.net.

2. Information we collect

2.1 Information you provide directly

Depending on how you use Baloch.Net, you may provide:

• Account information: your name, email address, password, and email-verification information.
• Member-profile information: your profile address, profession or role, city, country, tribe (optional), biography, website or portfolio link, profile photograph, and privacy choices concerning whether your profile, location, or tribe is displayed publicly.
• Contributions: stories, articles, photographs, captions, titles, descriptions, ideas, Balochi Batals, translations, cultural context, sources, gallery material, and other content you submit.
• Guest-submission information: your name, email address, general location, and information submitted with a contribution when you do not have an account.
• Communications: support enquiries, moderation correspondence, reports, complaints, requests, feedback, and other messages you send to us.

Please do not submit private street addresses, government identification numbers, financial information, medical information, passwords, or other highly sensitive personal information in public profiles or contributions.

If you provide personal information or content concerning another person, you must have the legal right and, where required, that person’s permission to do so.

2.2 Information received through Google sign-in

If you select Continue with Google, Google may provide us with basic account information that you authorize, such as your Google account identifier, name, email address, email-verification status, and profile image.

We do not receive your Google password and do not request access to your Gmail, Google Drive, contacts, calendar, or other unrelated Google data.

A Google profile image is not made public automatically. It is held for moderation and becomes public only if approved by an administrator and permitted by your public-profile settings.

2.3 Information collected automatically

When you access the Services, our systems and service providers may automatically collect:

• your IP address and approximate location derived from it;
• browser type, device type, operating system, language, and user agent;
• pages requested, referring page, access date and time, and technical errors;
• session identifiers, login activity, and security or anti-abuse signals;
• information about form submissions and account activity; and
• limited interaction information, such as the number of times a published Batal is shared.

We use this information to operate the website, maintain sessions, diagnose errors, prevent abuse, secure accounts, and understand the general performance of the Services.

2.4 Public information

Information you choose to publish may be visible to anyone, including people without an account, search engines, social-media services, archival services, and automated systems.

Public information may include your approved member name and photograph, profession, biography, city and country, tribe if you enable that option, website link, contributor credit, and published contributions.

Do not make information public that you want to keep private.

3. How we use information

We may use personal information to:

• create, authenticate, secure, and administer user accounts;
• provide member profiles and apply your privacy choices;
• receive, identify, organize, review, edit, moderate, publish, reject, or remove contributions;
• review profile photographs and profile changes before they are displayed publicly;
• link a guest contribution to a verified account when the submitted email address matches the account email;
• communicate about account verification, password resets, submissions, moderation decisions, security, support, and important service updates;
• generate and enable sharing of Balochi Batal cards and other public content;
• maintain the cultural archive, attribution records, editorial history, and integrity of published material;
• detect spam, fraud, malicious activity, security threats, and violations of our Terms of Use;
• debug, maintain, measure, and improve the reliability, accessibility, and usefulness of the Services;
• establish, exercise, or defend legal claims and comply with applicable law; and
• carry out another purpose disclosed when the information is collected, with consent where required.

4. Legal bases for processing

Where applicable law requires a legal basis, we process personal information on one or more of the following grounds:

• Contract: processing necessary to create your account and provide features you request.
• Legitimate interests: operating and securing Baloch.Net, moderating content, preventing abuse, communicating with users, improving the Services, and preserving a reliable cultural archive, provided those interests are not overridden by your rights.
• Consent: where you choose to publish optional profile information, connect a third-party sign-in service, or where consent is otherwise required. You may withdraw consent at any time.
• Legal obligations: compliance with applicable laws, lawful requests, court orders, and regulatory duties.
• Protection of rights and safety: where processing is necessary to protect users, Baloch.Net, the public, or another person.

5. Moderation and editorial review

Contributions, member profiles, and new or changed profile photographs may be reviewed by authorized administrators or editors before publication.

Moderators may evaluate accuracy, relevance, safety, permissions, cultural sensitivity, authenticity, and compliance with our Terms of Use.

Submitted content may be edited for spelling, formatting, clarity, translation, categorization, or publication while preserving its intended meaning. Internal moderator notes and review records are not normally made public.

6. Cookies and similar technologies

Baloch.Net uses cookies and similar technologies that are necessary to operate and secure the Services. These may include cookies used to:

• maintain your browsing session;
• remember that you are signed in;
• protect forms against unauthorized or forged requests;
• support Google sign-in;
• remember limited preferences;
• balance and protect network traffic; and
• identify malicious, automated, or abusive activity.

Baloch.Net does not currently use third-party advertising cookies or sell personal information for targeted advertising.

If we later introduce non-essential analytics, advertising, or tracking technologies, we will update this policy and request consent where required.

You can control cookies through your browser. Blocking necessary cookies may prevent login, form submission, account security, or other website features from working correctly.

7. How we disclose information

We may disclose information in the following circumstances:

• Publicly, at your direction: information included in an approved public profile or published contribution is publicly available according to your settings and our editorial decisions.
• Service providers: trusted providers that support hosting, databases, file storage, email delivery, content delivery, security, backups, and technical operations.
• Google: when you use Google sign-in, information is exchanged with Google as necessary to authenticate you, subject to Google’s privacy terms.
• Social and sharing services: when you choose Facebook, WhatsApp, X, native sharing, or another sharing option, your browser or device communicates with that service. The receiving service processes information under its own privacy policy.
• Legal and safety reasons: when reasonably necessary to comply with law, regulation, a court order, lawful process, or a valid government request; enforce our terms; investigate abuse; or protect rights, property, security, and safety.
• Organizational change: in connection with a merger, restructuring, transfer, financing, or succession involving Baloch.Net, subject to appropriate confidentiality and notice requirements.
• With your consent: for another purpose that you authorize.

8. No sale of personal information

Baloch.Net does not sell personal information for money. We also do not share personal information for cross-context behavioural advertising as those terms are defined under applicable privacy laws.

If this practice changes, we will update this policy and provide any legally required notice and choices before the change takes effect.

9. Data retention

We retain personal information only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this policy, including providing the Services, preserving the cultural archive, resolving disputes, enforcing agreements, meeting legal obligations, preventing abuse, and maintaining security and backups.

• Account and profile information is generally retained while your account remains active.
• Pending or rejected submissions and moderation records may be retained for a reasonable period to manage appeals, prevent abuse, and preserve editorial accountability.
• Server, security, and diagnostic logs are retained for a limited period appropriate to security and operational requirements.
• Backup copies may remain until they are overwritten through our normal backup cycle.
• Published cultural contributions may remain in the public archive after account deletion to preserve historical and editorial continuity.

When an account is deleted, we may remove or anonymize the contributor’s personal account information while retaining published cultural material. Requests concerning published content will be considered individually, taking account of privacy, attribution, public interest, legal obligations, and archival integrity.

10. Your choices and privacy rights

Depending on your location and applicable law, you may have the right to:

• ask whether we process your personal information;
• obtain access to personal information we hold about you;
• correct inaccurate or incomplete information;
• request deletion of personal information;
• restrict or object to certain processing;
• receive certain information in a portable, machine-readable format;
• withdraw consent where processing is based on consent;
• opt out of certain sales, sharing, profiling, or targeted advertising if those activities apply;
• appeal a refusal of a privacy request where applicable; and
• complain to an applicable data-protection or privacy authority.

You may update many profile fields and public-display choices through Profile & privacy. You may request account deletion through your account settings.

You may also submit a privacy request by emailing privacy@baloch.net. Please describe your request and identify the account or submission concerned.

We may need to verify your identity before processing a request. Authorized representatives may submit requests where permitted by law, subject to proof of authority and identity. We will not discriminate against you for exercising an applicable privacy right.

Google account connections

Deleting your Baloch.Net account does not delete your Google account. You can review or revoke Baloch.Net’s Google connection from your Google Account settings.

Revoking the Google connection does not automatically delete information already stored by Baloch.Net. Use the Baloch.Net account-deletion feature or contact us if you also want to request deletion of information held by Baloch.Net.

11. Security

We use reasonable administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards designed to protect personal information.

These measures may include:

• encrypted HTTPS connections;
• hashed account passwords;
• access controls;
• moderated publication;
• security monitoring and rate limiting;
• network and denial-of-service protection;
• software and security updates; and
• regular backups.

No online service or storage system can be guaranteed to be completely secure. You are responsible for protecting your password and notifying us promptly if you suspect unauthorized use of your account.

12. International access and data transfers

Baloch.Net serves an international community. Your information may be processed in countries other than the country where you live, including countries where our hosting, security, email, or other service providers operate.

Those countries may have different data-protection laws. Where required, we use appropriate safeguards for international transfers and apply the protections described in this Privacy Policy.

13. Children and young people

Baloch.Net is not directed to children under 13. Children under 13 must not create an account or submit personal information through the Services.

If local law requires a higher age for a person to consent to online data processing, a person below that age may use the Services only with authorization from a parent or legal guardian.

If you believe a child has provided personal information contrary to this section, contact privacy@baloch.net so that we can investigate and take appropriate action.

14. Third-party websites and services

The Services may contain links to member websites, sources, social networks, messaging services, or other third-party websites.

Baloch.Net is not responsible for the privacy, security, content, or practices of third parties. You should review the privacy policies of third-party services before providing information to them.

15. Automated decision-making

Baloch.Net does not currently use solely automated decision-making that produces legal or similarly significant effects on users.

Content and profile moderation may use technical anti-spam or security signals, but publication and account-management decisions may be reviewed by authorized administrators.

16. Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy to reflect changes to the Services, our practices, technology, or legal requirements.

We will publish the revised policy on this page and update the “Last updated” date. If changes are material, we may provide additional notice through the website, account interface, or email where appropriate.

17. Contact us

For privacy questions, requests, or complaints, contact:

Baloch.Net Privacy
Website: https://baloch.net
Email: privacy@baloch.net

Please do not send passwords, government identification documents, or other highly sensitive information by ordinary email unless we specifically request it through a secure method.