User Content Policy & Community Guidelines

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2.1 Who and what this covers

This policy applies to every person who submits User Content to any TDOF property, and to every type of User Content listed in § 1.2. It applies in addition to the Terms of Use, and it applies to paid advertisers and sponsors alongside § 1.10.

It applies to content in every language. Where TDOF cannot reasonably assess content in a language it cannot read and cannot obtain a translation, TDOF may decline to publish or may remove that content. Summaries of §§ 2.2 and 2.3 are published in the principal community languages; the English text governs.

2.2 The four standards

Every submission must meet all four:

1. 1. Lawful. It complies with United States federal law, Ohio law, and the law of any place it concerns.
2. 2. True, or clearly opinion. Factual claims are accurate and supportable. Opinions are framed as opinions.
3. 3. Yours to post. You created it, or you have the rights and consents to post it here.
4. 4. Civil. It addresses ideas, businesses, events, and public conduct — not a person’s character, family, faith, or private life.

2.3 Prohibited content

Content in these categories may be removed, with or without notice. Each entry names the exposure it creates, so moderators understand what they are protecting against.

• (a) Defamatory content. False statements of fact that damage a person’s or business’s reputation. This is the most common source of claims against community platforms, and it is not cured by “allegedly,” “I heard,” or “people are saying” — repeating someone else’s false accusation is itself actionable republication. Accusations of crime, fraud, theft, adultery, professional incompetence, or dishonesty are removed unless supported by a public record, an official finding, or reporting the poster can cite.

  Allegations about the financial or governance conduct of a community organization follow the same test: a documented, citable claim about an organization’s public conduct may stand; an undocumented accusation against a named officer does not. Where the poster frames the matter clearly as opinion about public conduct rather than as a statement of fact, it may stand.

• (b) Harassment, bullying, and pile-ons. Repeated unwanted contact; content designed to humiliate, intimidate, or shame a specific person; coordinated campaigns against an individual; posting after TDOF has asked you to stop.

• (c) Threats and incitement. Threats of violence against any person or place; wishing harm; content encouraging or organizing violence, riot, or property damage; glorification of violent acts or their perpetrators.

• (d) Hate speech and attacks on protected characteristics. Content attacking, dehumanizing, or inciting hatred or exclusion against people based on religion, caste, ethnicity, national origin, language, region of origin, race, colour, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, age, immigration status, or marital status. This includes caste-based slurs and exclusion, communal generalizations about religious communities, and regional or linguistic denigration. Slurs are prohibited in every language.

• (e) Sexual content and content sexualizing minors. Pornographic or sexually explicit material; unsolicited sexual content; non-consensual intimate imagery. Any content that sexualizes a minor is prohibited absolutely. TDOF reports apparent child sexual abuse material to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and to law enforcement, preserves the evidence, and does not warn the poster first.

• (f) Human trafficking and exploitation. Content advertising, facilitating, or promoting commercial sexual services, trafficking, forced labour, or exploitative recruitment. Section 230 does not shield platforms from federal sex-trafficking claims under FOSTA-SESTA, so this category is removed and escalated immediately, with no warning step.

• (g) Illegal goods, services, and activity. Firearms and ammunition sales; controlled substances; prescription medication sales, including imported medication; counterfeit goods; stolen property; forged documents; false credentials; unlicensed money transfer or hawala services; gambling operations.

• (h) Privacy violations and doxxing. Home addresses, personal phone numbers, workplace details, immigration or visa status, financial account information, government ID numbers, medical or mental-health information, or family details of any person, published without that person’s consent.

  Publishing or speculating about another person’s immigration status is prohibited. The single exception is reporting of legitimate public interest — for example, coverage of a detention or a court proceeding already in the public record — which requires the Content Compliance Officer’s written approval before publication and is never based on rumour. No user may raise another person’s immigration status in a comment, review, listing, or dispute.

• (i) Infringing content. Photographs, articles, video, music, logos, artwork, film stills, or news copy you do not own or have permission to use. See the Copyright and DMCA Policy. Copyright and trademark are expressly carved out of Section 230 protection, which makes this a real exposure rather than a theoretical one.

• (j) Political campaign content. Endorsement of or opposition to a candidate or a candidate’s party or slate, and campaign fundraising or organizing. See § 1.9. This protects TDOF’s tax-exempt status and is enforced without exception, including for candidates the community supports.

• (k) Communal agitation and homeland political advocacy. Content promoting communal hostility; content re-litigating India–Pakistan, India–Bangladesh, or intra-regional disputes in a way that attacks a religious or national group; content about foreign political parties, elections, or leaders framed as advocacy or mobilization. Neutral reporting, cultural and historical discussion, and coverage of matters affecting the local diaspora are permitted.

  Safeguard. Every removal under (k) requires two moderators’ agreement, or the Content Compliance Officer’s decision, and is logged with the reason.

• (l) Fraud, scams, and deceptive claims. Get-rich schemes; investment, crypto, or lottery solicitations; fake job postings; phishing; impersonation; multi-level marketing recruitment; false claims of TDOF affiliation or endorsement.

• (m) Misinformation with a real-world cost. Fabricated health claims and unproven cures; false emergency, disaster, or public-safety information; manipulated or AI-generated media presented as authentic; unverified forwarded messages presented as news. Photorealistic AI-generated content, or AI content depicting a real person or event, must be labelled as such.

• (n) Spam and manipulation. Repetitive posting; keyword stuffing; unrelated promotional links; comment SEO; vote or review manipulation; bulk-created accounts.

• (o) Unlicensed professional services. Offers of immigration advice or representation by anyone who is not a licensed attorney or a DOJ-accredited representative; legal, medical, tax, or financial services offered by an unlicensed person. “Notario,” “consultant,” and “visa agent” advertisements that imply legal authority to represent someone in an immigration matter are prohibited. This is a documented pattern of harm in immigrant communities and a serious consumer-protection exposure for the platform that carries the advertisement.

• (p) Content about deceased persons that harms the living. Obituaries and condolences are welcome under § 2.4.10. Disputes about inheritance, family conduct, or blame for a death are not.

2.4 Rules by content type

2.4.1 Comments

Comments are moderated. TDOF may pre-moderate sensitive articles, post-moderate elsewhere, and close comments on any item.

Comments must engage with the substance of the item. Comments about organizations and their public conduct are permitted where they are factual and supportable or clearly framed as opinion. Comments about private individuals that make factual allegations about their conduct are removed unless the allegation is supported by a public record or citable reporting.

TDOF does not edit the substance of a comment. TDOF’s options are: publish, decline, remove, or remove with a note. Moderators must not rewrite a comment, add words to it, or redact it in a way that changes what it says.

2.4.2 Business directory listings

Submit a listing only for a business you own or are authorized to represent.

Listings must state accurately: business name, address, contact details, category, hours, and services. At submission you attest that any licence, certification, accreditation, or professional qualification you claim is true and current, and that you hold it. TDOF does not confirm these attestations and does not audit listings; the attestation is yours and the responsibility for it is yours.

Prohibited in listings: services requiring a licence the business does not hold; superlative or comparative claims that cannot be substantiated (“best,” “cheapest,” “#1,” “guaranteed”); health, immigration-outcome, or financial-return guarantees; another business’s trademark, logo, or name used to divert customers; and images the submitter does not own.

A business is responsible for keeping its listing current. TDOF may remove listings that are stale, unreachable, duplicated, or the subject of substantiated complaints. Competitors may not submit, edit, or claim each other’s listings, or use the review system against each other.

Imported and seeded listings. Any listing TDOF creates from a public data source or bulk import, rather than receiving from the business, is TDOF Content, not User Content — Section 230 does not apply to it and TDOF’s own content-clearance rules do. Such listings carry only factual contact information from a source TDOF is licensed to use, carry no third-party photographs or copied descriptions, are labelled as compiled by TDOF, and are removed on the business’s request without argument. A business that claims its listing thereby accepts these Terms and the listing becomes User Content.

2.4.3 Reviews and ratings

Reviews must come from genuine first-hand experience with the business, describe that experience, and be posted by the person who had it.

Prohibited: reviews by the business, its owners, employees, relatives, or anyone with an undisclosed material connection; reviews written in exchange for payment, discounts, or goods where the incentive requires a particular sentiment; reviews of a competitor; and reviews that make factual accusations of crime or fraud rather than describing a service experience.

TDOF does not accept payment, advertising spend, or any other consideration to remove, reorder, suppress, or downrank a review, and does not use legal threats or intimidation against reviewers. TDOF removes reviews that violate this policy, and TDOF’s discretion under §§ 1.5 and 1.15 is otherwise unaffected.

Reviews of individuals. A review naming an individual professional — a doctor, tutor, priest, contractor, immigration consultant — is the highest-risk content on the Platform. It must describe the reviewer’s own experience of the service. Allegations of criminal conduct, fraud, malpractice, or misconduct are removed under § 2.3(a) unless documented in a public record.

2.4.4 Event submissions

Submit only events you organize or are authorized to publicize, with accurate date, time, venue, address, admission cost, organizer name, and a working contact.

TDOF publishes event listings as a community service and does not verify, inspect, insure, or endorse any event, venue, organizer, performer, food service, or attendee safety. The organizer is solely responsible for permits, licences, insurance, food safety, accessibility, ticketing, refunds, and the conduct of the event.

Prohibited: events promoting prohibited content; ticketed events whose organizer cannot be identified and contacted; and event descriptions making claims TDOF would not accept in an advertisement.

Organizers must notify TDOF of cancellations and changes. TDOF is not liable for losses from a listing error, a cancelled event, or a change TDOF was not told about.

2.4.5 Matrimonial, classified, and personal notices

Where TDOF offers these, submissions must be posted by the individual concerned or by an immediate family member with that individual’s consent, and must concern a person aged 18 or over.

Prohibited: dowry references of any kind; contact details of a third party without their consent; and any content offering or seeking marriage in exchange for immigration benefit.

Statements of personal preference in a matrimonial notice are permitted only as the submitter’s own preference about their own marriage. They may not be framed as a general exclusion, and the same language is absolutely prohibited in housing and job listings, where it is unlawful discrimination — see §§ 2.4.7 and 2.4.9.

2.4.6 Letters, opinion, and community announcements

Signed letters and opinion pieces are welcome and are labelled as opinion.

TDOF requires a real name and a working phone number or email from every letter writer, and confirms the contact by reply before publication. TDOF does not represent that it has verified the writer’s identity beyond this. TDOF does not publish anonymous or pseudonymous accusations against named individuals or organizations.

Announcements from community organizations must be submitted by an authorized officer.

2.4.7 Housing, rental, and roommate listings

If TDOF carries housing listings, all of the following apply without exception:

• (a) Every housing listing is pre-moderated. None publishes automatically.

• (b) TDOF will not create, and the Platform’s directory software will not be configured with, any field, tag, filter, or dropdown relating to a tenant’s religion, community, diet, nationality, language, family status, sex, or background. Creating such a field would make TDOF the co-creator of the discriminatory content.

• (c) Prohibited in any housing listing, however phrased and in any language: references to religion, caste, community, ethnicity, national origin, language, race, sex, marital status, family status, presence or absence of children, disability, or ancestry. This includes the phrasings that appear most often in this community — “vegetarian family preferred,” “Indian students only,” “no non-veg,” “females only,” “no children,” “same community preferred,” “professionals only, no families.”

• (d) A shared-living exemption may permit a person to choose a roommate on grounds that would otherwise be unlawful. It does not permit advertising that preference, and TDOF does not carry such advertising. This is the single most common misunderstanding and it does not survive § 3604(c).

• (e) Every housing listing carries the Equal Housing Opportunity notice and logo.

• (f) TDOF removes a non-compliant listing immediately, without the enforcement ladder, and repeat submitters lose housing-posting privileges.

2.4.8 Fundraising appeals

Appeals seeking funds for a person, family, or cause are User Content, not TDOF fundraising.

• (a) TDOF never receives, holds, routes, or processes funds for a third-party appeal, and never lends its payment processor to one.

• (b) The appeal must name the organizer, give a working contact, state who receives the funds and for what, and link to a recognized fundraising platform or a registered charity.

• (c) Every appeal carries a standing notice that TDOF has not verified the appeal or the beneficiary.

• (d) TDOF does not publish appeals for named individuals through TDOF’s own channels in a way that suggests TDOF is soliciting the gift — this is both a fraud risk and a tax-exempt-conduit risk.

• (e) Appeals for relief outside the United States must name a registered organization as the recipient. TDOF does not carry person-to-person overseas appeals.

• (f) TDOF removes any appeal on credible evidence of misrepresentation, and does not adjudicate whether funds were properly used.

2.4.9 Job postings

Job advertisements may not state or imply a preference or limitation based on race, colour, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, ancestry, military status, or marital or family status — including phrasings such as “Indians only,” “young candidates,” “unmarried female preferred,” “Hindi speakers only” where language is not a genuine job requirement.

Prohibited: offers of visa sponsorship in exchange for payment; postings requiring payment from the applicant; and postings without an identifiable employer.

2.4.10 Obituaries and condolences

Submissions must come from a family member or from a funeral home or organization authorized by the family, and must identify the submitter.

The portrait photograph is usually the studio photographer’s copyright, not the family’s — § 2.5(a) applies. TDOF will publish a cause of death only where the family has stated it. Any family member may request removal or correction, and TDOF acts on that request without requiring an explanation.

Fundraising in connection with a death follows § 2.4.8.

2.4.11 Religious and community organization listings

TDOF lists religious and cultural organizations of all faiths on the same terms.

TDOF does not adjudicate internal governance disputes. Where two or more people claim authority over the same organization’s listing, TDOF freezes the listing in its last undisputed state and makes no change until the parties agree in writing or a court order directs otherwise. TDOF does not remove one faction’s listing at another faction’s request, does not take a position on who controls an organization, and does not publish either side’s accusations about the other — those fall under § 2.3(a).

Where a listed institution hosts a political candidate, § 1.9 governs how, or whether, TDOF covers it.

2.4.12 Childcare, tutoring, eldercare, and services involving minors

TDOF does not verify, license-check, or background-check any provider, and a listing is not a referral or a recommendation. This disclaimer carries less weight in a child-safety case than in any other, so the rules are stricter:

• (a) At submission, a childcare, daycare, tutoring, or eldercare provider must attest to the licence, certification, or registration they hold, or state plainly that they hold none. Ohio licenses child day-care above defined child-count thresholds; providers are responsible for their own compliance.

• (b) Every such listing carries a standing notice directing parents to verify licensure themselves through the State of Ohio and to conduct their own checks.

• (c) The Platform’s messaging and listing-contact features may not be used to arrange contact between an adult provider and a person under 18. Contact must go through a parent or guardian.

• (d) Any report of concerning conduct toward a minor is treated as an emergency, escalated to the Content Compliance Officer immediately, and reported to authorities where required.

2.4.13 Food businesses operating from home

Ohio’s cottage-food rules permit only certain non-hazardous foods and impose labelling requirements; dairy sweets, curries, and most prepared meals fall outside them and require licensed facilities.

At submission, a home food business must attest either that it holds the required licence or registration, or that it operates within Ohio’s cottage-food rules, and must state its allergen information. TDOF does not confirm either. Every food listing carries a standing notice to that effect.

2.4.14 Messages and listing-contact forms

Messages sent through the Platform, including listing-contact forms, are User Content and are subject to this policy.

TDOF does not routinely read messages. TDOF may access a message when a recipient reports it, when required by law, or when investigating abuse of the messaging system. Report an abusive message to moderation@desiorb.org with the sender, date, and text.

Messages may not be used for spam, solicitation unrelated to the listing, harassment, scams, or contact with a minor. Message metadata is retained under TDOF’s records-retention procedures and message content is not retained beyond delivery except where reported or held.

2.5 Photographs, video, and people — including children

• (a) Rights in the image. You must own the photograph or video, or have the photographer’s permission. A photograph taken by someone else — forwarded to you, from a WhatsApp group, from a news site, from another organization’s page, or taken by a studio — is not yours to submit.

• (b) Identifiable adults. Where a photograph is used in a promotional, advertising, or fundraising context rather than as coverage of a public event, you must have the consent of every identifiable adult. Ohio Rev. Code Chapter 2741 protects a person’s name, image, and likeness from commercial use without consent, with an exemption for material of political or newsworthy value and for use in reporting an event of public interest.

• (c) Children. The rule scales with how the image is used.

Organizer’s warranty. An event organizer submitting photographs warrants that they gave attendees clear notice at the venue that photographs would be taken and shared, and that they hold any releases their own rules require.

No image of a child is ever published with the child’s full name, school, class, home neighbourhood, or a schedule of their regular activities. All uploaded images have EXIF and GPS data stripped.

• (d) Removal on request. Any person depicted, or the parent of any minor depicted, may request removal at moderation@desiorb.org. TDOF removes images of minors on request in every case, and reviews other requests within ten business days. TDOF does not require the requester to explain why. Removal covers the post, the underlying media file, and TDOF’s caches. TDOF cannot recall copies already distributed or reshared by others, and cannot delete material subject to a legal hold, in which case it restricts access instead.

• (e) Sensitive settings. No photographs identifying attendees at legal aid clinics, immigration services, medical facilities, shelters, or support groups without express individual consent. Coverage of public worship services, festivals, and religious community events follows the ordinary event rules above.

2.6 What TDOF does when this policy is broken

The measures below are the range available to TDOF. They are guidance, not a mandatory sequence — TDOF may apply any measure at any point, including immediate termination, and § 1.15 is unaffected.

Repeat copyright infringement is handled under § 3.4, which governs.

Spam and automated abuse. Content caught by a spam filter, bulk-created accounts, duplicate submissions, and automated promotional content are removed without individual notice, without appeal, and without an individual log entry; a monthly count is logged instead. The notice and appeal rights below apply to everything else.

2.7 If your content is removed

Where § 2.6’s spam carve-out does not apply, TDOF tells you what was removed and which section of this policy it fell under.

You may appeal once, in writing, to moderation@desiorb.org within 14 days. The appeal is decided by someone other than the original decision-maker where practicable, and otherwise by the Content Compliance Officer or a designated Board member, within 15 business days. That decision is final.

Appeals about copyright removals follow the DMCA counter-notice process in § 3.3, which has its own legal consequences.

TDOF is a private nonprofit publisher, not a government actor. Declining to publish something is not censorship in the constitutional sense. TDOF nevertheless explains its removals, because a community platform that removes content silently loses the community’s trust.

2.8 Reporting content

Anyone may report content at moderation@desiorb.org or through the report form on the Platform, with or without an account. TDOF does not disclose a reporter’s identity to the person reported except where compelled by law.

Copyright complaints go to the Designated Agent under the Copyright and DMCA Policy, not to the moderation mailbox.