The following sections describe content that is not allowed on Cetera. Report violations or potential violations if you see them, and seek support if you feel unsafe.

Context Matters

We consider content in context. Material that discusses or depicts sensitive or harmful conduct may be treated differently when it is shared for a legitimate purpose, such as journalism, documentation, education, research, fiction or art, criticism, advocacy, safety warnings, prevention, recovery, a survivor's account, seeking help, or reporting or condemning abuse.

Context is not an automatic exception. We may consider the content's purpose, audience, labels, level of detail, newsworthiness, and risk of causing or facilitating harm. Claiming an educational, journalistic, artistic, or public-interest purpose does not permit exploitation, targeted harassment, non-consensual intimate material, credible threats, operational instructions for wrongdoing, or content intended to facilitate harm.

1. Illegal and Harmful Content

This section covers content that could cause real-world harm or violate the law. Cetera prohibits such material to protect users from dangerous content and to comply with applicable local, national, and international laws.

1.1 Illegal Activities

You may not use Cetera to commit, solicit, coordinate, promote, or facilitate unlawful acts. Content that provides actionable instructions intended to help someone commit an unlawful act is also prohibited. This includes content intended to facilitate violence, theft, unauthorized access to accounts or systems, illegal drug manufacturing or distribution, human trafficking, or other criminal conduct.

Reporting on, documenting, criticizing, educating people about, or fictionally portraying unlawful conduct is not prohibited solely because it discusses or depicts that conduct. The content must not encourage or facilitate harm and remains subject to the rest of these Guidelines.

1.2 Dangerous or High-Risk Activities

Promotion of hazardous stunts, substance abuse, or challenges likely to cause harm is not permitted.

1.3 Terrorism or Extremism

Content that promotes terrorism, extremist ideologies, or organizations is strictly prohibited. Any praise, support, or propaganda for extremist groups, terrorist acts, or extremist violence is not allowed on Cetera. This includes recruiting for extremist organizations or glorifying their actions.

1.4 Selling or Promoting Regulated or Illegal Goods

Users may not use Cetera to buy, sell, or trade illegal or highly regulated goods and services. Content facilitating transactions involving drugs, firearms, explosives, or other illicit products is not permitted. Posts offering controlled substances or seeking unlawful services (such as prostitution or contract killing) are forbidden and may be reported to authorities.

2. Graphic & Sensitive Content

2.1 Violent or Graphic Content

Content that celebrates, glorifies, encourages, or promotes serious violence or animal cruelty is prohibited. We also prohibit excessively graphic or gratuitous depictions of serious injury, torture, death, or animal cruelty, particularly when they are intended to shock, sicken, humiliate, or encourage abuse.

News reporting, documentation, education, advocacy, and fictional or artistic portrayals are not prohibited solely because they depict violence or its consequences. Depending on the content, context, and intended audience, Cetera may label it, restrict who can access it, limit its distribution, or remove it. Content that encourages violence, exploits or humiliates victims, violates someone's privacy, or creates a serious risk of harm remains prohibited.

2.2 Promotion of Self-Harm Content

Posts that encourage, promote, or glorify suicide, self-mutilation, eating disorders, or other forms of self-harm are prohibited. This rule exists to protect vulnerable users and prevent harm; supportive discussions seeking help are allowed, but any glamorization or incitement of self-harm is not.

2.3 Traumatic or Sensitive Content

You may talk honestly about difficult experiences on Cetera, including trauma, abuse, grief, recovery, and seeking help or support. General discussion, advocacy, prevention, and non-graphic personal accounts are not prohibited solely because they concern traumatic subjects. At the same time, people should be able to use Cetera without unexpectedly encountering highly distressing details.

Detailed or strongly distressing descriptions of trauma must be hidden under a spoiler with a meaningful warning so that other people can choose whether to view them. Cetera may restrict or remove content that is not appropriately hidden or warned and may limit the distribution of sensitive content through Latest, recommendations, search, previews, notifications, or other discovery features. Selecting a Public audience does not guarantee distribution through those features.

A spoiler or warning is not an exception to the rest of these Guidelines. Cetera may restrict or remove content that is excessively graphic, intended to shock or harass, exploits or humiliates another person, reveals someone else's private information without permission, encourages harmful conduct, or creates a serious risk of harm. When discussing another person's experience, respect their privacy and consent.

3. Harassment or Hate

This section covers hate speech and harassment.

3.1 Hate Speech

Content that attacks or incites violence or hatred against individuals or groups based on protected characteristics is not permitted. This includes derogatory slurs, epithets, or insults targeting race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability, or other protected traits. Even veiled or coded language that promotes bigotry or prejudice is prohibited.

3.2 Harassment or Bullying

Content that harasses, bullies, or encourages others to harass an individual or group is not allowed. Personal attacks, persistent unwanted contact, or posts mocking, humiliating, or doxing (exposing someone's personal information) are prohibited. This includes sexual harassment, body-shaming, or any form of malicious personal ridicule.

3.3 Threats of Violence or Harm

Threatening language or content that expresses a sincere intent to harm someone (physically, sexually, or otherwise) is strictly forbidden. You may not post threats to kill, injure, or otherwise inflict violence on any person or group, nor may you encourage others to do so. Threats of damage to property or encouraging self-harm are also prohibited.

3.4 Rage-Baiting or Incitement of Conflict

Content intended to provoke anger or hostility, such as inflammatory statements designed to incite arguments, is prohibited. Deliberately provoking hostile replies so that you can report them is also prohibited.

3.5 Abuse of the Reporting System

Submitting repeated or malicious reports, or encouraging others to do so, with the intent to have another user's account or content removed for reasons unrelated to actual violations (such as personal disputes, desired usernames, or other motives) is prohibited.

4. Sexual Content or Exploitation

Cetera permits some consensual sexual content between eligible adults, but it is not a general-purpose adult-content service. Sexual content must stay within the audience and feature boundaries below. Content involving minors, non-consensual sexual content, exploitation, and unlawful sexual content are never permitted.

4.1 Mature Sexual Content

Mature sexual content includes pornography, explicit sexual acts, and other graphic or adult-oriented sexual material. The following rules apply even when everyone involved has consented.

4.2 Non-Consensual or Exploitative Sexual Content

Cetera prohibits sexual exploitation and intimate material that is created, obtained, posted, or shared without the consent of the person depicted. These rules apply in public and private areas of Cetera and include real and synthetic material.

4.3 Minor Safety (Child Sexual Abuse Material)

Cetera prohibits content that sexually exploits or sexualizes minors. This material is a severe breach of our rules and may violate criminal law.

4.4 How We Protect Children in the United Kingdom

This section explains how Cetera protects children in the United Kingdom from content that is harmful to children. The underlying content rules apply globally unless a rule says otherwise.

Age, access, and contact measures

Cetera uses a user's birthday and, where available, age information from an official mobile platform to determine an age range and apply age-appropriate rules. Minors receive protective audience, discovery, contact, feed, and privacy settings. Adults cannot initiate friendship or direct messaging with a known minor. An adult's invitation to add a minor to a group chat requires the minor's acceptance. Minors cannot access mature posts, and mature posts are unavailable to every user in the United Kingdom.

Content protections

Cetera uses the following rules and safeguards for each kind of content that United Kingdom law identifies as harmful to children:

Automated review technology

Cetera may use automated systems and human review to identify content or activity that may violate these Guidelines. These systems may help classify content, limit or suppress distribution, support further review, or inform other appropriate action.

Reports, controls, complaints, and appeals

Users can report profiles, posts, comments, and messages from within Cetera and can block or mute other users. Reports may lead to content restriction or removal, warnings, account restrictions, suspension, or permanent termination. A user who believes an enforcement decision was wrong may use the appeal process described under How Cetera May Treat Content and Accounts. A child, parent, or guardian may also contact us through our privacy and legal contact form.

5. Privacy and Personal Data

This section covers privacy rights and personal data. You may not share someone's personal or confidential information without their consent.

5.1 Sharing Personally Identifiable Information (PII) or Doxing

Content that exposes someone's personal information without permission is not allowed. This includes posting addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, financial information, social security or national ID numbers, or other sensitive identifiers of a private individual. Doxing (revealing someone's identity or personal details with malicious intent) is strictly prohibited.

5.2 Sharing Private Communications or Images

You generally may not publicly post or distribute another person's audience-limited content, private communications, or private images or video without their permission. This includes Friends or Close Friends posts, personal emails, text messages, direct messages, group-chat content, chat logs, and private photos or recordings.

A limited disclosure may be allowed when it is reasonably necessary to report abuse or unlawful conduct, seek help, document misconduct, protect someone's safety, or exercise or defend a legal right. When doing so, share no more than reasonably necessary and, where practical, remove unrelated personal or identifying information.

This rule does not prevent you from providing relevant material privately to Cetera, emergency or support services, law enforcement, a court, your lawyer, or another person whose assistance you reasonably need.

A claimed safety, accountability, journalistic, or public-interest purpose is not an automatic exception. It does not permit non- consensual intimate material, sensitive identifiers, stalking, targeted harassment, threats, or disclosure that is materially disproportionate to the legitimate purpose. The rest of these Guidelines continues to apply.

5.3 Unauthorized Surveillance and Stalking

Unauthorized surveillance, stalking, and attempts to evade platform controls (such as blocks) are serious violations. Depending on the severity, they may result in permanent account suspension and legal action.

6. Misinformation & Deceptive Content

This section addresses content that misleads or deceives others, such as impersonation, misinformation, and synthetic media. Content that intentionally misleads or creates false narratives is prohibited.

6.1 Impersonation or False Identity

Users may not impersonate others or misrepresent their identity in a deceptive manner. Creating an account or posting content that pretends to be another person or organization (including Cetera staff) with intent to mislead is prohibited. Parody or fan accounts must be clearly labeled as such to avoid confusion.

6.2 Misinformation

Misleading or demonstrably false content that could directly endanger public health or safety (e.g., false medical advice or conspiracy theories posing immediate harm) is prohibited.

6.3 Synthetic or Deepfake Content

Content that uses synthetic media must not mislead or deceive others. This includes using AI-generated images, videos, or audio to impersonate someone else or create false narratives. If you share synthetic content, it must be clearly labeled as such to avoid confusion. Misleading synthetic content that could cause harm or violate other guidelines (e.g., impersonation, misinformation) is not allowed. Non-consensual sexual deepfakes are prohibited under §4.2.1 Non-Consensual Intimate Material.

7. Copyright Infringement or Brand Misrepresentation

This section deals with copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property (IP). Cetera respects creators' rights and requires users to do the same. Content that infringes on someone else's IP rights is not allowed, in accordance with laws like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) in the US and international copyright treaties.

7.1 Copyright Infringement

Unauthorized use of copyrighted content is not permitted. Users must not post content (text, images, music, videos, software, etc.) that they do not own or have permission to use. This includes full works or significant excerpts from books, articles, songs, movies, or artwork that are protected by copyright. If you share content you didn't create, you must have the legal right to do so. Cetera responds to valid infringement notices and may terminate repeat infringers' accounts consistent with applicable law. Limited use of copyrighted material may be permitted under fair use principles (e.g., short excerpts for education or critique), but you are responsible for following applicable law.

7.2 Trademark and Brand Misuse

Content that infringes trademarks or misuses brand identities is prohibited. Users should not use others' logos, brand names, or slogans in a way that confuses others or implies false endorsement. Impersonating a brand or falsely claiming an affiliation to a trademark owner is not allowed (see also §6.1 on impersonation). Content that causes consumer confusion or dilutes a famous mark is prohibited.

7.3 Piracy and Counterfeit Goods

Cetera does not allow content that facilitates piracy or the distribution of counterfeit goods. Posts sharing links to pirated software, movies, music, or other media are prohibited. Content advertising or selling counterfeit products (fake designer goods, forged documents, etc.) is not permitted. Promoting techniques to circumvent copyright protections (like DRM cracks) is also disallowed.

8. Spam or Malicious Content

This section covers spam, scams, and other malicious content. Content that is deceptive or disruptive, including spammy advertising, malicious software, and fraud, is forbidden. Serious or repeated violations may result in permanent suspension without prior warning.

8.1 Spam and Repetitive Content

Unwanted promotional or repetitive content is not allowed. Users may not mass-post the same message, post off-topic advertisements, or excessively solicit others (commercially or otherwise). This includes posting links solely to drive traffic, sending bulk unsolicited messages, or creating content that is considered spam under applicable laws (e.g., CAN-SPAM Act for commercial messages). Coordinated campaigns to clutter the platform with ads or duplicative content are prohibited.

8.2 Fraud or Phishing

Any content that attempts to defraud users or phish for personal information is prohibited. This includes scams like pyramid schemes, "get rich quick" cons, fake giveaways, or posts impersonating legitimate institutions to trick users into providing sensitive data or money. You may not post fraudulent offers (such as false investment opportunities or counterfeit charity appeals). Such conduct can carry legal consequences under fraud and cybercrime statutes.

8.3 Malware and Harmful Code

You may not upload, distribute, or link to malware, viruses, credential-stealing tools, or other code intended to damage devices or data, disrupt services, or gain access to accounts, systems, or information without authorization.

Content that provides actionable instructions, exploit code, credentials, or other information that creates a material risk of enabling an attack may be removed or restricted. General cybersecurity education, defensive analysis, and good-faith discussion are not prohibited solely because they concern malware or security vulnerabilities, but they must not be used to facilitate harm or unauthorized access.

9. Platform Integrity and Misuse

This section addresses behaviors that threaten Cetera's platform integrity, such as impersonation, manipulation, or evading moderation. Some of these behaviors may also violate Cetera's Terms of Service or even applicable laws (e.g., computer fraud statutes) and can result in permanent suspension without warning.

9.1 Evasion of Suspension or Filters

Attempts to circumvent platform controls or penalties are not permitted. If your content is removed or your account is suspended, you must not create new accounts or use other means to evade those enforcement actions. Similarly, deliberately altering banned content (e.g., using obfuscated text or images) to slip past content filters is prohibited. Evasion may result in permanent account termination.

9.2 Manipulation and Gaming the System

Any coordinated activity that manipulates Cetera's systems or other users is forbidden. This includes using bots or scripts to artificially inflate view counts, likes, or other engagement metrics. Coordinating with others to falsely report content, or to vote or promote content en masse for deceptive purposes (e.g., astroturfing), is not allowed. Users must not exploit bugs or platform features to gain an unfair advantage or disrupt others' experience.

9.3 Unauthorized Access and Good-Faith Security Research

You may not access or attempt to access Cetera's services, user accounts, systems, or data without authorization. You also may not disrupt Cetera, evade security controls, maintain unauthorized access, or access, alter, copy, or delete another person's information without permission.

Good-faith security research is permitted only as described in our Security Reporting Policy. Among other requirements, you must limit testing to the minimum necessary to confirm an issue, use only accounts and data you own or have permission to use, avoid disrupting the service, and stop immediately if you encounter another person's information or create an unexpected risk. Report suspected vulnerabilities privately through our security report form.

A good-faith purpose does not excuse activity outside these limits, service disruption, social engineering, malware, persistence, harmful exploitation, or public disclosure of credentials, personal information, secrets, or actionable exploit details. Submitting a report does not by itself authorize additional testing or promise payment or other compensation.

10. External Linking to Prohibited Content

Links are subject to the same rules as content shared directly on Cetera. You may not share a link if its destination would be prohibited in the audience or context where you share it. Links promoting subscription-based adult content are permitted only in a properly labeled mature post or an eligible adult-to-adult direct message, as described in §4.1.5. You may not use redirects, shortened links, QR codes, encoded text, or similar methods to disguise a destination or evade these Guidelines.

How Cetera May Treat Content and Accounts

Cetera enforces these Guidelines in light of the content or conduct involved, its context and audience, and the risks it creates. When we determine that a violation has occurred, we respond based on its nature and severity, relevant context, previous violations, and the need to protect users and the service. Our response may include one or more of the actions below.

To appeal a decision, submit a request to moderation team. Include enough information for us to identify the decision and explain why you believe it was wrong. We review appeals and communicate the outcome as appropriate. An enforcement action generally remains in effect while an appeal is pending.

Enforcement may differ based on context, applicable law, and the tools available for the affected feature.

Last updated

September 4, 2026