Most organisations write a privacy policy because they have to. This is the same information written as an article, because a policy is not much use to somebody deciding, right now, whether it is safe to send a message.
The short version: we hold very little, we tell you what we hold, and the reason is not philosophical. Every piece of information that does not exist is a piece that cannot be subpoenaed, stolen, leaked by accident or found by the person you are trying to get away from.
What we ask for
A name to use, which can be any name at all. Many women give one that is not theirs and we would rather have that than nothing, because we need something to call you.
A way to reach you, and the hours and days when that way is safe. If a call at the wrong hour would put you in danger, that instruction is more important to us than the number itself.
What you need, or that you do not know, which is a perfectly ordinary way to begin.
That is the whole of it. Everything else on the form is optional and marked optional, and nobody is asked why they left a field empty.
What we do not ask for, ever
- Your address, unless we are arranging something that physically requires it, and then only for as long as the arrangement takes.
- His name. We do not need it to help you, and a file with his name in it is a file that becomes dangerous if it is ever read by the wrong person.
- A detailed account of what happened. Tell us what you want us to know. You do not have to prove anything to us, and we are not assessing whether it was bad enough.
- Photographs of injuries. If you have them, keep them somewhere safe for a court. They should not live in our inbox.
- Your employer. Unless you are asking for help with work, and then we ask you first.
The rule behind all of this is that we do not collect anything on the basis that it might be useful later. Later is exactly when it becomes a liability.
Who can see it
A small number of named people, and not the whole organisation. Volunteers do not have access to case information. Neither do funders, at any level and for any amount, and a donor who asks to be told who their money helped is told no. That has cost us funding and it is not negotiable.
Nobody outside is contacted without your permission. Not the police, not a hospital, not your family, not your employer, not a lawyer, not a pastor or an imam. If you ask us to speak to one of them, we do it and we tell you what was said.
There is one exception and it is written here so that it is never a surprise: if a child is at risk of serious harm, or somebody’s life is in immediate danger, we may have to act without permission. If that ever happens we will tell you we are doing it and why, before or as it happens, unless telling you would itself put somebody in danger.
How long anything stays
Records are kept for as long as they are needed to help you and no longer, and then they are deleted rather than archived.
You can ask us at any time what we hold about you and we will tell you plainly rather than sending a form. You can ask us to delete it and we will, and we will confirm when it is done. You do not have to give a reason and you will not be asked for one.
If you stop contacting us we do not chase you. Silence is a decision and it is yours to make. Nobody will ring to ask how things are going, because that call could arrive at the worst possible moment.
How we contact you
Only in the way and at the times you told us. If you said mornings only, it is mornings only. If you said never leave a message, no message is left, and if somebody else answers we say nothing beyond asking for the name you gave us.
We do not send anything by post unless you ask. We do not identify ourselves by name to whoever picks up. Our messages are written so that a person reading over your shoulder learns nothing from them, which means they are short and they do not mention abuse.
Your side of it
What we do at our end only covers our end. The device in your hand is the part we cannot protect, and it is where most people are actually found out.
Before you contact us, or anybody else, it is worth reading how to cover your tracks online and how to make a phone harder to monitor. Both are short and both describe the specific ways this goes wrong: a browser history nobody cleared, a message thread synced to a shared tablet, a phone with software on it that was installed as a gift.
Be aware of what a Quick Exit button can and cannot do. Ours replaces the current page rather than adding to your history, so pressing Back does not bring the site back. It cannot remove pages you visited before you arrived here, which is why private browsing matters more than the button does.
If your phone is not safe, use somebody else’s. A friend, a colleague, a public terminal, a phone at a place of worship. When abuse follows you onto your phone covers what to look for.
Why this is worth the inconvenience
Holding little makes some things harder. We sometimes cannot answer a question about a woman we helped last year, because there is nothing left to look at. We cannot produce the case studies that funders like, and we cannot show a donor the person their money reached.
That is the trade and we have made it deliberately. An organisation that holds detailed records about frightened women is one break-in, one compromised account, one court order or one careless employee away from doing enormous harm to every one of them at once. The safest place for information is nowhere.
The formal version of all this, in the language lawyers expect, is in our privacy policy. If the two ever disagree, tell us, because one of them is wrong and it needs fixing.
If you are about to make contact and want to know what happens next, that is written out step by step.
Questions people ask
Can I contact you without giving my real name?
Yes. Give us any name you want us to use. We are not going to check it and nobody will ask.
Will you tell the police?
Not without your permission, unless a child is at risk of serious harm or somebody is in immediate danger. If that happens we tell you we are doing it and why.
Will you contact my husband or my family?
No. Never, under any circumstances, and not to verify anything you have told us.
What if he finds out I contacted you?
Nothing we send identifies us or mentions abuse, and we only make contact in the way and at the times you set. The larger risk is the device itself, which is why covering your tracks online is worth reading first.
Can I ask you to delete everything?
Yes, at any time, without giving a reason. We will do it and confirm when it is done.
I want to refer someone. Can I tell her all of this?
Yes, and please do. Knowing in advance what is held and what is never asked for is often what makes the first message possible.
If you need help now
If you are in immediate danger, call 112. To talk to HealBridge, call or send a message to +2348025170267, or use the form on our contact page. Every page on this site has a Quick Exit button at the top right, and pressing the letter E three times does the same thing.
Before you rely on anything on this page
We publish these articles so that you can understand a subject and work out what to ask for. They are written carefully and in good faith. They are still general information about how things usually work, and not advice about your situation, which we do not know.
- This is not legal advice.
- We are not a law firm. Criminal law in Nigeria is largely a state matter, the VAPP Act applies in a state only if that state adopted it, and statutory, customary and Islamic marriages are governed by different law and different courts. Two people with the same facts can have genuinely different options. Get advice from a lawyer who practises where you live — and if cost is the obstacle, ask us, because arranging that is part of what we do.
- This is not medical advice.
- Nothing here is a diagnosis and nothing here replaces being examined. Do not delay seeing a doctor, nurse or pharmacist because of something you read here, and do not start, stop or change any treatment on the strength of it. If something is time critical, go and be seen.
- This is not counselling, and it is not financial advice.
- Articles about trauma, sleep, money, debt, renting or starting a business describe what commonly helps. They are not therapy and they are not a recommendation about your own money. Speak to a counsellor, a qualified adviser or your own bank about your circumstances.
- It may be out of date, or wrong for where you are.
- Law changes, services close, numbers stop answering and practice varies by state. We correct what we find, and we cannot promise that every page is current on the day you read it. Where we do not have something confirmed, we say so rather than fill the gap.
- Reading this does not make us your lawyer or your doctor.
- No professional relationship is created by reading an article, and we cannot accept liability for decisions taken on the strength of one. What we can do is help you reach somebody who is qualified to advise you, which is what the legal and health parts of our work exist for.
- We cannot promise an outcome, and we cannot make anybody safe.
- A protection order is a piece of paper backed by an enforcement system that is inconsistent. A plan works until the day it does not. Anybody in this field promising safety is selling something, and the promise itself is dangerous because it stops people planning.
Do not let this notice stop you acting. If you are in immediate danger, call 112. If something is medically urgent, go to a hospital — you do not need a police report to be treated. And if you do not know where to start, that is a normal way to begin: use the contact page and we will take it from there.
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