WhatsApp Community

WhatsApp Community Privacy Policy and Guidelines

The Oxford Pastorate uses a WhatsApp Community to further its mission of serving postgraduate students and postdocs in Oxford through connection, conversation, and formation. The WhatsApp Community exists to share information about events and opportunities offered by the Pastorate, local churches, and other relevant Christian ministries including Graduate Christian Forum and Developing a Christian Mind.

If WhatsApp Communities and Groups are not managed well, they have the potential to breach people’s privacy and contravene our Conversation Guidelines. Because of this, the Oxford Pastorate has put in place the following guidelines to ensure that the Pastorate WhatsApp community announcement and group chat adheres to GDPR requirements.

If you join our WhatsApp Community, you have the right to:

• Leave the Community at any time

• Contact the Oxford Pastorate to request not to be added to any future Community or Group

• Report any comments or activity you think risks breaching a person’s privacy or contravenes our conversation guidelines, and raise any questions, concerns or complaints by contacting the Oxford Pastorate: [email protected]

• For any safeguarding concern email the Chaplain, Revd Dr Bethan Willis [email protected] or our Safeguarding Lead, Professor Lorna Smith [email protected]

Guidelines for the Announcement Channel:

• Anyone can join the Community Announcement channel; administrators do not need to approve requests to join

• Existing members can invite/add others to the Announcement channel

• Only administrators can make posts, share polls, or create events

• Any member of the Community can react or respond to posts

• Administrators reserve the right to delete reactions or responses including if they contravene our conversation guidelines.

• Administrators reserve the right to remove people from the Community including if it is not deemed relevant to them or if their participation contravenes our conversation guidelines

• The Oxford Pastorate will close the Community Announcement channel if it is no longer necessary or relevant. Administrators will endeavour to inform Community members of this at least 2 days before the Community is closed

Guidelines for Community Sub-Groups:

• Administrators will inform Community members, including through the announcement channel, of the purpose of any interactive sub-group that is set up

• In sub-groups, members can interact directly with one another, post and reply to messages. Due to the interactive nature of sub-groups, there is potential for sensitive data to be shared by members of the group. As a result, an administrator will shut down this type of group when it is no longer needed. I.e., when the relevant programme or event has finished

• This is to ensure that sensitive data does not remain accessible for an unreasonable period of time, and to ensure that members of the group are still active participants in the programme/event and/or relevant to the content being shared

• The administrator will give 2 days notice before closing down the group wherever possible

• Only an administrator can approve requests to join interactive sub-groups. If you think someone else should be part of a group, you can let the administrator know

• Administrators reserve the right to delete comments posted by a member

• Administrators reserve the right to remove a member from a sub-group if it is not deemed relevant to them or if their participation contravenes our conversation guidelines

Your Data:

• To protect your privacy, your contact numbers are not visible to any other Community members in the Announcement channel, unless you are already saved as their contact in WhatsApp

• Contact numbers of all members, in the Announcement channel and in sub-groups, are visible to administrators. To protect your privacy, this data will only be used for the purpose of administering the Community and sub-groups. We will not extract, store, or use this data for other purposes

• In Community sub-groups, your contact numbers will be visible to other members of the same sub-group. To protect your privacy, Community members must request to join sub-groups and be approved by administrators, who will only do so if the sub-group is relevant to that person

• Please be aware that any personal information that you share via the Community or sub-groups will be viewable by other members

• Community members and sub-group members can and should contact the Oxford Pastorate with any questions or concerns about membership in any WhatsApp Community sub-group

Created: October 2025