Privacy & Terms

Last updated: 20 August 2026 · Applies to ng-ai.co.za and the NG∞AI WhatsApp service

Who we are

NG∞AI (written “NG-AI” where the symbol can’t render) is a community-funded South African AI assistant. Conversations are processed on our own infrastructure in South Africa. For anything in this policy — questions, requests, complaints — message us on WhatsApp.

What we collect, and why

  • Chat messages. Conversations with NG∞AI (on the website and on WhatsApp) are recorded and reviewed so we can improve answers, fix problems, and keep the service safe. This is stated next to every chat box. Don’t share information you wouldn’t want stored — ID numbers, banking details, medical records.
  • Account details. If you create a free account: your name, email address and a password. Passwords are stored only as salted cryptographic hashes — we cannot read them.
  • Technical basics. Your IP address is used for rate limiting (keeping the free service fair) and appears in standard server logs. The site stores your language choice and a random visitor ID in your browser’s local storage — no advertising cookies, no trackers, no analytics scripts.

What we never do

  • We never sell your information, to anyone.
  • We never hand your conversations to third parties to train their models.
  • We don’t profile you for advertising — there are no ads.

Where your information lives

Chats are processed by AI models running on NG∞AI’s own local infrastructure in South Africa. The website itself is served from a hosting provider (Vercel), which sees standard web-request logs. When you tap “read aloud”, the reply text is converted to speech by a speech service and the audio is cached on our own infrastructure.

How long we keep it

Conversation history is kept while the pilot runs, so the assistant can remember your recent chats and so we can improve it. Type RESET in any chat to clear the assistant’s memory of that conversation. You can ask us to delete your account and history at any time.

Your rights (POPIA)

Under the Protection of Personal Information Act, you may ask us what personal information we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it. Send the request on WhatsApp and we’ll act on it. If you believe we’ve mishandled your information, you can also complain to the Information Regulator (South Africa) — inforegulator.org.za.

Children

NG∞AI is a general-audience service. Children should use it with a parent or guardian’s knowledge, and we don’t knowingly collect more from children than the service needs to work.

Terms of the free pilot

  • It’s free, and it’s a pilot. While our pilot is online, NG∞AI is free for everyone. It may be slow at busy times and may go offline for upgrades — no service levels are promised.
  • AI makes mistakes. NG∞AI is not a doctor, lawyer or financial advisor. Answers can be wrong, incomplete or out of date — verify anything important before acting on it.
  • Fair use. Don’t use NG∞AI to harm others, break the law, spam, or attempt to break the service. Rate limits exist to keep it free and fair; working around them may get you blocked.
  • Donations. Donations fund infrastructure and are not payment for services; certificates are tokens of thanks, not securities or shares.

Changes

If this policy changes in a way that matters, we’ll say so on this page and update the date at the top.