Our Policies

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When you use Weenja chat, we process the messages you send, the people or groups you choose, and any photos, videos, documents, audio or other files you attach. We use this information to deliver and display your messages, keep the conversation available, and operate and protect the messaging service. Chat content is associated with your Weenja account and is available to the recipients you choose. Service providers that host or support Weenja may process it for us.

If you choose Weenja from your phone's share menu, the app may make a local copy of the selected content so you can review it and choose a Weenja chat. We do not upload that content to Weenja merely because you selected Weenja in the share menu. It is sent through the messaging service when you choose a recipient and tap Send. The sharing process may leave a copy in app storage on your device.

After you send messages, Weenja may give Android or iOS a conversation name and internal conversation identifier so the phone can suggest recent Weenja chats in its share menu. We do not include message text or attachment contents in this suggestion information. The operating system controls whether and where suggestions appear. When you sign out, Weenja asks the operating system to remove the conversation suggestions it registered.

Sent messages and attachments are retained as part of the conversation under the data retention and deletion rules in this Privacy Policy. You can use the account controls or contact us about access or deletion requests.

When Caller ID is available and enabled, Weenja uses members' OTP-verified phone numbers and profile labels to identify eligible Weenja callers. Android uses a protected local matching list and may request a live match. On iPhone, Weenja downloads the numbers and labels of members with an established Weenja relationship to the signed-in device so iOS can identify incoming calls.

We do not upload your phone address book for Caller ID. Members can turn off their own Caller ID visibility in Chats settings. The iPhone list is removed when you sign out; you can also disable Weenja in iPhone Caller ID settings.

We use your activity on Weenja — gigs you view, searches, statuses and jobs you engage with, and keywords from messages you send — to recommend relevant services. Message content is processed automatically on our servers for this purpose. Recommendation signals derived from messages are not shown to other users; messages themselves are available to the recipients you choose.

This section explains how Weenja Technologies Uganda Limited ("Weenja", "we") handles personal data in the Trusted Growth Center: verification requests to schools, training centres and employers, badges, and recommendations from people. It adds to the rest of this Privacy Policy and to the Trust & Verification Terms. We process this data in line with the Data Protection and Privacy Act, 2019 of Uganda ("DPPA 2019") and its regulations. Weenja is the data controller.

1. What we collect

• From sellers: your Weenja profile (name, username, photo, skills); the details of your course (institution, campus, course, level, study status, dates, registration number) or your job (company, role, type of work, dates); documents you upload (for example certificates, transcripts, student IDs, letters); and the names, roles, emails and phone numbers of the institution or employer contacts you give us.
• From institutions and employers: official contact details, the name and role of the person who answers, and their answer and remarks.
• From recommenders: your name, your phone number (to send you a one-time SMS code), how you know the seller, the skills and ratings you choose, your comment and an optional photo of the work. If you are logged in, we use your Weenja account and its verified phone instead of a new code.
• Technical and security data: for recommendations, a one-way scrambled (hashed) form of your IP address and device/browser details, used only to detect fake or duplicated recommendations; and, when you accept these terms, a consent record (account, version, date and time, IP address and browser).

2. Why we use it

• to send your verification request to the right institution or employer, and to confirm their official contact details first;
• to show badges and recommendations on your profile, gigs and in search;
• to confirm that a recommender is a real person with a real phone number and to stop fake, duplicated or paid recommendations;
• to handle reports, disputes and appeals, and to keep the Trusted Growth Center safe;
• to suggest typical course durations. For this we may send the course name only (never your name, documents or contacts) to an AI service.

3. Legal basis

We process this data on the basis of your consent, which you give when you accept the Trust & Verification Terms, send a request, answer one, or give a recommendation. You can withdraw your consent at any time (see section 7). Withdrawing stops future processing; it does not make earlier lawful processing unlawful. We may keep limited records where the law requires it or to establish or defend legal claims. If you are under 18, a parent or guardian must give consent for you.

4. Who we share it with

• The institution, company or person you choose: only the details and documents needed for them to answer your request.
• Weenja administrators who review requests, directories, reports and suspicious recommendations.
• Service providers who work for us under contract, for example to deliver SMS codes or host our systems. They may only use the data to provide that service.
• The public: only what is listed as public in the Trust & Verification Terms (for example the institution name, course, dates, approver role, and a recommender's first name, relationship, ratings and comment). Documents, phone numbers, emails and registration numbers are never public.
• Authorities, only where the law requires it.

We do not sell personal data.

5. Storage and security

Uploaded documents are kept in private storage that is not reachable from the public website and can only be opened by you, the approver you chose (once requests are sent) and authorised Weenja staff. Recommenders' phone numbers are stored only in a one-way hashed form plus the last three digits. SMS codes are stored hashed and expire after a few minutes. We use encrypted connections (HTTPS) and access controls. Where data is processed outside Uganda by our service providers, we only do so as the DPPA 2019 allows.

6. How long we keep it

• Documents: deleted when a request is declined or withdrawn, or 90 days after it is approved, unless you choose to keep them in your account.
• Request details and answers: kept while the related badge is shown and for as long as needed to handle disputes; then deleted or anonymised.
• Badges: kept until they expire, are revoked by the approver, or are removed by you or by Weenja.
• Recommendations: kept until removed by Weenja or on a valid request by the recommender. A seller can hide a recommendation at any time.
• Consent records: kept as proof of consent, including after consent is withdrawn.
• Unused uploads: files uploaded but never attached to a request are deleted after 24 hours.

7. Your rights under the DPPA 2019

You have the right to:

• access the personal data we hold about you;
• ask us to correct data that is wrong or incomplete;
• ask us to delete data, for example a request, a document or a recommendation you gave;
• withdraw your consent at any time;
• object to processing, including to a recommendation or badge about you.

How to use your rights: write to support@weenja.com with the subject "Data request - Verification", or use the options in the Trusted Growth Center in the app (for example withdraw a request or hide a recommendation). We may ask you to confirm your identity. We aim to reply within 30 days.

Complaints: if you are not happy with how we handled your data, you can complain to the Personal Data Protection Office (PDPO), Uganda (pdpo.go.ug). We would appreciate the chance to resolve your concern first.