Member User Guide

KFS Social Strand

No cookies, no data selling — just your conversations, kept yours.
Feed & Posts · Direct Messages & Encryption · Group Chats
Customization · Reporting & Blocking · Community Guidelines
Enforcement & Finality · Grievance Redressal
Valid from 25 July 2026
Version 2.1
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Privacy by design — your data stays yours

Social Strand is provided exclusively for the private use of KFS members, entirely free of charge — please do not share access, this guide, or its contents with anyone outside KFS. We secure the platform using industry‑standard practices to the best of our ability.

Legend — Defined Terms

KIIT
Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology
The Deemed‑to‑be University under whose aegis KSAC, and by extension KFS, is constituted and operates. KIIT's disciplinary rules and code of conduct apply, in full, to all Social Strand activity.
KSAC
KIIT Student Activity Centre
The University body that recognises, charters, and governs student societies at KIIT, including KFS. KSAC retains disciplinary jurisdiction over Members independent of, and in addition to, KFS's own enforcement action.
KFS / "the Society"
KIIT Film Society
The Society that owns, operates, and administers Social Strand, the KFS members' portal, and all associated Digital Channels, and which holds sole and exclusive authority over the same as described in this guide.
Social Strand
The Platform
The feed, posting, reaction, comment, Direct Message, and Group Chat feature set documented in this guide, together with all associated infrastructure, accessible within the KFS members' portal.
Digital Channel
As defined in the Terms of Use
Social Strand is one Digital Channel among those operated by KFS; obligations applicable to Digital Channels generally under the Terms of Use apply equally to Social Strand.
Member / User
Account Holder
Any individual holding, or acting through, a Social Strand account. "Member" carries the additional obligations set out in the Terms of Use's Member Conduct provisions (Section 13 of the Terms of Use).
E2EE
End‑to‑End Encryption
The security model described in Section 3, under which DM and Group Chat content is encrypted (rendered into Ciphertext) on the sender's device and decrypted only on the recipient's device.
Ciphertext / Plaintext
Encrypted / readable content
Ciphertext is scrambled, unreadable data as stored and relayed by the server. Plaintext is the readable message, which exists only on the sending and receiving devices, and, where reported, on the reporting Member's device at the moment of submission (Section 3.3).
Master Administrator
KFS Trust & Safety Team
The small, accountable KFS personnel group authorised to view decrypted content of a reported message, and no more, subject to Section 3.3.
Report
A user‑initiated flag
The mechanism by which a Member submits content to KFS moderation for review, described in Section 7.1 and Section 3.3. A Report is the sole means by which KFS becomes aware of the plaintext content of a DM or Group Chat message.
Moderation Ladder
Standard enforcement track
The escalating sequence of warning, timed mutes, temporary suspension, and permanent disablement set out in Section 10.1, applied per account across all Social Strand features.
Sole Discretion
Unilateral determination by KFS
Indicates that the relevant decision, judgment, or action is reserved exclusively to KFS, is not subject to a fixed evidentiary standard, and is reviewable only through the grievance process in Section 10.4.
Suspension / Disablement
Access restrictions
A Suspension is a time‑bound restriction on account access; Disablement is a permanent restriction. Both are enforcement outcomes under Section 10 and do not, of themselves, terminate KFS membership, which is governed separately by KFS's Membership Terms.
Grievance Redressal
Internal appeal process
The Step 1–3 review procedure in Section 10.4, culminating in a binding decision by KFS leadership under Section 10.3.
Finality
Conclusiveness of a decision
The principle, set out in Section 10.3, that a KFS decision becomes binding and non‑appealable within KFS once the Grievance Redressal process has been exhausted or waived.
Submitted Work
Content you post or upload
Any post, comment, image, video, project, or Movie Submission a Member uploads to Social Strand or the KFS members' portal, as described in Section 8.
Platform Licence
Rights you grant KFS
The limited, non‑exclusive licence a Member grants KFS over their Submitted Work solely to operate, display, and promote Social Strand, described in Section 8.2.
KFS Marks
KFS's own IP
KFS's name, logo, branding, this guide's text and design, and any KFS‑produced film or promotional material, all of which remain KFS's exclusive property (Section 8.1).
Take‑Down Notice
Copyright removal request
A request made under Section 8.5 asking KFS to remove content that infringes a rights‑holder's copyright or other intellectual property.

01What Is Social Strand?

Social Strand is the KFS members' community feed, built into the KFS members' portal. It's where you share your work, follow other members, react and comment on posts, and message each other directly or in groups — all in one place, alongside your KFS account tools (My Movies, My Works, Collaborate).

This guide covers every feature currently available, how your data is protected, and the rules that keep Social Strand a place people want to be in — including what happens if those rules aren't followed.

02Feed & Posts

The main Social Strand feed shows posts from members you follow and the wider community, newest first. New posts from other members appear as a small "↑ New posts" pill at the top of the feed rather than being inserted automatically — tap it whenever you're ready so you're never pulled away from something you're reading.

2.1 Post types

Project post — share a finished or in‑progress project with a caption, cover image, and optional collaborators.
Text post — a caption‑only update with no attached media.
Video post — a project post with an embedded video and its own caption field.
Collab post — an open call for collaborators, posted from the Collaborate tab, with role, description and fulfillment date.

2.2 Creating and editing a post

Use the composer to pick a post type, add a title, tags, description, and (for project/video posts) media. Text boxes grow automatically as you type, so long captions are never trapped in a tiny scrolling box.

You can edit or delete your own posts at any time from the post's menu (⋯). Deleting a post removes it from the feed, your profile, and anyone's saved links to it.

2.3 Reactions & comments

Tap and hold (or long‑press) the reaction icon on a post to choose from the reaction set (❤ 😂 😮 😢 😡 👏 🔥 😍 👍 🙂 😊), or tap once for a quick default reaction. Comments open in the post's detail view, support threaded replies, and refresh automatically every few seconds while the detail view is open — so you'll see new comments from others without needing to close and reopen the post.

Note — Comment auto‑refresh briefly pauses while your cursor is inside the reply box, so nothing you're typing gets overwritten.

2.4 Following & analytics

Follow members from their posts to see more of their work in your feed. Your own profile shows a Followers / Following list and basic post analytics (views, reactions, comments) so you can see how your posts are performing.

2.5 My Movies / My Works

Movie submissions and your works portfolio live together under one panel with a tab switcher ("Submissions" / "My Works"), since both track the same thing — your film credits with KFS. From here you can submit new work and request edits to existing entries.

03Your Data & Message Security

This is the part most members want a straight answer on, so here it is in plain language before we get into features.

3.1 How your DMs and group chats are protected

Every direct message and group chat on Social Strand is end‑to‑end encrypted (E2EE). In practice, that means:

Your device generates its own private encryption key when you first sign in. That private key never leaves your device — it is never uploaded, backed up, or transmitted to KFS in any form.
Only the matching public key is shared with the server, so other members' devices can encrypt messages to you. A public key can encrypt messages for you but cannot be used to read them — decryption requires the private key sitting only on your device.
Messages are encrypted on the sender's device before they ever leave it. The server stores and relays ciphertext — scrambled data it cannot itself read.
Messages are decrypted only on the recipient's device, at the moment they're displayed. This applies equally to one‑to‑one DMs and group chats.

3.2 What this means for you

3.3 The one deliberate exception: reporting

Encryption is designed to protect you — not to protect someone who's harassing or abusing you. So there is exactly one narrow, user‑initiated exception, modelled on the same approach used by mainstream E2EE apps like Signal:

When you choose to report a specific DM or group message, that single message is decrypted on your own device, at the moment you press submit.
The decrypted copy is attached to your report so a moderator can review the exact content you flagged — not your whole conversation history, and not anything you haven't reported.
Only KFS's master administrators — the small, accountable team responsible for trust & safety — can view decrypted report content, and only for the message(s) included in that report.
Note — KFS cannot proactively scan, read, or monitor the plaintext content of your DMs or group chats. The only way a message becomes visible to a moderator is if a participant in that conversation reports it.

3.4 Data KFS does and doesn't hold

KFS can see / storesKFS cannot see
That a conversation exists, and its participantsThe plaintext content of your DMs or group messages
Encrypted (ciphertext) message data, needed to deliver it to the right deviceYour private encryption key, at any point
Ordinary account data — profile, posts, comments, reactions (these are not E2EE, since they're public by design)Messages you haven't reported, even during a moderation investigation
The specific content of a message once you report itAnything beyond the exact message(s) included in a report
Note — Posts, comments, and reactions on the Social Strand feed are intentionally public‑facing content, not encrypted — they're visible to other members by design, the same way a public social feed works anywhere else. Encryption applies specifically to DMs and group chats.

04Direct Messages

DMs are one‑to‑one conversations, protected the way Section 3 describes.

4.1 Starting and managing conversations

Start a new DM from a member's profile, a post, or the member picker in the DM panel.
Conversations are listed with a photo, name, message preview and time, Instagram‑style; unread conversations show a highlighted ring around the avatar.
Swipe a bubble (on mobile) to quickly reply to it.
Delete a message you sent from its context menu; this removes it for both participants.

4.2 Read receipts

Read Receipts show a double‑tick on messages you've sent once the other person has seen them. You can turn this off for yourself in Settings → Customization → Privacy — this is a per‑device, local preference.

4.3 Blocking

Blocking a member immediately stops new DMs between you both in either direction and hides their group‑chat messages from you. Existing conversation history is preserved but new messages won't go through while the block is active. You can block someone from their profile, a message's context menu, or after reporting them.

05Group Chats

Group chats work like DMs but with multiple members, and share the same end‑to‑end encryption described in Section 3.

5.1 Pinning messages

Pin an important message from its context menu so it stays visible in the pinned banner at the top of the chat for everyone in the group. The pin/unpin label always reflects the message's real current state, and the banner updates immediately after you toggle it.

5.2 Moderation inside groups

The same community guidelines and profanity filter apply inside group chats as everywhere else on Social Strand (see Section 9). A muted or suspended member cannot send group messages until their cooldown ends.

06Customization

Settings → Customization lets you personalize how chats look and behave. Changes are saved per device.

Chat Wallpaper & App Background — choose a wallpaper for chat backgrounds, or set a colour/gradient app background, from the built‑in gradient builder.
Message Bubble Color — set the colour used for your own outgoing message bubbles in DMs and group chats.
Bubble Opacity — two sliders control how see‑through your own bubbles and received bubbles are, from 30% to fully opaque, with a live preview before you leave the screen.
Privacy → Read Receipts — toggle the read‑receipt double‑tick on or off. "Reset All" also resets bubble opacity back to 100%/100% alongside every other customization option.

07Reporting, Blocking & Nicknames

7.1 Reporting content

Every post, comment, DM message, group message, and member profile has a Report option in its context menu (⋯ or long‑press). Reports go to the KFS moderation team for review; you'll see a confirmation toast once a report is submitted. See Section 3.3 for exactly what a report on a DM or group message does and doesn't expose.

ReasonUse it for
Harassment or bullyingRepeated targeting, threats, or pile‑ons aimed at one member.
Hate speech or discriminationAttacks based on identity, background, or protected traits.
Spam or misleading contentFake engagement, scam links, repeated off‑topic posting.
Inappropriate or explicit contentSexual, graphic, or otherwise NSFW material.
ImpersonationAn account pretending to be another member, staff, or KFS itself.
OtherAnything that doesn't fit the categories above — use the details box.

7.2 Nicknames

You can set a private nickname for other members that only you see, from their profile or a conversation. Nicknames cannot be set for the official KFS account — this is enforced both in the interface and on the server, as a protection for the platform's own identity.

7.3 Blocking

See Section 4.3. Blocking is reversible at any time from the same menu.

08Content Ownership, Copyright & Intellectual Property

This Section covers who owns what on Social Strand — your own posts and movies, KFS's own branding and productions, and other people's work — and the rules that protect all three from misuse, whether by a Member or by someone outside KFS entirely.

8.1 KFS's own content stays KFS's

8.2 What you own when you post

You keep full ownership of everything original you create and post — your photographs, videos, movies, scripts, artwork, and captions (Submitted Work). Posting to Social Strand does not transfer copyright to KFS, and it does not make your work available for anyone to reuse.

What you do grant KFS, automatically and for as long as your Submitted Work remains on the platform, is a limited licence — described in full below.

8.3 The licence you grant KFS

By posting or uploading Submitted Work to Social Strand — including feed posts, comments, Collab posts, and Movie Submissions under My Movies / My Works — you grant KFS a non‑exclusive, royalty‑free, revocable licence to:

Note — This licence is limited to the uses above. It does not let KFS sell your work, license it to third parties, use it in commercial advertising outside KFS, or alter its creative content without your consent. The licence ends when you delete the Submitted Work or your account, except for copies already made for an event or promotional use that occurred before deletion, and except where KFS is required to retain a copy as part of an active report or grievance under Sections 7 or 10.

8.4 Movie submissions & collaborative works

If your movie uses licensed music, stock footage, or any third‑party material, you're responsible for making sure you have the rights to use it — including for a student screening. Sharing something on Social Strand does not, by itself, satisfy any licensing requirement that material may carry.

8.5 Respecting other people's rights

8.6 Reporting a copyright or IP concern

If you believe your copyright or another intellectual‑property right has been infringed by something posted on Social Strand — by a Member or by content that shouldn't be there — use the same Report option described in Section 7.1, or contact KFS leadership directly (Section 11) with:

1. What was taken. A description or link to your original work.
2. Where it appears. A link or clear description of the infringing post, comment, or Movie Submission.
3. Your relationship to the work. A statement that you are the rights‑holder, or authorised to act on their behalf.
Note — KFS may remove or restrict access to reported content while a Take‑Down Notice is under review, before a final determination is made, to prevent ongoing harm to the rights‑holder.

8.7 Outside access, scraping & redistribution

Not for anyone outside KFS

Social Strand, this guide, and everything posted on the platform — Members' Submitted Work and KFS Marks alike — are provided exclusively for the private use of current KFS Members and are not licensed for public or outside use. The following are prohibited for outsiders and Members alike:

KFS reserves the right to pursue takedown requests, disciplinary referral to KSAC/KIIT University, and civil or legal remedies against any person — Member or outsider — who infringes these rights, consistent with the Terms of Use.

8.8 Consequences

Copyright or IP infringement by a Member is misconduct under Section 9 and is assessed under the moderation ladder in Section 10.1. Deliberate, repeated, or commercial‑scale infringement — including uploading pirated films or mass‑redistributing Members' work outside the platform — is treated as serious misconduct under Section 10.2 and may result in immediate suspension or permanent account disablement, independent of any separate legal claim the rights‑holder may have.

8.9 No guarantee, and your own responsibility

09Community Guidelines & Fair Use Policy

Social Strand exists so KFS members can share work, get feedback, and collaborate. Everything below applies across posts, comments, reactions, DMs, and group chats — including inside end‑to‑end‑encrypted conversations, since misuse there is just as reportable even though KFS can't proactively read the content (Section 3.3).

9.1 What you can do

9.2 What you shouldn't do

10Enforcement, Finality & Grievance Redressal

This Section sets out, in unambiguous terms, the authority KFS exercises over Social Strand accounts, the manner in which that authority is exercised, and the procedure by which a member may seek redress.

10.1 Standard moderation ladder

Most violations — profanity, low‑level rule‑breaking flagged by an automated filter or a routine report — escalate through one shared ladder per account. Each additional violation moves you one step further, regardless of which feature (post, comment, DM, or group message) it happened in:

Violation #Automatic actionWhat it affects
1stWarningMessage is blocked; nothing else changes.
2nd1‑minute mutePosting, comments, DMs and group chat all pause for 1 minute.
3rd2‑minute muteSame as above, longer cooldown.
4th5‑minute muteSame as above, longer cooldown.
5thTemporary account suspensionYou cannot post, DM, or use Social Strand or Group Chats until the timer expires. An appeal link is shown on the lockout screen.
Continued after suspensionPermanent account disableAccount is permanently disabled. Only KFS leadership can review an appeal at that point.
Note — Timers are wall‑clock, not "active use" time — a 5‑minute mute expires 5 minutes after it's issued whether or not you're online.

10.2 Serious misconduct — immediate, harsher action

Zero‑tolerance categories

Certain conduct is serious enough that KFS may act immediately and skip the standard ladder entirely — including an immediate temporary suspension or permanent account disablement on a first occurrence, at KFS's sole discretion. This includes, without limitation:

KFS may preserve relevant account and report information and, where warranted, refer serious misconduct to KSAC, KIIT University disciplinary authorities, law enforcement, or other appropriate authorities, consistent with the Terms of Use.

10.3 Authority & finality of KFS decisions

KFS holds full authority

10.4 How to raise a grievance or appeal

If you believe a moderation action was applied to you in error, or you want to raise a concern about how a report was handled, you have a direct path to a human review — not just an automated system:

Step 1 — Appeal from the lockout screen. A temporary suspension shows a one‑tap "Request Review" option directly on the suspension screen. This routes straight to the KFS moderation team.
Step 2 — Contact KFS leadership. If your account has been permanently disabled, or you disagree with the outcome of a Step 1 review, contact KFS leadership directly (Section 11) to request a final review.
Step 3 — Decision. KFS leadership's review is the final stage of the grievance process for Social Strand account actions. Its outcome is binding, per Section 10.3.
Note — Raising a grievance in good faith is always welcome and will never itself be treated as a violation. Submitting a report or appeal in bad faith — to harass, silence, or waste the moderation team's time — is itself a violation of Section 9.2.

10.5 A note on scope

10.6 General legal provisions

No waiver. KFS's decision not to act on a particular violation, or delay in doing so, is not a waiver of KFS's right to act on that or any other violation, whether at the time or subsequently.
Cumulative remedies. Enforcement action under this guide (Section 10) is independent of, and in addition to, any consequence under KFS's Membership Terms, referral to KSAC or KIIT University, or civil or criminal liability under applicable law — including for copyright or intellectual‑property infringement under Section 8.
Severability. If any provision of this guide is found unenforceable, that finding shall not affect the enforceability of the remaining provisions, which shall continue in full force and effect.
Survival. Provisions relating to confidentiality, intellectual property, enforcement, finality, indemnification, and limitation of liability under the Terms of Use survive the closure, suspension, or disablement of a Social Strand account.
Electronic acceptance. Continued use of Social Strand after being presented with this guide, or after an update to it, constitutes acceptance of its terms in full, in the same manner as electronic acceptance of the Terms of Use.
Amendment. KFS may amend this guide at any time; the version notice in the header reflects the guide currently in force. Material changes to Section 8, Section 9, or Section 10 will be reflected in an updated version number.
Assumption of risk. Use of Social Strand, including its messaging and group‑chat features, is undertaken at the Member's own risk, subject to the Disclaimer of Warranties and Limitation of Liability provisions of the Terms of Use.

11Getting Help

If something on Social Strand looks broken rather than against the rules, that's a bug report, not a content report — use the feedback option in Settings, or contact KFS support directly.

If you believe a moderation action was applied to you in error, use the appeal link shown on the suspension screen, or follow the grievance process in Section 10.4. To report a copyright or intellectual‑property concern, see Section 8.6.