Privacy Policy

Last updated: Draft

This policy explains what information Hingtam collects, how we use and share it, and the choices and rights you have — wherever in the world you’re using the app. It covers the Hingtam mobile app and applies to members in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, the United States, and Bhutan.

Information we collect

We collect information you give us directly, and a small amount we generate to make the app work.

• Account & profile information — your name, date of birth, email address, gender, the photos you upload, your bio and prompt answers, and the preferences you set (such as who you’re looking for).
• Location — if you allow it, your precise location, used only to calculate distance to other members and to show or filter candidates nearby. You can deny or later revoke this in your device settings; matching just won’t be distance-aware without it.
• Photos and chat images — every photo you upload, and every image you send in a conversation, is scanned by an automated moderation check before anyone else can see it.
• Messages and activity — the messages you send, and your likes, matches, blocks, hides, and reports.
• Account & device information — basic sign-in and session data needed to keep you securely logged in.

How we use it

• To create your profile and show you (and show you to) potential matches.
• To calculate distance-based matching, where you’ve allowed location access.
• To screen photos and chat images for content that violates our Community Guidelines, before they’re shown to anyone.
• To operate core features — messaging, matching, notifications about your account.
• To review reports, enforce our Community Guidelines, and keep the app safe.
• To contact you about your account — for example, confirming a change to your email.

Who we share it with

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it with advertisers. We share it only with:

• Other members — the profile information you choose to show is visible to other members you match or are shown to, exactly as you’ve set it up in your profile.
• Service providers — companies that process data on our behalf to run the app: our database, authentication and file storage provider; the automated service we use to screen photos and chat images before they’re shown to anyone; and our transactional email provider, used only for account emails like sign-in and email-change confirmations. They can only use your data to provide these services to us.
• Law enforcement or legal requests — if we’re required to by law, or to protect the safety of a member or the public.

Your rights

Everyone can ask us to access, correct, or delete their personal information, and can delete their account at any time from Settings. Beyond that, some rights are specific to where you live:

• Australia — we handle your personal information in line with the Australian Privacy Principles under the Privacy Act 1988. You can ask how your information is held and used, and complain to us or to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) if you believe we’ve mishandled it.
• Canada — under PIPEDA, we only collect what we’ve told you we collect it for, and won’t use it for a new purpose without asking again. You can request access to, or correction of, the information we hold about you.
• United Kingdom — under the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, you have the right to access, correct, or erase your personal information, to restrict or object to how we use it, and to receive a copy of it in a portable format. You can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk if you believe we’ve mishandled your information.
• New Zealand — under the Privacy Act 2020, you can request access to, or correction of, the personal information we hold about you. You can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (privacy.org.nz) if you believe we’ve breached your privacy rights, and we’ll notify both you and the Commissioner of any data breach likely to cause you serious harm.
• United States (California residents) — under the CCPA/CPRA, you have the right to know what personal information we’ve collected about you, to request its deletion, and to correct inaccurate information. We don’t sell or share personal information for cross-context advertising, so there’s no opt-out needed for that.
• Bhutan — Bhutan does not yet have a dedicated data protection law; we apply the practices in this policy — access, correction, and deletion on request — to all members regardless of location, Bhutan included.

To exercise any of these, contact us at support@hingtam.com.

Retention, security, and more

• Retention — we keep your information while your account is active. If you delete your account, we delete your profile, photos, and messages, other than what we’re required to keep for legal, safety, or fraud-prevention reasons.
• Security — we use industry-standard safeguards, including encryption in transit, to protect your information. No system is completely immune to risk, but we work to keep yours secure.
• Children — Hingtam is for adults 18 and over. We check your date of birth at sign-up and don’t knowingly collect information from anyone under 18.
• International data — our service providers may process your information in countries other than the one you’re in. Wherever that happens, we require the same standard of protection described in this policy.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as Hingtam changes. Material changes will show a new “last updated” date above. If you have questions about this policy, contact us at support@hingtam.com.