Safety

Designed to be a safer place for students.

An honest read for parents, guardians, professors, and university IT teams. What we do, what we don't, and how to reach us.

Last updated May 5, 2026 · Written for non-users

What Butterfly is, in 30 seconds

Butterfly is a social app for verified college students. It helps students discover people on campus, connect with classmates, and start conversations through playful, low-pressure interactions.

Our core feature, Peek, turns a passive profile view into a simple connection loop: a student can peek at someone, the other person guesses who viewed their profile, and Butterfly gives them a short window to say hi and reply. Students can also find their classmates and join campus conversations.

Butterfly is not anonymous, and it is not affiliated with any university. We are an independent Delaware corporation currently live at USC and UCLA with roughly 10,000 verified students.

How we keep students safer than the average social app

🎓
.edu verification — every account

Every user signs up with a college email and confirms it via a one-time link. Accounts that can't verify never get into class chats. No fake accounts, no scrapers, no strangers from other countries.

👥
Real names, real classmates

Butterfly is not anonymous. Profiles use real names. Class chats are gated to students actually enrolled in that class. There's no sense of unknown audience that anonymous apps create.

🛡️
Human moderation, not just AI

Reports are reviewed by a real person — usually within hours. Repeat offenders are removed across the platform. We escalate reports involving minors with priority.

📵
One-tap controls

Block, mute, leave any chat in two taps. Report a message in two taps. Hide your profile from search. Disable optional fields entirely. Settings default to the safer option.

🔒
No precise location tracking

We don't track GPS. The app derives only city-level location from your IP address to route you to the right campus. Nothing you do or say in the app reveals where you physically are.

Specific protections for users under 18

Butterfly is age-rated 16+ and intended for college students, but some incoming freshmen are 17. We apply additional protections for any user under 18:

  • Optional fields are off by default. Profile visibility, relationship status, Instagram handle, etc. — all opt-in.
  • No profiling.We don't use information about minor users for any kind of behavioral profiling, even for product analytics.
  • Discovery is limited.Minor accounts don't appear in cross-class campus search by default.
  • Reports involving minors are escalated. Faster review, lower threshold for action.
  • No DMs from non-classmates. Minor accounts only receive direct messages from people in shared class chats.
  • No content involving minors. Sexual content involving anyone under 18 is reported to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and law enforcement, with the account permanently banned.

What we can — and can't — see

✓ Can see
  • ✓ Account info (name, email, school)
  • ✓ Class schedule you added
  • ✓ Messages you posted in chats (we don't read them, but we can access them on a valid report)
  • ✓ Reports filed by other users
  • ✓ App diagnostic data when something crashes
— Can't see
  • — Anything you do outside the Butterfly app
  • — Your contacts, photos, or browser history
  • — Your precise GPS location
  • — Your messages on other platforms
  • — Your school login credentials

For parents and guardians

If your student uses Butterfly, here's what you should know:

  • What Butterfly is for. Students use Butterfly to discover and meet people on their campus — through Peek, our four-step game that turns a profile view into a real conversation. Every account is .edu-verified, real-name, and tied to a school.
  • Privacy works both ways.Your student's school can't see what they say or do on Butterfly. Neither can you. We don't share account contents with anyone other than the account holder, except as required by law.
  • You can request your student's data be deleted. Email legal@butterflyapp.co with proof of guardianship, and we'll delete the account within 30 days.
  • You can report concerns about a specific account or interaction. Send details to trust@butterflyapp.co. Real people read every report.
  • If your student is in danger, contact local emergency services first — then send us what you know. We work cooperatively with law enforcement on credible threats and respond to legal requests promptly.

For university IT and student affairs

  • We don't store login credentials. Verification is one-time, via a magic link sent to the .edu inbox.
  • If you have concerns about Butterfly being used in a way that affects campus safety, email trust@butterflyapp.co. We'll work with you.
  • For legal process (subpoenas, preservation requests, search warrants), email legal@butterflyapp.co. We respond promptly to valid requests and push back on overbroad ones.
  • For security disclosures, see our Security page or email security@butterflyapp.co.

If something goes wrong

Most issues are resolved in-app. But if you need to escalate, here's where to send things:

Contact

Butterfly Social Network, Inc.
A Delaware corporation