Sillside · Child Safety

Child Safety Standards

Last updated: 6 May 2026

Sillside is a private photo-sharing app for small, closed circles of friends. We have zero tolerance for child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and any content that sexualises, exploits, or endangers minors. This page describes the standards, controls, and reporting paths we operate to detect, respond to, and prevent such content on our platform — in compliance with Google Play's Child Safety Standards Policy and applicable law.

1. Architecture that limits exposure

Sillside is structured to minimise the surface where CSAE could occur in the first place:

• Closed circles only. Photos are sent to small groups (typically 2–8 people) that you build explicitly via invite codes. There is no public feed, no discovery, no follower graph, no search, and no way for strangers to find or contact you in-app.
• No public profile. Display names are only visible to people in the same circle as you. There are no public bios, statuses, or open messaging.
• No anonymous broadcast. Every photo is attributed to its uploader's verified Firebase Auth account. We retain server-side records that allow us to identify any uploader on demand.
• No third-party content insertion. All photos are uploaded by signed-in users from their own devices. There is no automatic content suggestion, no algorithmic feed, and no bot accounts.

2. Age requirements

Sillside is rated for users aged 13 and above. Account registration requires acceptance of our Terms of Service, which include this minimum age. Sillside is not directed to children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect data from users under 13.

Reports indicating that an account holder is under 13 result in immediate review and account termination if confirmed.

3. In-app reporting

Every photo viewable inside Sillside has a "Report" action accessible from the photo's overflow menu (the three-dot icon on the photo detail screen). Users can report:

• Content that sexualises, exploits, or endangers a minor
• Nudity or sexual content
• Harassment, hate speech, or threats
• Other policy violations

Reports are written to a dedicated Firestore collection, triggering a server-side Cloud Function that:

• Records the report alongside the photo ID, the reporter, the uploader, the reason, and a timestamp.
• Logs a high-priority entry to our operations monitoring (Cloud Logging) so that we are notified.
• Surfaces the report to manual review by the operator (Lukas Merz).

Reports concerning child safety are reviewed and acted upon within 24 hours, in line with applicable law and the Google Play Child Safety Standards Policy. Where the operator is temporarily unavailable, reports are escalated automatically via the alerting channel.

4. Blocking

In addition to reporting, every user can block any other user from inside the photo overflow menu or from the Settings → Blocked accounts list. A block immediately:

• Hides the blocked user's photos from the blocker's feed and widget.
• Drops the blocker from the recipient list of the blocked user's outgoing photos at the server, before any push or delivery — the blocked user cannot reach you again, even via a shared circle.

5. Action on confirmed violations

When a report is confirmed by manual review, we:

• Remove the offending content from Storage and Firestore.
• Permanently disable the uploader's account (via Firebase Authentication's user-disabled flag and account deletion of associated data within 30 days).
• Preserve the relevant server-side metadata (photo doc, uploader UID, timestamp) for the duration required to support law-enforcement follow-up.
• Where the violation involves child sexual abuse or exploitation, file a report with NCMEC (CyberTipline) and notify the relevant national authority — the BKA (Bundeskriminalamt) for Germany and KOBIK / cybercrime.admin.ch for Switzerland — with the preserved evidence.

6. Reporting to authorities

Sillside complies with all applicable laws regarding the detection, removal, and reporting of child sexual abuse material. We forward credible CSAM reports to:

• National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) — the United States CyberTipline at report.cybertip.org.
• Bundeskriminalamt (BKA) for content implicating users in Germany — bka.de.
• KOBIK / cybercrime.admin.ch for content implicating users in Switzerland — Sillside's home jurisdiction — cybercrime.admin.ch.

Where law enforcement makes a valid request, we cooperate promptly and within the limits of applicable data-protection law.

7. Account termination

Accounts associated with confirmed CSAE violations are terminated permanently. We block re-registration where possible by retaining a one-way hash of the offending identifier. Re-registration attempts that we detect are blocked.

8. Continuous improvement

We review and update these standards as the product, the threat landscape, and the regulatory environment evolve. We track new tooling for proactive detection (such as PhotoDNA / hash-based matching) and will integrate it where it can meaningfully reduce harm without compromising user privacy.

9. Designated contact

Concerns or questions regarding child safety on Sillside — including those raised by Google Play, law enforcement, or researchers — should be directed to:

The designated contact is available and able to discuss our methods for preventing the availability of child sexual abuse material on the app and our compliance with these standards.

10. Related documents

• Privacy Policy — what we collect, who can see it, and how to exercise your data-protection rights.
• Delete account — step-by-step for permanent deletion of your account and all associated data within 30 days.