Privacy Policy

Last updated: September 2026

ishomeaffairsonline.co.za ("this site", "we") is an independent, crowdsourced tool for tracking South African Department of Home Affairs branch status. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the Department of Home Affairs. This page explains what data the site collects, how it's used, and what choices you have.

Short version: you don't need an account to use this site, and reports are submitted anonymously — we don't ask for your name, email, or any way to identify you. Some technical data (like IP addresses) is unavoidably visible to the services that host and run the site, and third-party tools we use (advertising, translation) may set cookies. Details below.

Information you provide

When you submit a branch status report, we store:

The branch name or bank branch you selected or typed
Whether you marked it as working or down
The time of the report (including any "when did you see it?" adjustment you made)
If you chose to add one, a link to a social media post, and which platform it's from

None of this requires or asks for your name, email address, phone number, or any other way to identify you personally. If you choose to type personal information into a free-text field (for example, in a branch name or a pasted link), that's on you to avoid — we don't ask for it and don't want it.

Information collected automatically

Like virtually any website, some technical information is generated just by your device connecting to our hosting provider (Vercel) and database provider (Google Firebase) — including your IP address, browser type, and general timing of requests. This is standard server activity logging done by those providers as part of running the infrastructure; we don't separately collect or analyse it ourselves.

Cookies and similar technology

Local storage (on your device only): we use your browser's local storage to remember which branches you've recently reported on, so the same person can't spam-report the same branch repeatedly. This stays on your device and is never sent to us.
Google Translate widget: if you use the language switcher, Google may set cookies and process the page's text through its translation service, under Google's own privacy terms.
Google AdSense: once advertising is active on this site, Google AdSense may use cookies to serve and measure ads, including personalised ads based on your browsing activity, subject to your consent choices where required. You can review or opt out of personalised advertising at adssettings.google.com, and learn more about how Google uses data at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.

Third parties this site relies on

Google Firebase — stores submitted reports (Firestore database)
Vercel — hosts the website
Google Translate — powers the language switcher
Google AdSense — serves advertising (once approved and active)
Reddit's public API — if the optional automated poller is running, it pulls public posts mentioning Home Affairs; no Reddit account data is accessed

Each of these operates under its own privacy policy, which we'd encourage you to review if you have concerns beyond what's covered here.

How long is data kept?

The site's branch status displays are based on recent reports (the last few hours), but submitted reports themselves are not automatically deleted from the underlying database after that — they simply age out of what's shown on the page. If you'd like a report removed (for example, because it accidentally contained personal information), contact us using the details below.

Your rights

Under South Africa's Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA), you have rights around any personal information relating to you, including the right to ask what's held and to request correction or deletion. Because this site is built to avoid collecting personal information in the first place, there's typically very little tied to any individual to act on — but if you believe something you submitted should be removed, reach out and we'll look into it.

Children

This site isn't directed at children and we don't knowingly collect information from anyone we know to be under 18.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as the site changes — for example, once advertising goes live, or if new features are added. The "last updated" date at the top will reflect the most recent change.

Contact

Questions about this policy, or requests relating to your data, can be sent to [ishomeaffairsonline@gmail.com].