Contributor guidelines

Last updated: September 6, 2026

Purpose

PrivacySafe and 3NWeb bring together volunteers, paid professionals, students, teachers, researchers, maintainers, users, and other contributors from different countries, cultures, backgrounds, identities, disciplines, and viewpoints.

That variety makes the projects stronger, but it also means that people may have different communication styles, expectations, languages, and experiences. These Contributor Guidelines establish project-specific expectations for respectful and productive collaboration. They put the principles in VALUES.md into practice for contributor collaboration.

These Contributor Guidelines apply equally to everyone participating in PrivacySafe and 3NWeb project spaces, regardless of role, level of responsibility, length of involvement, or technical experience. Maintainers, contributors, newcomers, people seeking help, and anyone representing the projects are expected to follow the same standards.

It is not intended as an exhaustive catalog of every acceptable or unacceptable act. Participants should follow both the specific rules and their broader purpose: helping people contribute, learn, disagree constructively, correct mistakes, and move the work forward.

Core expectations

Be welcoming, friendly, and patient

Make a reasonable effort to help people participate, especially when they are new to the project, unfamiliar with a tool or process, or communicating in a language that is not their primary language.

Do not treat lack of familiarity, different terminology, imperfect grammar, or a reasonable request for clarification as evidence that someone does not belong in the project.

Take responsibility and accept constructive feedback

Take responsibility for your own words, actions, and contributions. Give constructive feedback in a way that helps improve the work, and receive good-faith feedback without treating disagreement as hostility.

When your actions cause a problem, make a reasonable effort to correct it. Depending on the circumstances, that can include acknowledging what happened, clarifying intent without dismissing impact, correcting inaccurate material, changing future behavior, or offering an apology.

Start from good faith

Begin with the assumption that other participants are trying to contribute constructively unless there is concrete evidence otherwise.

Evaluate claims, patches, documentation, and conduct based on what was actually submitted or said. Do not accuse someone of plagiarism, deception, misconduct, or bad motives based only on speculation.

Address people respectfully

Use the names people ask to be called. When referring to someone's gender, use language that reasonably includes the identity they have stated. Participants may use different words or approaches, and those differences should be handled with tolerance rather than hostility.

Be considerate of users and other contributors

Project work affects other people. Code, protocols, documentation, infrastructure, security decisions, review practices, and technical choices may affect users, downstream projects, maintainers, contributors, and communities outside the project.

Consider those consequences when making decisions. Remember that PrivacySafe and 3NWeb are international projects and that participants may be working across languages, time zones, legal systems, cultures, accessibility needs, and different levels of technical experience.

Keep criticism about the work

Technical disagreement is normal. Critique code, documentation, designs, decisions, statements, and behavior without turning that criticism into an attack on the person.

Avoid insults, humiliation, threats, demeaning language, or an unnecessarily harsh tone.

Choose words with care

Harassment, intimidation, and exclusionary conduct are not acceptable. This includes:

• threats of violence or language intended to make another person fear violence;
• discriminatory slurs, jokes, or degrading comments;
• personal insults, including insults based on race, sex, gender, disability, religion, nationality, sexual orientation, or another personal characteristic;
• unwelcome sexual attention or sexualized harassment;
• publishing or threatening to publish another person's private identifying information without permission;
• directing sexually explicit or gratuitously violent material at participants where it is not legitimately relevant to the project context;
• encouraging another person to engage in harassment, threats, discrimination, or doxxing; and
• repeatedly targeting or contacting someone after they have clearly asked you to stop.

If someone reasonably asks you to stop a particular unwanted interaction, stop.

Respect confidentiality and identity

Do not disclose or act on another person's private or confidential information without permission, except where disclosure is required for a legitimate safety, security, legal, or project-administration reason.

Do not impersonate another contributor, maintainer, project, organization, or support identity in a deceptive way. Pseudonyms and alternative identities are not prohibited when they are not being used to deceive people or evade project enforcement.

Do not use contributor spaces primarily for unsolicited advertising, commercial promotion, spam, or other activity unrelated to the purpose of the project.

Do not escalate personal conflict

Criticism of your work or statements is not automatically an attack on you. If a discussion feels personal, do not answer hostility with more hostility.

When useful, step away before replying. A calm private message explaining how an exchange affected you can be more productive than continuing a public argument while angry.

Do not generalize about demographic groups

Do not make claims about the presumed abilities, preferences, behavior, intelligence, interests, or motives of a demographic group. Such generalizations are usually irrelevant to project work and can make participation needlessly hostile.

Treat mistakes as part of the work

Software development, documentation, standards work, design, operations, and security research all involve mistakes.

Point out errors clearly, but do so in a way that helps the contributor fix the problem and continue participating. A mistake is not evidence that someone does not belong in the project.

Advocate for software freedom without nagging

PrivacySafe and 3NWeb are committed to Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS). Contributors may still use nonfree software in their own environments, and that alone does not make their contributions unwelcome.

When encouraging someone to replace nonfree software, be helpful and restrained. Repeatedly badgering someone is not constructive.

Project documentation, recommendations, and required workflows should not direct contributors to use nonfree software when a suitable FLOSS approach can meet the project need.

Respond to the position that was actually expressed

Do not replace another person's argument with an exaggerated or easier-to-attack version. Quote or summarize the real point fairly before criticizing it.

Try to understand disagreement

Technical and social disagreements are inevitable. Before assuming another participant is unreasonable or acting in bad faith, try to understand the facts, constraints, experiences, or priorities behind the position.

Not understanding why someone holds a view does not by itself make that view dishonest or irrational. Focus on resolving the issue, finding evidence, and learning from mistakes rather than assigning blame.

Keep threads focused

When a discussion drifts into a separate issue, move that issue into a new thread, issue, discussion, or message where practical.

A tangent may be worthwhile without belonging in the current discussion. Keeping subjects separated makes decisions easier to follow and preserves useful project history.

Know when no response is needed

Do not continue a thread merely to have the final word. If your substantive point is already clear, another reply may add heat without adding information.

Let decisions move into implementation

Once a project decision has been made, do not repeatedly reopen the same argument without new evidence, changed circumstances, or a concrete reason for reconsideration.

Dissent can be recorded without preventing the work from moving forward.

Do not carry grudges into future work

A difficult exchange should not become a permanent reason to mistreat another contributor.

When someone makes a genuine effort to improve their communication or behavior, give that improvement a fair chance.

Adjust communication when a problem is raised

If participants tell you that the way you are expressing a point is making collaboration harder, make a reasonable effort to change the presentation without abandoning the substance of your position.

Clearer, calmer communication generally makes technical persuasion more effective.

Keep unrelated political disputes outside project work

PrivacySafe and 3NWeb discussions are not general-purpose political forums. Do not derail technical or project work with political disputes unrelated to the project.

Project decisions are guided by the principles in VALUES.md, including software freedom, privacy, security, decentralization, and human autonomy. Contributors do not need to share every political opinion held by maintainers or other participants.

Where this Code applies

These Contributor Guidelines apply to project-controlled collaboration spaces, including:

• repositories, pull requests, and code review;
• issues and technical discussions;
• project mailing lists and chat systems;
• documentation and standards discussions;
• security and vulnerability coordination;
• project meetings and contributor events; and
• other spaces identified as official PrivacySafe or 3NWeb contributor channels.

It also applies when someone is officially representing PrivacySafe or 3NWeb in public or in another community, such as by using an official project account or address, speaking on behalf of a project, or acting in an appointed project role.

Conduct outside project spaces that is unrelated to official project representation is outside the scope of these Contributor Guidelines.

Reporting conduct problems

Not every disagreement, misunderstanding, or tense exchange is a Code of Conduct violation. Participants should use ordinary discussion and conflict resolution when that is safe and appropriate.

If you believe conduct connected to a PrivacySafe or 3NWeb project violates these Contributor Guidelines or the Code of Conduct, report it through the applicable project or service moderation channel or email:

abuse@privacysafe.net

For sensitive reports, use the published GPG key when appropriate:

https://psafe.ly/xSpQhF

Do not submit ordinary vulnerability reports through the conduct channel. Security vulnerabilities should be reported under SECURITY.md.

A useful conduct report should identify the relevant project or space, describe what happened, provide links or records when available, and explain any immediate safety or participation concern.

Reports should be handled as confidentially as reasonably possible. Information may need to be shared with the people responsible for reviewing or responding to the report.

Reports should be evaluated using the available evidence and context. Depending on the situation, review may include relevant messages, repository history, logs, recordings, or information from people who directly observed the conduct.

Handling problems

Ordinary disagreements should be handled proportionately whenever possible. Maintainers or other people responsible for the relevant project space may intervene when behavior repeatedly disrupts work, targets participants, prevents discussion from functioning, creates a credible safety concern, or substantially conflicts with these Contributor Guidelines or the Code of Conduct.

Responses should be proportionate to the conduct and may escalate when problems are serious or repeated. Depending on the circumstances, they may include:

1. Informal correction or warning. A request to stop or change behavior, clarify expectations, or correct a specific problem.
2. Temporary limits. Time-limited restrictions on a thread, channel, interaction, repository, event, or other project activity.
3. Temporary suspension. A defined period without access to some or all project-controlled spaces, normally with clear conditions for return when appropriate.
4. Permanent removal. Removal from project-controlled spaces when serious conduct, repeated violations, or failed earlier interventions make continued participation incompatible with the safety or functioning of the project.

Lower-level responses need not be used first when the conduct is sufficiently serious.

Responses should consider context, severity, repetition, impact on participants and project work, willingness to correct behavior, and the needs of the affected project or community. Permanent removal should be used carefully and with a clear reason.

Where practical, a person affected by a significant enforcement decision may ask the responsible maintainers or moderators to reconsider the decision based on relevant new information or a material misunderstanding.

Good-faith disagreement, technical criticism, requests for evidence, discussion of project decisions, and respectful criticism of conduct are not themselves violations.

Related community rules

These Contributor Guidelines govern PrivacySafe and 3NWeb project collaboration. Service-specific rules also apply when contributors participate in a community space. These include the 8 Simple Rules for PrivacySafe Social and the PrivacySafe Foundation Community Guidelines for our Learning Commons and community events.

Questions

Questions about how these Contributor Guidelines apply to a particular PrivacySafe or 3NWeb project may be sent to abuse@privacysafe.net or raised with the maintainers responsible for the relevant project space when the question is not sensitive.

Relationship to the Code of Conduct

PrivacySafe and 3NWeb adopt CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md, based on Contributor Covenant 3.0, as the formal Code of Conduct for project spaces.

These Contributor Guidelines provide additional project-specific guidance and are independently written. They draw on public guidance from the GCC Code of Conduct and the GNU Kind Communications Guidelines.

The Contributor Guidelines supplement the Code of Conduct and do not reduce its protections or participation standards.

This document is released under the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

The Security Patches software and this documentation are dedicated to the public domain under CC0 1.0 Universal. Other pages on privacysafe.app/docs are CC BY-SA 4.0 unless the page says otherwise.