Website Terms and Conditions

1. ABOUT THESE TERMS

1.1 This website at www.hackhouse.com (the "Website") is owned and operated by HackHouse Pty Ltd (ABN 38 620 566 430) ("HackHouse", "we", "us", "our"), an Australian offensive security company with its registered office at Unit 155, 248 Osborne Ave, Clayton South VIC 3169.

1.2 These terms apply to your use of the Website. By using the Website you agree to them. If you do not agree, please do not use the Website.

1.3 Our Website Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal information collected through the Website and forms part of these terms.

1.4 These terms govern the Website only. They do not govern any services HackHouse provides. Section 3 explains how our services are contracted.

2. THE WEBSITE IS FOR INFORMATION

2.1 The Website describes HackHouse and the services we offer, and lets you contact us. The content is general information about security and about our services. It is not advice about your organisation's systems, your legal or regulatory obligations, or any particular situation, and you should not rely on it as such.

2.2 We take care to keep the Website accurate and current, but we do not promise that it is complete, accurate or up to date at any time, or that it will be available without interruption. We may change, suspend or remove any part of the Website at any time without notice.

2.3 Nothing on the Website is an offer to provide services. Descriptions of services, methodologies, certifications and experience are indicative and are confirmed, for any engagement, in the documents described in section 3.

3. HOW OUR SERVICES ARE CONTRACTED

3.1 HackHouse provides its services only under a written agreement: a Master Services Agreement and a Statement of Work, or a written proposal that you accept, and any Rules of Engagement that accompany them. No contract for services is formed by using the Website, by sending an enquiry, or by any response to an enquiry, until that written agreement is in place.

3.2 Security testing and related services can be carried out only with the written authorisation of the person entitled to give it, for the systems and period that the authorisation covers. Nothing on the Website, and no enquiry through it, is an authorisation to test, or a request by HackHouse to be authorised.

3.3 Where you contract with us for services, the terms of that written agreement govern the services, and these terms do not apply to them. Terms on a purchase order, supplier portal or similar document do not apply to our services unless we agree to them in writing.

4. ENQUIRIES AND INFORMATION YOU SEND US

4.1 When you contact us through the Website we will use the information you send to respond to you, as our Website Privacy Policy describes.

4.2 We treat the content of an enquiry about our services as confidential, and use it only to respond to you and to prepare any proposal you ask for. Confidentiality obligations beyond that, including the terms on which we can receive detailed information about your systems, are set out in the non-disclosure deed or services agreement we enter into with you.

4.3 Please do not send us credentials, personal information about other people, or other sensitive material through a Website form or by unencrypted email. If an engagement needs it, we will agree a secure channel with you.

4.4 By sending us content other than an enquiry about our services, such as feedback, a suggestion or an idea, you agree that we may use it without obligation to you, and you confirm you have the right to send it to us.

5. ACCEPTABLE USE OF THE WEBSITE

5.1 You may use the Website for its intended purposes: to read its content and to contact us. You must not:

(a) use the Website for any unlawful purpose or in breach of any law;
(b) interfere with or disrupt the Website or the systems and networks that host it, or impose an unreasonable load on them;
(c) attempt to gain unauthorised access to any part of the Website, or to any system, account or data connected to it, except as section 6 permits;
(d) scrape, harvest or systematically collect content or email addresses from the Website, including by automated means;
(e) send us unsolicited commercial communications through the Website's contact channels, or use them to send anything that is unlawful, defamatory, abusive or that contains malicious code;
(f) impersonate HackHouse, our personnel or any other person, or misrepresent your relationship with us; or
(g) remove or alter any copyright or trade mark notice on the Website.

6. SECURITY RESEARCH AND VULNERABILITY REPORTS

6.1 HackHouse welcomes reports of security vulnerabilities in its own systems. Report a vulnerability to security@hackhouse.com. We acknowledge every report within 5 business days and will keep you informed of our progress. We will not publish your name without your permission.

6.2 Safe harbour. HackHouse will not take legal action against, or make a complaint to law enforcement about, a person who reports a vulnerability in HackHouse's systems in good faith and who:

(a) tests only HackHouse's own systems;
(b) accesses, keeps and discloses no more data than is needed to demonstrate the vulnerability, and deletes it afterwards;
(c) does not degrade or disrupt any service, use social engineering, or attempt physical access;
(d) stops and reports immediately on encountering client data or personal information, and does not access, modify or destroy it; and
(e) does not disclose the vulnerability publicly before HackHouse has had a reasonable opportunity to remediate it, normally 90 days.

6.3 HackHouse treats research within these conditions as authorised access to its own systems for the purposes of Part 10.7 of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth) and the computer offence provisions of State and Territory law, including Part I Division 3 of the Crimes Act 1958 (Vic), Part 6 of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) and section 408E of the Criminal Code (Qld).

6.4 HackHouse cannot authorise access to systems it does not own or control. The Website may be hosted on, and relies on, platforms operated by our service providers. Testing that reaches those providers' systems, or any client's systems, is outside this authorisation, and HackHouse cannot bind law enforcement or a prosecutor.

6.5 Research outside the conditions in section 6.2 is not authorised, and section 5.1(c) applies to it.

7. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

7.1 The Website and its content, including text, graphics, logos, the HackHouse name and marks, methodologies, document and report formats, and the design and layout of the Website, are owned by HackHouse or used under licence, and are protected by copyright, trade mark and other laws.

7.2 You may view the Website, and print or download its content, for your own information and for the purpose of considering or dealing with HackHouse. You must not otherwise reproduce, adapt, distribute, publish or commercially exploit any part of the Website without our prior written consent. You may link to the Website's home page provided you do not suggest that HackHouse endorses you or your website.

7.3 Nothing on the Website grants you any licence or right in HackHouse's intellectual property, including its methodologies, tooling or report templates, other than as section 7.2 states.

8. THIRD-PARTY LINKS AND CONTENT

8.1 The Website may link to websites, resources or publications that HackHouse does not operate. Those links are provided for convenience. HackHouse does not endorse, and is not responsible for, the content, accuracy, security or privacy practices of any third-party website, and your use of it is at your own risk and subject to its terms.

9. AUSTRALIAN CONSUMER LAW

9.1 The Australian Consumer Law in Schedule 2 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), and other laws, may give you rights and guarantees that cannot be excluded, restricted or modified by agreement. Nothing in these terms excludes, restricts or modifies any such right or guarantee, or any liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.

9.2 Where a guarantee under the Australian Consumer Law applies to anything HackHouse supplies through the Website and the law permits it, HackHouse's liability for a failure to comply with that guarantee is limited, at HackHouse's option, to supplying the relevant services again or paying the cost of having them supplied again.

10. LIABILITY

10.1 The Website is provided free of charge, for information. Subject to section 9, HackHouse excludes all conditions, warranties and guarantees that would otherwise be implied into these terms, and does not promise that the Website will be free of errors, viruses or other harmful components.

10.2 Subject to section 9, HackHouse is not liable to you for any loss or damage arising from your use of, or inability to use, the Website or its content, or from your reliance on any information on it, including any indirect or consequential loss, loss of profit, revenue, data or business opportunity, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), under statute or otherwise. Where liability cannot be excluded but can be limited, it is limited to AUD 100.

10.3 Nothing in these terms limits HackHouse's liability for fraud, for death or personal injury caused by its negligence, or for any other liability that cannot lawfully be limited.

10.4 You are responsible for your own use of the Website and for any loss HackHouse suffers that is directly caused by your breach of section 5. HackHouse will take reasonable steps to mitigate any such loss.

11. PRIVACY

11.1 HackHouse handles personal information collected through the Website in accordance with its Website Privacy Policy and the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). The Website Privacy Policy explains what we collect, why, who we disclose it to, including the technology service providers we use and the countries they operate in, how to ask for access or correction, and how to complain.

12. CHANGES TO THESE TERMS

12.1 We may change these terms from time to time. The current version is published on the Website, and the version number and effective date at the top identify it. A change applies to your use of the Website after it is published. Where a change is material, we will draw attention to it on the Website.

13. GENERAL

13.1 These terms are governed by the laws of Victoria, Australia. You and HackHouse submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of Victoria and the courts entitled to hear appeals from them.

13.2 If any part of these terms is invalid or unenforceable, it is severed to the extent necessary and the rest of these terms continues in force.

13.3 A failure or delay by HackHouse in exercising a right under these terms is not a waiver of it.

13.4 These terms, together with the Website Privacy Policy, are the entire agreement between you and HackHouse about your use of the Website. They do not affect any other agreement between you and HackHouse, which continues to govern its own subject matter.

14. CONTACT

Organisation: HackHouse Pty Ltd
ABN: 38 620 566 430
Registered office: Unit 155, 248 Osborne Ave, Clayton South VIC 3169, Australia
Enquiries: through the contact form on the Website
Privacy: privacy@hackhouse.com
Security reports: security@hackhouse.com