Is the Upwork forum a part of the "platform"?

[varungs]

More specifically, are we allowed to make payments outside of Upwork if the relationship was forged on the Upwork forum? I've had two clients message me from this forum itself, and I'm interested in hiring someone I met on here. Granted, I would do it through Upwork anyway because it has the best protection, but I became curious about this so I decided to ask.

tl;dr Does the Upwork forum count as "the platform" or is it off-platform?