Law Enforcement Guidelines

1. About these guidelines

These guidelines explain how law enforcement and other government agencies may request member records from Yoked Matchmaking LLC ("Yoked"), a Texas limited liability company operating a membership-based matchmaking service in East Texas. We cooperate with valid legal process, we review every request individually, and we disclose records only as described below and as required by applicable law, including the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2701 et seq.

2. How to submit a request

Serve legal process by email to hello@yokedmatchmaking.com with the subject line "Law Enforcement Request" (or "EMERGENCY Law Enforcement Request" for emergency disclosure requests, see Section 7). Requests may also be served by mail to Yoked Matchmaking LLC's registered agent in Texas; the registered agent's address is on file with the Texas Secretary of State. Acceptance of legal process by email is for convenience and does not waive any objection, including to jurisdiction or proper service.

3. Requester verification is required

We verify every request before processing it. Requests must:

• be issued on official agency letterhead;
• be sent from an official government email address (we do not accept requests from personal email accounts);
• be signed by the responsible officer, agent, or prosecutor, and identify that person by name, badge or identification number where applicable, agency, and division;
• include a direct callback telephone number and email so we can independently verify the request with the issuing agency before responding.

We may contact the issuing agency through publicly listed channels to confirm authenticity. Requests that cannot be verified will not be processed.

4. Account identifiers are required

Yoked is a small, closed membership service. We identify accounts by the information members give us. Every request must identify the account(s) at issue with as much of the following as possible; we cannot process requests that do not include sufficient identifiers:

• the member's full name;
• the email address associated with the account;
• the phone number associated with the account;
• the approximate date of account creation, if known; and
• the specific date range of the records sought.

Overbroad requests (for example, "all records" with no date range) will be narrowed or objected to. We do not operate usernames or public profiles; screen-name-only requests cannot be matched to an account.

5. Legal process required, by record type

Consistent with 18 U.S.C. § 2703, we require:

• Valid subpoena (grand jury, trial, or administrative). For basic subscriber records: name, email address, phone number, dates of account creation and termination, means and source of payment, and IP addresses used at signup and sign-in, where held.
• Court order under 18 U.S.C. § 2703(d). For records and other information pertaining to the account that are not contents of communications, including message header information and usage records beyond basic subscriber information.
• Search warrant issued on probable cause by a court of competent jurisdiction. For the contents of member communications (for example, messages between members), profile answers, photos, and any other stored content.

Each response is limited to the specific accounts, record types, and date ranges named in the legal process. We produce records in standard electronic formats and certify authenticity on request.

6. Preservation requests

On receipt of a preservation request under 18 U.S.C. § 2703(f) that meets the verification requirements of Section 3 and identifies the account per Section 4, we will preserve the identified records for 90 days, renewable once for an additional 90 days on written request. Preservation is not disclosure; disclosure still requires the legal process listed in Section 5.

7. Emergency disclosure

Under 18 U.S.C. § 2702(b)(8) and (c)(4), we may disclose records without legal process when we believe in good faith that an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical injury requires disclosure without delay. Mark these requests "EMERGENCY" in the subject line and include: the nature of the emergency, the specific danger and the person(s) at risk, why the danger is imminent, the records needed, and how those records will help prevent the harm. Emergency requests are reviewed immediately, at any hour. We voluntarily report child sexual exploitation to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) as required by 18 U.S.C. § 2258A.

8. Member notice

Our policy is to notify a member before disclosing their records, unless we are prohibited from doing so by law or court order (for example, an order under 18 U.S.C. § 2705(b)), or we believe in good faith that notice would create a risk of harm to any person, would compromise an investigation into child exploitation, or the request is a verified emergency under Section 7. When a non-disclosure obligation expires, we may then notify the member.

9. Requests from outside the United States

Yoked is a United States company and holds records in the United States. Non-U.S. law enforcement should proceed through a mutual legal assistance treaty (MLAT) request or letters rogatory directed to the U.S. Department of Justice, resulting in U.S. legal process.

10. Costs, and what we retain

We do not currently charge for responding to routine requests, and we reserve the right to seek cost reimbursement permitted by law for unusually burdensome requests. Note that Yoked retains records only in the ordinary course of running the service; records deleted in the ordinary course before a preservation request is received may not be available.