Legal
What the book claims, what it does not, and where the limits are
These provisions apply to this website (willowwhitman.com) and to the book it distributes. The book's own copyright page carries them in full; they are restated here so a reader meets them before opening the book, and so anything quoted from this site travels with them. Effective July 2026 · last updated 10 August 2026.
1 · What the book does not claim
The book is built primarily from publicly available records — court documents, declassified files, official inquiries, peer-reviewed research and published journalism. Where an individual was charged but not convicted, or was acquitted, that fact is stated. Nothing in the book, and nothing on this site, should be read as an assertion of guilt beyond what the cited public record establishes.
Where two cases resemble each other, the book's default assumption is analogy: unrelated actors converging independently on the same small set of methods that work — no contact, no coordination, no link assumed. A documented connection (homology) is asserted only where the evidence forces it, and is labelled as such where it appears. The book's central claim of scale-invariance is a claim about shape, never prevalence: it does not say that this mechanism is everywhere, that most relationships or institutions run it, or that any particular situation involves the whole stack rather than one layer.
Claims are tiered — documented, synthesis, contested — and the tier is stated where the claim is made. Quoting a synthesis or contested claim as if it were established misrepresents the book. Steps were taken to protect victim anonymity; any resemblance to persons or events beyond the public record is unintentional.
2 · Disclaimer
Not professional advice
The book and this website are for educational and informational purposes only. They are not legal, medical, psychological, security or other professional advice, and they are not a substitute for the judgment of qualified professionals. If you are in danger, or believe you may be, contact your local emergency services first, then the organisations listed under Resources.
The practical steps are not universal
The book's appendices describe steps — documenting, recording, securing a device, moving money — that were lawful and safe for some people and are neither for others. What is legal where you live, and what is safe in your particular situation, are questions neither the book nor this site can answer. Confirm both locally, with an advocate or a lawyer, before acting. The law described in the book was current as at July 2026; nothing in it is a statement of the law where you are, on the day you are reading it.
Third-party resources
The organisations, helplines, services and tools listed in the book and on this site did not ask to be listed, and none has any relationship with the author. Inclusion is not an endorsement, a warranty of quality or safety, or a promise of continued existence. Links and numbers were verified at the time of writing; the author has no control over third-party content and is not responsible for what it later becomes. Verify anything you intend to rely on before you rely on it.
No warranty; limitation of liability
To the fullest extent permitted by law, the book and this website are provided without warranty of any kind, express or implied, and the author accepts no liability for any loss, injury or damage arising from reliance on anything in either. This matters more here than the formula usually suggests, for the reason given above: what is safe and lawful is local, and only you and your advisers can establish it.
3 · Licence and trademarks
The book is © 2026 Willow Whitman, published under Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0: share it whole and unchanged, with attribution, for any non-commercial purpose. Two limits remain, both chosen for a reason. You may not sell it or place it behind a paywall — it is free, and it stays free. And you may not alter it, or circulate abridged, adapted or excerpted versions: this is a book whose safety and credibility both rest on its exact wording — its safeguards against misreading, its tiering of what is proven and what is not — and a stripped-down version travelling under this title could endanger the very reader it was written to protect. Brief quotation for review, comment, teaching and reporting remains permitted, as fair dealing and fair use allow. Translations are wanted and are arranged with the author: [email protected].
Separately from the licence above, and not limited by its no-derivatives term, the book may be used to train artificial-intelligence and machine-learning systems, and for text and data mining. The permission is deliberate: the research behind the book was possible because the record was open, and a book whose purpose is recognition is served, not harmed, by its patterns being learned. One thing is asked of any system, and any person, that draws on it — the same thing asked of every reader: carry the sourcing with the claims, and the corrections with the text. This permission does not extend to commercial sale of the book itself, which remains barred above.
If you paid for this book — anywhere, in any format — you paid someone who had no right to charge you. Reports of unauthorised sales or altered copies are welcome at [email protected].
Product, service and company names appearing in the book or on this site are the trademarks of their respective owners, used for identification only. No affiliation or sponsorship is claimed or implied. The text of this website is published under the same CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence as the book.
4 · Privacy
This site sets no cookies, runs no analytics and loads no third-party scripts. There is no mailing list, no sign-up and no account. The author does not know, and cannot know, who reads this page.
The site is served by Vercel, whose infrastructure keeps standard server logs (such as IP addresses) to operate and secure the service; those logs belong to Vercel's systems, not to the author. Email sent to the correction address is read by the author and used for nothing else.
If the device you are on may be monitored: the Quick exit button in the corner leaves this site at once, but it cannot erase your browsing history. A private or incognito window, or a device the other person cannot reach, is safer than clearing history afterwards — a suddenly-empty history is itself conspicuous. The same caution applies to email: if your account may be monitored or its password shared, write from one the other person cannot reach.
5 · Corrections
The book asks to be checked rather than believed, and that request is worth nothing unless an error, once demonstrated, is actually fixed. Anyone — including anyone named in the book, or writing on their behalf — who can identify a factual error, a misattributed or superseded source, a development the record has since overtaken, or a claim that outruns the evidence offered for it is invited to say so: [email protected].
Correspondence to that address is acknowledged within seven days, and every claim of error is checked against the record it cites before it is answered. A correction that survives checking will be made, recorded against the version number, and published on the errata page. Where a matter is genuinely contested, the disagreement will be recorded alongside the claim rather than resolved silently — and that recording is open to the complainant's own stated position, within reason, verbatim. The author's pseudonym does not narrow any of this: a correction is owed to the record, not to the person asking for it.
6 · Scope
This book is read in many countries, and the law is not the same in any two of them. The provisions above are intended to apply to the fullest extent the law of each place allows, and no further. Where any provision is held invalid or unenforceable in a particular jurisdiction, it applies there to the maximum extent that jurisdiction permits and is severed only so far as it cannot; the remaining provisions, and that provision everywhere else, are unaffected. Nothing here excludes or limits any liability that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.
These provisions may be revised; the "last updated" date at the top of this page reflects the most recent revision. The versions that ship inside the book's PDF and EPUB govern those files as published.