Acceptable use

A trusted professional workspace.

These rules protect seafarers, client records, opportunity integrity, and the security of the MSA platform.

Version acceptable-use-2026-08-22 · Effective 22 August 2026

1. Lawful professional use

Use the platform only for genuine maritime career, document, education, consultancy, opportunity, and professional-community purposes. Comply with applicable law, these policies, the rights of others, and a recipient's legitimate instructions.

2. Account security

Use a personal email, a strong unique password, and multi-factor authentication where available. Do not share, sell, lend, automate, or transfer an account. Notify MSA immediately of suspected compromise, mistaken access, or an unexpected verification message.

3. Prohibited documents and representations

Do not upload, request, create, buy, sell, alter, or distribute forged, stolen, impersonated, unlawfully obtained, or materially misleading documents. Do not falsely claim a qualification, rank, sea-service period, medical fitness, licence, employer, government connection, or authority approval.

4. Prohibited opportunity conduct

Do not sell or guarantee jobs, demand a seafarer-paid placement fee where prohibited, advertise a false vacancy, collect passports as security, arrange debt bondage, conceal wage deductions, impersonate an employer, or pressure a person to travel or sign an incomplete agreement.

5. Network and messaging standards

Do not post or privately send harassment, threats, hate, unlawful discrimination, sexual exploitation, doxxing, spam, malware, scams, confidential company or vessel information, personal medical or identity records, examination answers, or content that compromises ship, port, offshore, or operational security. Do not use connection requests or messages for mass solicitation, romantic or sexual pressure, recruitment-fee demands, document collection, credential requests, or payment instructions. Advice must be framed as personal experience unless supported by an authoritative source.

6. Platform integrity

Do not probe, scan, overload, scrape, reverse engineer, bypass access controls, upload malicious code, enumerate accounts, intercept traffic, exploit a vulnerability, or use the service to attack another system. Network photos must be lawful to share, relevant to the discussion, and must not expose another person's identity document, private contact details, confidential vessel information, safety-sensitive location, or image without appropriate authority. Good-faith security concerns should be reported privately through the contact route and not include client data.

7. Personal data and confidentiality

Share only information you are authorised to share and only through the correct protected workflow. Do not copy another member's details from the community or portal into an external database, mailing list, recruitment file, or public group without lawful authority.

8. Moderation and enforcement

MSA may hold content for review, request evidence, remove or restrict material, suspend a feature or account, preserve relevant evidence, warn affected users, and report conduct where law requires or permits. Enforcement should be proportionate, documented, and open to complaint. Urgent protective action may occur before notice.

9. No retaliation

Retaliation against a person for reporting fraud, prohibited fees, harassment, unsafe work, data misuse, or another good-faith concern is prohibited. Knowingly false or malicious reports may themselves violate this policy.

Questions or rights requests

Contact MSA through the protected enquiry route.

Use the contact form for legal, privacy, cancellation, or complaint matters. Do not include passport numbers, medical information, or document copies in the public form.

Contact the agency