Safety and governance
From our adherence to strict safeguarding frameworks and comprehensive training programmes, to our policy of pre-moderating all content on our platforms, safety is front and centre of everything we do.
Go somewhere good
A safe space facilitates trust and enables people to access the help they need. It is the cornerstone of our services and the reason so many people have turned to Kooth for help.
Our head of safeguarding, Tom Strannix, describes our safety framework, ensuring that in an often fraught online world, people looking for help can 'go somewhere good'.
Ensuring safe content
We pre-moderate every single word on Kooth.
This means that no user generated content - such as a poem, a story or a forum comment is published to our site until it has been moderated by one of our moderating team.
All our content is age-gated to ensure service users only see what is appropriate and relevant for their age. Based on an evidence based framework, our age ratings are 10-11, 12-13, 14-17 and 18+.
In addition there is certain content we would never publish, such as details or methods of self harm or suicide.
How Kooth helped Jessica
Jessica created this video to convey the depth of support around loneliness, depression and anxiety she received from Kooth, as an undiagnosed autistic girl. Jessica describes her experience with Kooth as having "found community".
Compliance frameworks
Kooth has earned accreditations from a range of clinical and safety bodies
Insights
Kooth as a trusted 'front door'
We know from decades of research, how people do not speak up about abuse or neglect when it happens. At Kooth we work with them, we develop the relationship, we develop trust...
An evidence-based age-gating framework
The online world can be an amazing space for people to seek help. It also has its risks and dangers. We are focused on creating a space that is a positive experience for all our users - of every age
Moderated by real people
Our moderators are a team of passionate, dedicated professionals. All moderators have a degree in a relevant subject, such as psychology or social work.
The team also benefits from extensive training in relation to safeguarding, fully aligned with NHS guidelines
As our service grows, we are trialling the use of ethical AI to support moderation in identifying safeguarding issues in service users' online journals.
All professional support is delivered by trained mental health practitioners; Kooth does not use AI within counselling or elsewhere on the platform.