# Safety levels

> The two safety levels, what is checked at each, what the safety event tells you, and what a child hears when a check acts.

Source: https://docs.voice.kheelona.com/concepts/safety-levels/

Every voice has a **safety level**, set by Kheelona: `child` or `general`. You can see it on the **Voices** page of your
console and in `GET /v1/voices`. You cannot change it, and the `instructions` of a session cannot switch it off.

## The levels

| | `child` | `general` |
|---|---|---|
| What the person says | Checked in every category | Checked for the most serious content |
| What the voice is about to say | Every sentence, in every category | Checked for the most serious content |
| Meant for | Voices for children | Voices for older users |

The `child` level is the strictest. It checks each sentence of the voice's reply before it is spoken, not only what the
person says. Use a `child` voice for a child.

A typed turn (`input.text`) goes through the same checks. On a `child` voice, what is said aloud is checked a little more strictly than typed text, because speech recognition can change the words.

## Enforced outside the prompt

Safety does not depend on asking the voice nicely. The checks run **outside** the voice's instructions, as separate steps
on the text of the turns, in all 11 languages. The voice's instructions do not control them, and your `instructions` cannot
remove them. You don't switch them on, and you can't switch them off.

## When the main check is slow

Kheelona's safety rules have more than one part. If the part that judges the meaning of a sentence cannot answer in time,
Kheelona's own safety rules still apply to that turn or sentence. That check is then less thorough, and the turn is
marked as such on Kheelona's side. You get no event for it. Don't assume a turn without a `safety` event was checked in
every way.

## What happens when a check acts

There are two places a check can act, and two things that can happen.

- **On what the person said** (stage `input`): the voice does not answer it. It says a short, friendly line in the
  person's language that changes the subject. The `safety` event has the action `redirected`, and the reply ends with
  `reply.done` and the reason `safety`.
- **On what the voice was about to say** (stage `output`): that sentence is dropped and never spoken. If nothing had
  been said yet, the voice says its friendly line instead and the reply ends. Otherwise the reply ends after the
  sentences already spoken. The `safety` event has the action `sentence_dropped`.
- A third stage, `provider`, is for a block reported by the system that writes the reply. You may never see it.

### A gentle line for a child who needs a grown-up

On a `child` voice, when what the person says is about hurting themselves, sexual content or violence (this covers a
child saying that they are being hurt), the voice does not change the subject. It answers with a calm, caring line that
tells the child to talk to a grown-up they trust, in their language, and says it is still there to play. It is the same
in every `child` voice. The event is the same `safety` event with the category `self_harm`, `sexual` or `violent`.

### Harmless replies are sometimes stopped

In every language, the checks sometimes stop a harmless reply, a few in every hundred in our tests. The voice then
says its short friendly line, or ends the reply early. The checks sometimes mistake a harmless reply for a harmful one,
and stop it.

On a `child` voice, a harmless question asked aloud is occasionally answered with the gentle "talk to a grown-up you
trust" line instead of the friendly one. This is rare, and it happens in every language.

### Beta languages

Of the [beta and alpha languages](https://docs.voice.kheelona.com/concepts/languages.md#supported-beta-and-alpha), Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam have less precise safety checks,
and they stop a few harmless sentences. On a `child` voice, such a sentence may get the gentle "talk to a
grown-up you trust" reply instead of an answer. Otherwise the voice changes the subject, or drops a sentence of its
reply. The checks stay on, even when that stops a harmless sentence. We measure them
again when they improve.

## The `safety` event

```json
{ "type": "safety", "turn": 3, "stage": "input", "category": "violent", "action": "redirected" }
```

| Field | Values |
|---|---|
| `turn` | The turn number. |
| `stage` | `input`, `output` or `provider`. |
| `category` | A short label for the kind of content. It is never the words themselves. |
| `action` | `redirected` or `sentence_dropped`. |

One event is sent per block, with one category. If several apply, the care categories `self_harm`, `sexual` and `violent`
come first. The labels today are:

- `violent`, `illegal`, `sexual`, `pii`, `self_harm`, `unethical`, `political`, `copyright`, `jailbreak`, `unknown`;
- `profanity`, `hate`, `romance`, `scary`, `dangerous_activity`, `substances`, `personal_data`;
- `unsafe`, when nothing more specific applies;
- `unchecked`, when a check could not be completed and the text was stopped to be safe.

The set can grow. **Treat a label you don't know as "other".** Kheelona does not publish the checks themselves.

## What to do with the event

The event is yours to use. For example: log it with the session ID, tell a parent or a moderator, or show a note in the
page. Kheelona does not keep the conversation, so the event is your record. In the browser SDK it is the `safety` event.
On a WebSocket it is the `safety` message. See [Live text events](https://docs.voice.kheelona.com/concepts/live-text.md) and the
[server events reference](https://docs.voice.kheelona.com/reference/generated/events/server.md).

If you decide that something in your product needs a human, such as a child who may be in danger, that is your
responsibility. Plan who reads these events before you go live.