Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

Last updated: 21 September 2026

1. Introduction

SMBI Index (“we”, “us”, “our”) is a community platform for the Southern Moreton Bay Islands. We respect your privacy and handle your personal information in line with the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) under the Privacy Act 1988.

2. Information We Collect

• Account and profile information: your name, email, island, street name and house number (and phone, when you give it), your account type, and the date you confirmed you are 18 or over.
• Things you submit: directory listings, business claims, events, articles, community noticeboard notices, headlines, photos and replies, written recommendations for local businesses, favourites and vouches.
• Profile requests: if you ask to post as a group, council body or candidate, the name and the details you give us so we can check it. Only moderators see these details.
• Emails you send us: if you email a notice or a reply to the noticeboard address, we receive the text of your email and your email address. Attachments are ignored.
• Digest setting and email records: whether you want the digest, and a log of the emails we send (recipient, subject and whether it was delivered).
• Moderation records: whether a notice was approved, edited or declined, reports made about content, and any strikes or suspensions.
• Automatically collected: IP address, browser and device type, pages viewed, taps on listing links, search terms typed into the directory search, and cookies or similar technology used for the site to work and improve.

3. The Community Noticeboard and Digest

What other members see. Notices, replies and other posts show your name and street name. If you post as a business or group, its name is shown too. Your house number, email address and phone number are never shown. There are no anonymous posts.

What you write is visible. Anything you type into a notice, including any phone number, is visible to the signed-in members who receive it. If a business chooses to show a notice on its directory listing, that notice (and any photo) is also visible to visitors to that listing. Please don’t put other people’s personal details in a notice.

Photos. You may add one photo to a notice. We remove location data (EXIF) from the picture before it is uploaded, and a moderator checks every photo before it is published.

Replies. Public replies are shown with your name and street in the same way as notices. A private reply is emailed to the author of the notice with your name and your email address so they can answer you. The author’s email address is not shown to you.

Recommendations. A written recommendation for a business is shown on its directory listing with your name and street once a moderator approves it. The number of members who have hearted a listing is shown, but not who they are.

Moderation. A moderator reads every notice, public reply and written recommendation before it is published. We may edit lightly (and say so), decline, or remove content.

How long things are kept. Approved notices are shown on the members-only noticeboard page for up to 30 days. We keep an administrative copy of each notice for about 45 days after it appears in a digest, then delete it. If you withdraw a notice it is removed from the noticeboard. Moderation records, such as strikes, may be kept longer.

Digest. Once you have chosen an island you receive the digest by email. You can turn it off at any time in digest settings, and every digest has an unsubscribe link.

4. How We Use Your Information

• Provide and improve the ferry tracker, directory, noticeboard, calendar, fishing times, guide and other community features.
• Publish and moderate what members submit, and send you the digest and service emails (for example that your notice was approved or declined, or that someone replied).
• Check that noticeboard members live on the islands and are adults, and keep out made-up or duplicate accounts.
• Understand how the site is used (for example popular searches) and run the service.
• Comply with legal obligations and respond to complaints.

5. Sharing Your Information

We do not sell personal information. We share it only:

• with other members, as described in section 3;
• with the service providers that host the site, send our emails and receive emailed notices (currently Base44 for hosting, Resend for email delivery and Google Gmail for the inbox that receives emailed notices);
• where the public choose to see it (for example business contact details in a listing);
• with authorities where the law requires it, or where we believe there is a serious risk of harm.

6. Storage and Security

Our service providers may store or process information outside Australia. We take reasonable steps to make sure they handle it consistently with the Australian Privacy Principles. We use reasonable measures to protect your information, including limiting who can see personal details and checking content before it is published, but no system is completely secure. If a data breach is likely to cause you serious harm we will notify you and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner as the Privacy Act requires.

7. Your Rights and Choices

• You can see and update your name, island, street and digest setting in your account.
• You can ask to access or correct your personal information, or ask us to delete your account and the notices linked to it, subject to records we must keep. We will respond within 30 days.
• You can withdraw your own notices in “My notices”, and unsubscribe from the digest at any time.
• Contact us at the email below with any request or complaint.

8. Cookies, Analytics and Tracking

We use essential cookies to keep you logged in and usage analytics (such as page views and taps on listing links) to improve the site. If you add SMBI Index to your phone’s home screen, it is the same website, with the same cookies and analytics.

9. Third-Party Links and Data

Ferry, weather and fishing information comes from external sources, and some pages link to other websites. We are not responsible for their privacy practices.

10. Changes to this Policy

We may update this policy. When we make a material change we will update the “Last updated” date and tell noticeboard members by email or on the site.

11. Contact Us

Email: Support@smbi.com.au
Address: 1 Cavendish St, Russell Island QLD 4184
For complaints you are not satisfied with: Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC).