Privacy Policy

Who we are

SpotUs (“we”, “us”) operates the SpotUs mobile app and related services. Questions about this policy: support@joinspotus.com. Safety reports can also go to reports@joinspotus.com or through in-app Report.

Information we collect

Account: email address, username, password (stored by our auth provider, not in readable form), date of birth (to enforce our age minimum), and optional profile name and profile photo. If you use Sign in with Apple or Google, we receive the identifiers those services share with us (such as a token and, when you allow it, name or email).

Social content you create: callouts, comments, stories, food drops, saved photos or videos, friend connections, Close Friends, and blocks. Direct messages are processed by our chat provider so you can message friends.

Location: when you turn on location sharing and open Nearby, we store your current position so mutual friends can see you on the map, according to your Close Friends / Other Friends settings. We do not keep a history of past locations — only the latest position.

Diet (optional): food-log entries you save, and meal photos you scan. Scan photos are sent to our servers and to a third-party AI provider to estimate foods and macros. We may keep a short-lived scan cache so the same photo is not re-analyzed immediately. Estimates are not medical or nutritional advice.

Device and app: push notification tokens, crash reports, and basic diagnostics so the app can run and we can fix bugs.

Reports: if you report a person or content, or someone reports you, we store the reason, optional details, and a snapshot of the reported content so we can review it.

How we use information

To create and run your account, show profiles and usernames to other users, and let you use friends, map, Pulse, messages, and Diet features.

To honor your location-sharing and notification choices, and to send pushes you have enabled (for example messages or Pulse activity).

To moderate the community (report, block, remove content or accounts that break our terms).

To improve the product (for example crash logs, and adding scanned foods to a shared food catalog without attaching them to your name).

We do not sell your personal information. We do not use your private messages or precise location to advertise to you.

Who can see what

Your username and profile (name, photo if you add one) can be seen by other SpotUs users as needed to use the app (for example friend search and friend profiles).

Location is visible only to mutual friends, and only if you enable Share My Location. Close Friends and Other Friends have separate visibility settings, including “at Spots only” (enforced more fully over time). Turning sharing off hides you from friends on the map.

Pulse callouts, stories, and food drops are shown to the audience you choose (friends or Close Friends), subject to friendship and block rules.

Direct messages are visible to people in that chat. We use a third-party chat service; they process message content to deliver the feature.

Your food log is private to you. Shared food photos (Food Drops or DMs) are visible to the people you share them with.

Service providers

We use companies that process data on our behalf to run SpotUs, including: hosting and database (Supabase), chat (Stream), maps (Mapbox), place search (Google), food-scan AI (Google), push delivery (Apple, Google, Expo), crash reporting (Sentry), and email (Resend) for report notifications.

Those providers see only what they need to provide their service, under their own terms and our instructions.

How long we keep data

We keep account and content data while your account is open. Stories and similar ephemeral posts expire on the schedule shown in the app (typically 24 hours).

If you delete your account, we remove your profile, friends graph, posts, messages access, diet log, location, and media we store for you. We keep reports other people filed about you (with a username snapshot, not a live account) so we can handle safety issues. Shared food-catalog entries that are not tied to your account may remain.

Backups and logs may persist for a short period after deletion, then drop off on our normal rotation.

Your choices

You can edit profile name and photo, location sharing, Close Friends, blocks, and notification settings in the app.

You can delete your account from Account & Support. That is permanent.

You can turn off location permission in your device settings; Nearby features that need GPS will not work.

You can disable notifications in the app and at the system level.

Children

SpotUs is for people 16 or older. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 16. If we learn that an underage account was created, we will delete it.

Security

We use industry-standard measures (encryption in transit, access controls, and database rules so users cannot read data they are not allowed to see). No method of transmission or storage is 100% secure.

Changes

We may update this policy. We will change the effective date above and, if changes are material, provide a notice in the app or by email. Continued use after the update means you accept the revised policy.

Contact

Privacy questions: support@joinspotus.com. Website: https://joinspotus.com.