Privacy Policy

We collect only the information needed to run the platform and provide the features you use. Information falls into the following categories:

Personal Information is used for legitimate business purposes, including:

• Creating and managing your account
• Authenticating you and keeping your session secure
• Delivering messages, notifications and in-app updates
• Processing service requests, quotes and responses
• Enabling commerce features (orders, quotes, reservations, invoicing)
• Helping you discover local businesses, events and specials
• Providing location-based features (nearby businesses, weather, events)
• Displaying and routing emergency service and safety information
• Sending push, email and in-app notifications you have opted in to
• Detecting and preventing fraud, abuse and platform manipulation
• Maintaining platform security and integrity
• Powering AI-assisted features (see the AI section below)
• Providing customer support and responding to your requests
• Meeting legal, tax, accounting and regulatory obligations

Personal Information is retained only for as long as it is needed for the purposes for which it was collected, or as required by law.

• Active accounts: account information is kept while the account remains active.
• Closed or deleted accounts: Personal Information is permanently deleted or irreversibly anonymised within a reasonable retention window, unless longer retention is legally required.
• Financial records: invoices, subscription and payment records may be retained for the period required by South African tax, accounting and consumer protection legislation.
• Security & fraud logs: limited security, moderation and fraud-prevention logs may be retained to protect users and the platform.
• Encrypted backups: deleted information may remain in encrypted backups for a short rolling period before being automatically overwritten.
• Anonymous analytics: aggregated, non-identifying analytical data may be retained indefinitely to improve the platform.

You can delete your account and associated Personal Information at any time.

• In-app: open Profile > Settings > Privacy & Security and follow the delete-account flow, where available.
• By email: write to support@mylocallink.co.za from the email address linked to your account and ask us to close it.

When we action a deletion request:

• Account credentials, profile, contact details, private messages, saved searches and personal preferences are permanently removed or anonymised.
• Business listings and public content you posted may be retained in anonymised form (or removed) where they are useful to the community and no longer identify you.
• Records required by law — for example invoices, tax records, safety reports or law-enforcement holds — may be kept for the period the law requires.
• We aim to complete deletion within 30 days of a verified request; more complex cases may take slightly longer.

We rely on carefully selected service providers to run the platform. They process Personal Information only where necessary to deliver functionality on our behalf, under contractual confidentiality and security obligations. Categories include:

• Cloud infrastructure and database hosting
• Authentication and identity providers (including Google sign-in)
• Push and in-app notification delivery
• Payment gateways for subscriptions and add-ons
• AI and content-moderation providers
• Mapping and geolocation services
• Transactional email delivery

Some of our authorised service providers may process information outside South Africa. Where this happens we take reasonable steps to ensure that recipients are bound by data protection obligations comparable to those required under POPIA.

We implement reasonable technical and organisational safeguards to protect Personal Information, including:

• HTTPS/TLS encryption for all traffic between your device and our servers
• Password hashing and secure session management
• Database row-level access controls scoped to your account and role
• Least-privilege access for administrators and support staff
• Continuous security monitoring, logging and alerting
• Automated moderation and fraud-prevention systems
• Regular platform updates and dependency patching

Under POPIA and applicable data protection law you have the right to:

• Access — request a copy of Personal Information we hold about you
• Correction — ask us to correct information that is inaccurate or out of date
• Deletion — request the deletion of your account and Personal Information
• Objection — object to certain processing activities
• Restriction — ask us to limit the way we use certain information
• Withdraw consent — where processing is based on consent, you may withdraw it at any time
• Complain — lodge a complaint with the South African Information Regulator

To exercise any of these rights, contact our Privacy Officer at support@mylocallink.co.za. See also our Your Privacy Choices page.

AI-assisted tools may be used to help operate the platform, including:

• Business content and description suggestions
• Search relevance and recommendation ranking
• Review and message summarisation
• Content moderation (text and images)
• Fraud, abuse and safety-signal detection
• Platform quality and performance improvements

With your permission, we may use approximate or precise location to:

• Show nearby businesses, events and specials
• Surface local emergency contacts and safety information
• Personalise your active town and local content
• Provide accurate weather and outage information
• Route service requests to businesses in your area

You can disable location permissions at any time from your device or browser settings. Some features may become less useful without location.

You may receive occasional promotional communications about new features, campaigns or offers from My LocalLink. You can opt out at any time using the "unsubscribe" link in the message, in your in-app notification settings, or by contacting support. Opting out of marketing will not stop essential service messages such as transactional receipts, security alerts and moderation notices.

My LocalLink is intended for adults aged 18 and older. We do not knowingly collect Personal Information from minors. If we become aware that we have collected information from a child without appropriate parental consent we will delete it promptly. Content involving minors is governed by our Child Safety Standards.

Data Integrity & Platform Protection

To protect the integrity of platform data, users and businesses may not:

• Scrape, extract or copy platform data
• Use automated tools, bots or crawlers
• Reproduce listings, reviews or user content for external use

Questions, requests or complaints about this Privacy Policy can be sent to My LocalLink's Privacy Officer at support@mylocallink.co.za. You may also lodge a complaint with the South African Information Regulator.

Changes to this Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Material changes will be highlighted in-app and the "Last Updated" date below will be revised. Continuing to use the platform after an update means you accept the revised policy.