Terms of use

A platform for documenting environmental concerns in the Philippines, routing verified cases to the offices with the authority to act on them, and publishing what happens next.

• It is not an emergency service. For anything threatening life, contact your barangay, your local disaster office or 911 first.
• It is not a government agency and it has no enforcement power. It cannot compel any office to act, issue a citation, or impose a penalty.
• It is not a legal service. Nothing here is legal advice, and filing a case is not the same as filing a formal complaint under any law.
• It is not a substitute for reporting a crime to the authorities.

When you file a report you confirm it is truthful to the best of your knowledge. Do not:

• File a report you know to be false, or submit evidence from somewhere else presented as the reported location.
• Use the platform to harass, defame or pursue a dispute with a neighbour, a business or an official.
• Submit photographs or video of identifiable people who have not agreed to appear, unless they are the subject of the environmental concern itself.
• Attempt to overwhelm the platform with automated or repeated submissions.

Reports that appear to be any of the above are rejected at verification and are not published. Repeated abuse can lead to a block.

You keep ownership of your photographs and video. By submitting them you give EARTHLINK permission to publish them on the case page, include them in the evidence pack sent to a government office, and use them in case studies and reporting about the platform, with attribution where you have asked for it.

You can withdraw that permission for future use at any time. Material already sent to a government office as part of a referral cannot be recalled from that office.

Case content is supplied by members of the public and verified as far as is reasonably possible. Verification means the concern is real and accurately described. It is not a legal finding, and it is not an allegation against any named person or company.

Response figures for partner organisations record what was received and acknowledged through this platform only. An office may well have acted on something without telling us, and where we learn that, the record is corrected.

If you believe something published about a case is inaccurate, write to arabpame@gmail.com. Corrections are added to the case history rather than replacing what was there, so the correction itself is part of the public record.

Never put yourself at risk to gather evidence. Do not confront anyone, do not enter private land, and do not document illegal activity at close range. A report filed from a safe distance is worth more than any photograph.

You can always ask for your identity to be withheld, and that request is honoured in everything published and in everything sent to an agency.

The platform is provided as it is. We aim to keep it available and accurate, but we do not guarantee uninterrupted service, and we are not liable for loss arising from it being unavailable or from a case not receiving a response.

These terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of the Philippines.