Privacy policy

Last updated 11 November 2026

Hello by Kinilo ("Hello") is a WhatsApp messaging service for healthcare practices in South Africa, at hello.kinilo.co.za. It is provided by Neil Cuninghame Consulting (Pty) Ltd, registration number 2014/155763/07 ("we", "us"), whose director is Dr Neil Cuninghame. The Hello by Kinilo app on Meta's platform is registered under the business portfolio of Dr Neil Cuninghame. This policy explains what information Hello holds, why, where, who it is shared with and how it is deleted, as the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 ("POPIA") and Meta's platform terms require.

Two kinds of people, two roles

Practice users are the practitioners and staff who sign in to Hello; for their information we are the responsible party. Patients are the people a practice messages; for their information the practice is the responsible party and we are its operator, under the operator agreement each practice accepts. If you are a patient, your practice decides how your information is used, and your questions are best put to it first.

Information about practices and their users

When a practice signs up we collect its name, profession, contact and billing details, and for each user their name, email address, role, the diary name they are linked to, their alert choices and, if they choose WhatsApp alerts, their mobile number. For each practitioner the practice records their HPCSA or AHPCSA registration number or, for someone registered with neither, an identity or passport number, which is sealed with the practice's own key so that only its last four characters can ever be shown. If a user turns on two-step sign-in we store its secret in encrypted form. We record sign-ins, the device and browser used, actions taken in the panel, and each associate's or receptionist's confirmation, on the "Before you start" page, that patient information belongs to the practice. Card payments are handled by Paystack; we keep only the card type, its last four digits and its expiry date, encrypted, and never the full card number.

We use this information to run the practice's account, sign users in securely, send the alerts each user has chosen, bill the subscription, give support the practice asks for, keep Hello secure and tell practices about changes to the service. Our lawful basis is that the processing is needed for our contract with the practice and for our legitimate interest in keeping Hello secure (sections 11(1)(b) and 11(1)(f) of POPIA). We do not send practice users marketing for other products without their consent.

Information Hello processes about patients

On the practice's instructions, Hello processes the patient information the practice gives it or connects it to: names, mobile numbers, dates of birth, email addresses where supplied, appointment dates, times, types and practitioners, the wording of messages sent and received, delivery and read receipts, whether and when a patient opened an exercise link the practice sent, and each patient's consent and opt-out status. Because appointments and messages can reveal something about health, we treat all of it as special personal information under section 26 of POPIA. A practitioner can mark a conversation private, so that reception cannot read it; the practice's owners still can. Alerts and summaries sent to the practice's staff never contain a patient's name or words.

Information from Meta, WhatsApp and Facebook Login

When a practice connects its WhatsApp number through Meta's Embedded Signup, Hello receives and stores an access token for the practice's WhatsApp Business Account, the account's ID, the phone number ID, the display number and business name, and the account's messaging limits and quality rating. Hello does not receive the Facebook password, friends list, posts, photos or any other part of the person's own Facebook profile.

Hello uses the permissions whatsapp_business_messaging and whatsapp_business_management only to send the practice's approved messages, receive patients' replies and delivery receipts, and create and manage the practice's message templates. We do not use this data for advertising, sell it, pass it to data brokers, combine it across practices, or use it to train any artificial intelligence model.

If a practice connects a number it also uses in the WhatsApp Business app (Meta's coexistence route), its chats are mirrored between the app and Hello, and Hello brings in up to six months of earlier one-to-one chat history only if an owner instructs it to when connecting the number.

Cookies and network information

Hello sets an essential cookie to keep a user signed in, for no longer than the practice allows, and remembers in the user's browser which practice they last had open. It uses no advertising or analytics cookies. Our hosting provider, Cloudflare, processes visitors' network (IP) addresses to deliver and protect the service, and Hello keeps a scrambled count of sign-in requests per network address to stop abuse, deleted after a day. When an owner accepts our terms, we record the network address it was accepted from.

Where information is kept and how it is protected

Each practice's patients, appointments and messages are held in that practice's own separate database, inside the European Union, encrypted at rest. Where a practice's number is registered to Hello alone, we ask Meta to keep its WhatsApp message content in South Africa; this is not available for numbers connected through the coexistence route. Credentials for a practice's appointment system and WhatsApp account are encrypted before they are stored. Every connection uses HTTPS, every message from Meta is checked against its signature, and practices can require two-step sign-in for their whole team. We have no standing access to any practice's information: a practice opens time-limited, read-only support access when it asks for help, and every visit is logged where the practice can see it.

Each practice's information is backed up every night, encrypted with a key that belongs to that practice alone, stored in the European Union, and locked so that it cannot be altered or deleted before it expires. Every backup is checked when it is made, and restoring it is rehearsed every week. If information is ever restored, anyone the practice has erased stays erased.

If we have reasonable grounds to believe that personal information in Hello has been accessed or acquired by someone without authority, we tell each affected practice immediately, as section 21 of POPIA requires, and help it notify the Information Regulator and its patients. Where our own users' information is involved, we notify the Regulator and the users ourselves.

Who information is shared with

We share information only with the service providers Hello needs: Cloudflare, Inc. (hosting and storage), Meta Platforms, Inc. (WhatsApp; each practice also contracts with Meta directly), Resend (emails, which contain no patient information), Paystack (card payments, which involve no patient information) and Domains.co.za (which hosts our hello@kinilo.co.za mailbox in South Africa). The current list, and where each works, is on our sub-operators page, and practices are told at least 30 days before it changes. Where a practice connects its appointment software, such as Cliniko or Bookem, information passes between Hello and that software on the practice's instructions. We disclose information to anyone else only if the law compels us, and then tell the practice first unless the law forbids it.

Information outside South Africa

Cloudflare, Meta and Resend are based in the United States, and Meta may process message content in other countries. Practice databases and backups stay in the European Union, whose law gives protection substantially similar to POPIA, and each provider is bound by its data processing terms. We rely on section 72 of POPIA for these transfers.

Automated decisions and children

Hello makes no decisions about anyone based solely on automated processing that have legal or similarly significant effects. It decides automatically when to send a practice's messages and who in the practice a conversation belongs to, but every message follows a rule the practice chose. Hello is a service for practices and is not directed at children. Where a patient is under 18, the practice is responsible for the consent of a parent or guardian and for messaging the right number, and Hello reminds it when a patient's date of birth shows they are under 18.

How long information is kept

The wording of messages is removed after the period the practice sets, 72 months (six years) unless it chooses otherwise. When a practice deletes its account, everything is deleted at once; when its trial or subscription ends without a plan being chosen, its information is kept for 90 days, with warnings to its owners, and then deleted. Deletion includes the stored WhatsApp token. Nightly backups are kept for 35 days and one a month for 12 months; when a practice is deleted, the key its backups are encrypted with is destroyed, so none can be opened again, even before they expire. Sign-in links expire within minutes. The practice's Activity log is kept for 36 months. A scrambled record of each WhatsApp number that has had a free trial is kept so that a trial is given once. Invoices and billing records are kept for seven years, as company and tax law require.

Your rights

Under POPIA you may ask to see the personal information held about you, ask for it to be corrected or deleted, object to its processing, and withdraw consent you gave. Patients should contact their practice, which can download, correct or erase their information in Hello; if a patient writes to us, we pass the request to the practice within two working days and help it respond. Practice users may contact us directly. Our PAIA manual explains how to request records, and our data deletion page how to have information deleted. You may complain to the Information Regulator at inforeg.org.za or enquiries@inforegulator.org.za.

Contact

Neil Cuninghame Consulting (Pty) Ltd, 2 Meyrickton Place, Hillcrest, 3650, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Telephone +27 83 638 8934. Email hello@kinilo.co.za. Information Officer: Neil Cuninghame, registered with the Information Regulator.

Changes to this policy

We update the date at the top whenever this policy changes, and tell practices by email at least 30 days before any change to how patient information is handled takes effect.