Fuse is designed for teenagers and young adults. In accordance with Section 9 of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023:

• Users under eighteen (18) years of age represent, warrant, and covenant that they have obtained verifiable permission and consent from their parent or lawful guardian to register an account and interact on this platform.
• Users misrepresenting their age or guardian consent are subject to immediate and permanent account termination without prior notice upon identification.
• Lawful guardians maintain the right to inspect, correct, or demand the permanent deletion of their minor dependent's account and personal records by contacting our Grievance Redressal Officer.

Accounts are authenticated exclusively through Google OAuth. To maintain platform integrity and prevent identity forgery:

• Immutable Usernames: Usernames chosen at registration are permanently locked and cannot be altered, transferred, or reassigned by users under any circumstances.
• Single-Account Policy: You may not create multiple disposable accounts to evade moderation, bypass vouch locks, or harass users.
• Credential Integrity: You are solely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your Google authentication credentials. You agree to notify Fuse immediately of any unauthorized access to your account.

In accordance with Rule 3(1)(b) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, users shall not host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, store, update, or share any information that:

• Belongs to another person and to which the user does not have any right.
• Is obscene, pornographic, pedophilic, invasive of another's privacy, including bodily privacy, insulting or harassing on the basis of gender, racially or ethnically objectionable, or promotes money laundering or gambling.
• Is harmful to child welfare or promotes self-harm, suicide, or illegal narcotics.
• Infringes any patent, trademark, copyright, or other proprietary rights.
• Deceives or misleads the addressee about the origin of the message or knowingly communicates misinformation.
• Impersonates another person or entity.
• Threatens the unity, integrity, defense, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign states, or public order.
• Contains software viruses or computer code designed to interrupt, destroy, or limit the functionality of any computer resource.

Fuse operates community spaces with anonymous posting options. Anonymity is a feature designed for peer candor, not a shield against legal responsibility:

• While public display names are masked in anonymous clubs, cryptographic author audit trails (`author_data`) are preserved on secure backend partitions.
• Users remain individually, civilly, and criminally liable under Indian penal laws for all statements, posts, and roasts published through their accounts.
• Lawful Disclosure: Fuse will only disclose identity records when compelled by a formal court order or statutory summons issued under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (or Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023). Private grievances or school administrative complaints do NOT constitute lawful grounds for identity disclosure.

Communities created on Fuse are autonomous social environments governed by platform rules:

• Founder Passwords: Community founders are responsible for the secrecy of their passwords. Fuse is not liable for unauthorized access resulting from shared community passwords. Founders may reset passwords at their discretion.
• Immutable Attributes: Core community attributes (Name, CID, Cover Image, Identity Mode, and Sneak Peek status) are permanently locked after creation and cannot be renamed or altered by founders or members.
• Trademark Disputes: In the event of a verified trademark complaint regarding a community name, Fuse may require a name modification or archive the community. User identities are not disclosed to complainants.

If a community founder enables "Sneak Peek Mode" during creation:

• Non-members may preview the first 5–8 active posts of that community prior to entering a password or submitting a vouch request.
• By posting within a community with Sneak Peek enabled, members grant permission for their posts to be previewed publicly by prospective members.
• Comments, reactions, and compose features remain strictly restricted to verified club members.

Users seeking entry to a community without a password may submit a Vouch Request:

• Transparent Peer Review: Submitting a request authorizes the temporary display of your username (@handle) to existing community members for voting purposes.
• Admission Threshold: Admission requires an absolute majority vote of active community members.
• 48-Hour Lockout: If a request is declined by an absolute majority, the user is subject to a mandatory 48-hour cool-down lockout before another request can be initiated. Tampering with this lockout constitutes a violation of platform integrity.

Community members may generate timed invite links subject to platform restrictions:

• 1-Hour Single-Use Lifecycle: Timed links expire exactly one (1) hour following generation, or immediately upon entry by a single user, whichever occurs first.
• Monthly Quota: Members are restricted to generating a maximum of three (3) timed invite links per community in any rolling thirty (30) day period.
• Prohibited Distribution: Commercializing, trading, or mass-distributing invite links on public forums is strictly prohibited and grounds for account termination.

Posts created with the "24-Hour Burner" option are subject to specific operational rules:

• Burner posts cease display and are automatically hidden from community feeds 24 hours following publication.
• No Immunity from Accountability: The burner feature is an ephemeral display tool, not an instrument for unlawful content. As required by Rule 3(1)(h) of the IT Rules, 2021, backend audit trails are preserved for statutory compliance (up to 180 days) before deletion.

Fuse deploys automated AI classifiers to evaluate content prior to publication. Content may be approved, flagged for manual moderator review, or rejected outright.

• Automated systems are not infallible; Fuse does not warrant that all inappropriate or unlawful content will be intercepted before display.
• Fuse reserves the right to remove, restrict, or modify any content that violates these Terms or applicable laws at its sole discretion without prior liability.

You retain ownership of text content you publish on Fuse. By posting, you grant Fuse Labs a royalty-free, non-exclusive license to host, display, and format your content on the platform.

Platform branding, graphic card themes (Y2K, Cyber Neon, Inferno, Retro), design assets, and logos are the proprietary intellectual property of Fuse Labs. Graphic cards exported via platform sharing tools must retain authentic branding and may not be manipulated to generate defamatory or fraudulent material.

Fuse is an intermediary under Section 2(1)(w) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and is protected under the safe harbor provisions of Section 79 of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Fuse does not initiate transmissions, select recipients, or modify transmitted communications.

The platform is provided on an "as-is" and "as-available" basis. Fuse Labs disclaims all warranties and shall not be liable for indirect, incidental, or consequential damages resulting from user-generated content, member disputes, or temporary service interruptions.

In accordance with Rule 3(2) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, any complaint regarding violation of these terms, user safety, or unlawful content may be directed to our Grievance Officer:

• Designation: Grievance Redressal Officer, Fuse Labs India
• Contact Email: fusehelpline@gmail.com
• Timelines: Complaints are acknowledged within twenty-four (24) hours and resolved within fifteen (15) days of receipt. In cases involving non-consensual sharing of intimate or impersonated imagery, content will be reviewed and removed within twenty-four (24) hours of receipt of notice.

These Terms & Conditions are governed by and construed in accordance with the substantive laws of the Republic of India. Any legal disputes, claims, or proceedings arising out of or in connection with the platform shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the competent courts located in India.