Privacy Policy

Hope Behind Bars Organization(“we,” “us,” or “the organization”) is a nonprofit registered in Ethiopia. This Privacy Policy describes the personal information we collect from visitors, donors, volunteers, and partners when you interact with our website, donate to our campaigns, or contact our team.

We treat the data you share with us the same way we treat the gifts you make: with care, with restraint, and with the people we serve in mind first.

We only collect what we genuinely need. That means:

• Donor details — your name, email, phone number, optional message, and the amount and currency of your donation.
• Payment information — handled directly by our payment processors (Stripe, Chapa, Telebirr). We never see or store your card number, CVV, mobile-money PIN, or bank login.
• Volunteer and contact submissions — what you write into forms on /volunteer or /contact.
• Basic technical data — IP address, browser type, and pages viewed. Used only for security, fraud prevention, and understanding which programs resonate.

We use the information you share to:

• Process your donation and email you a receipt.
• Send you the impact updates you opt into — never anything you didn't ask for.
• Reply to messages, volunteer applications, and partnership inquiries.
• Comply with Ethiopian charity-reporting law and our auditors' reasonable requests.

We do not sell, rent, or trade your data to advertisers or third-party marketers. Ever.

When you choose “Make this donation anonymous” in the donate flow, your name is hidden from the public donor wall and from the campaign organizer. We still keep the underlying record so we can send your receipt and comply with reporting law, but it's only accessible to a small number of authorized staff.

We share information only in narrow, well-understood cases:

• Payment processors — Stripe (USD), Chapa (ETB and USD), and Telebirr (ETB) receive only what they need to process your gift.
• Email service — to deliver receipts and the updates you subscribe to.
• Auditors and regulators — when legally required.

Each processor has its own privacy policy and PCI-DSS or equivalent compliance posture. We choose vendors who meet that bar.

You have the right to:

• Ask what data we hold about you.
• Correct anything that's wrong.
• Delete your record (subject to charity-law retention windows for financial records).
• Unsubscribe from any email at any time.

Email us at hopebehindbars01@gmail.com and we'll respond within ten business days.

We keep donor records for as long as Ethiopian charity law requires — currently seven years for financial records — and only as long as necessary for the purpose we collected them. Volunteer applications are deleted twelve months after the position closes unless you ask us to keep them on file.

Our site runs over HTTPS. Donations route through PCI-DSS-compliant processors. Admin access requires a password (never stored in plain text) and is limited to staff who actually need it. We log access to donor records and review the log regularly.

Our website is not directed at children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect their information. If a parent or guardian believes a child has submitted information, please contact us and we'll delete it promptly.

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The “Effective” date at the top of the page reflects the latest revision. Material changes will be announced via email to anyone subscribed to our updates.