Terms of Service

1. Acceptable Use & Account Responsibilities

By creating an account on OurRoots, you agree to provide accurate registration information and safeguard your credentials. You agree not to:

• Upload defamatory, abusive, or unlawfully acquired personal information.
• Attempt to bypass access controls, silhouette masking, or rate-limiting systems.
• Impersonate living individuals or falsely claim nodes representing other family members.

2. The Bloodline Permission Model

To prevent accidental alteration or vandalism of genealogical history, OurRoots enforces a strict Bloodline Rule:

• Direct Edit Authority: Tree administrators and direct bloodline relatives (self, parents, children, spouses) hold permissions to modify node records directly.
• Change Suggestions: Extended family members and non-direct relatives may propose edits via the Change Request queue, requiring administrative approval prior to merging.

3. User-Contributed Content & Family Privacy

Users who create family tree nodes represent that they have the right or legitimate genealogical interest to record family information. When adding living persons, users should exercise respect and care. OurRoots reserves the right to unpublish, mask, or delete records upon receipt of a valid removal notice.

4. Guest View Links & Sharing Mechanics

Tree owners may issue read-only or silhouette guest view links. Guest links grant viewing access to the tree structure subject to the privacy masking settings defined by the tree administrator.

5. Service Availability & Disclaimers

OurRoots is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis. While we perform daily backups and redundancy safeguards, we encourage users to maintain external copies of important historical documents.