CIRL Child Safety Standards Published 2026-10-07, updated 2026-10-15

Connect In Real Life (CIRL) is run by Michael Christen in Switzerland. This page sets out our standards against child sexual abuse and exploitation (CSAE), how to report it, and what we do with reports. It applies to everyone who uses CIRL and to everything shared on it: profiles, photos, activities and events, comments, initiatives, and messages.

Child-safety contact **support@cirl.app**, subject “Child safety”. The designated child-safety point of contact is the operator, Michael Christen. Child-safety reports are handled before any other kind of report.

If a child is in immediate danger, call the police first (in Switzerland 117, in the EU 112).

Zero tolerance CIRL does not allow child sexual abuse or exploitation in any form. This includes: - child sexual abuse material (CSAM), including drawn, generated, edited or “fictional” depictions of minors, and links to it; - sexualizing minors in text, photos, profiles or listings; - grooming, or trying to contact, meet or get images from anyone under 18; - sextortion, trafficking, or offering or asking for sexual services involving minors; - using CIRL to find, share or trade any of the above, or to plan it off CIRL.

These standards are part of the Community and Safety Rules and the Terms of Service.

CIRL is for adults only You must be 18 or older to use CIRL. At sign-up every person must confirm that they are 18 or older; the server refuses an account without that confirmation. A birth date entered in the profile that makes someone younger than 18 is refused. Activities and events are for ages 18 and up. CIRL does not check identity documents, so we also rely on reports: if we learn that an account belongs to someone under 18, we close it.

How to report - **In the app:** use Report on a person’s profile, on a chat or a single message, on an activity or event, or on an initiative or comment. Choose “Seems under 18” for a suspected minor, or the reason that fits best, and add a short description. - **Messages as evidence:** when you report a chat message, you can choose to include the reported message and the messages around it. Only then does your app send them to CIRL with the report. Without that choice, the report still works. - **Block:** you can block a person from their profile or from a chat. Blocked people cannot see or contact you on CIRL. - **By email:** support@cirl.app, subject “Child safety”. Please do not attach or forward abuse images; describe where they are (profile name, activity, date) instead. - **Without an account:** the email address above works for anyone, including parents, teachers and organizations.

What we do with reports - We review child-safety reports first. - We remove the content we host and control, and we suspend, close or delete the accounts involved. A suspended or closed account cannot use CIRL; deleting an account removes its profile and photos. Sign-up is refused for the email address of an account we deleted for abuse. - We keep the report and the evidence attached to it, and we can put a legal hold on an account’s deletion so its data is not erased while an investigation needs it. - We report child sexual abuse material and situations where a child may be at risk to the competent law-enforcement authorities as required by law. In Switzerland this is the Federal Office of Police (fedpol). We cooperate with valid requests from the authorities.

What CIRL can and cannot see - **Private chats:** CIRL does not read or monitor private conversations. In the current version of the app, chat messages, photos, videos and voice messages are end-to-end encrypted, so CIRL cannot scan them. Staff see chat content only when a person in that chat chooses to attach it to a report. - **Public content:** profiles, photos, activities, events, initiatives and comments can be reported by anyone who can see them. Most public text (names, profiles, listings, initiatives and comments) passes an automatic word and pattern filter. Uploaded photos (profile photos, banners, activity covers, organizer photos) are checked automatically before others see them, for nudity and sexual content and for whether a person in the photo may be under 18. A sexual photo that may show a minor is refused, kept on legal hold for the authorities, and the account's later photos are held for review by staff. Matching against lists of known abuse material is not active yet. - CIRL is run by one person. We do not promise round-the-clock coverage, but child-safety reports always come first.

Compliance with the law CIRL follows the child-protection laws that apply to it, including the Swiss Criminal Code, and cooperates with law enforcement. Nothing on this page limits a duty we have under the law.

Other places to report - Switzerland: the police, or the Federal Office of Police (fedpol), www.fedpol.admin.ch - United States: NCMEC CyberTipline, report.cybertip.org - Elsewhere: your local police, or a hotline of the INHOPE network, www.inhope.org

Changes We update this page when our practices change. The date at the top shows the current version.