Privacy notice

What we collect

• Account details: your email address, and the sign-in method you used. If you sign in with Google, Google shares your name, email address and profile picture link with us; Vice Mate does not show your Google name or picture to other members. If you sign in with Apple, Apple shares your email address with us, or a private relay address if you choose to hide yours. We don't ask Apple for your name.
• Age check: when you sign up (or the first time you use the app after the check was added), the date of birth and country you give. We pre-fill the country from the approximate location of your connection (your IP address) as a guess, and you can change it. We use these details once, to check the minimum age. We don't store your date of birth or your country. We store only when the check was done and, if an account is locked for age reasons, the lock type and a time, plus a case reference when a moderator locked it after a report. We don't keep your age, birth year or whether you were under 18; if you were, your account is simply made private when you answer.
• Profile: your handle, display name, built-in avatar or profile photo, bio, spoiler level, theme and whether your account is public or private.
• Profile photo (optional). If you choose a photo for your profile, your phone or browser first crops it to a square. Our server then makes two small copies of the crop (512 and 128 pixels) and removes the information stored inside photo files, such as the camera, the date and the location. We store only those two copies. We never keep the photo you picked or its location data. Your photo is shown to signed-in members who can see your posts: if your account is private, only your approved followers see it. It is never shown to people you have blocked or who have blocked you, or to people who aren't signed in; they see your initial instead. A device that has already shown your photo may keep its own copy for up to a week. An automatic nudity check runs on our own server on each new photo (no other company sees it); a photo it flags, or can't check, is held for a moderator to look at before others can see it. If a photo is reported, moderators can see it. If a moderator removes it, we keep a copy for 90 days for appeals and safety, and longer while a child-safety report about it is open. When you change or remove your photo, the old copies are deleted straight away, unless a report about the photo is open, or it is a new photo the check flagged that is still waiting for a moderator; then they are kept for 90 days, and longer while a child-safety report about it is open. When you delete your account, your photos are deleted with it, except a photo under a child-safety report, which is kept without a link to your account until its 90-day hold ends, or longer while that report is open. Copies also exist in our encrypted backups until those expire (35 days).
• Images in posts (optional). If you add images to a post, your phone or browser first makes a copy of each one, at most 1600 pixels across. Our server then makes two copies (up to 1080 and 400 pixels) and removes the information stored inside image files, such as the camera, the date and the location. We store only those copies, never the file you picked. Images are shown only to signed-in members who can see the post: if your account is private, only your approved followers see them, and people you have blocked or who have blocked you never see them. A device that has already shown an image may keep its own copy for up to a week. Images in a post that is covered by a spoiler warning stay hidden until the viewer reveals the post. People who aren't signed in never see your images, and we never use them in link previews. Accounts less than 72 hours old can't add images. An automatic nudity check runs on our own server on each new image. Images it flags, or can't check, and every image from an account less than 7 days old, wait for a moderator before others can see them. If an image is reported, moderators can see it. When you remove an image or delete the post, we delete the image straight away, unless someone's report about the image or its post is still open, or it is an image the check flagged that is still waiting for a moderator; then we keep it for 90 days, and longer while a child-safety report about the image itself is open. If a moderator removes an image, we keep a copy for 90 days for appeals and safety, and longer while a child-safety report about the image itself is open. When you delete your account, your images are deleted with it, except an image under an open child-safety report (about the image or its post), which is kept without a link to your account or the post until its 90-day hold ends, or longer while that report is open. The image files are not included in our daily backups, so an image may be lost if we ever restore a backup.
• What you do in the app: posts (including YouTube links), reposts and quotes, communities you join, comments, likes, saved posts, follows and follow requests, blocks, spoiler reveals, notifications, direct messages and message requests, reports, appeals and messages you send to Support.
• Safety and security records: rate-limit events, moderation decisions and the staff audit log. Staff accounts also store a two-step verification (authenticator app) setting.
• Phone notifications (optional): if you turn them on, we store your phone's push address so we can send you notifications. A notification only says what happened and who did it, never what a post says. Turning notifications off or logging out removes your phone. A notification already on its way may still arrive after you turn notifications off or log out.
• Notifications in the iPhone app (optional): from version 1.1.1 of the Vice Mate iPhone app, you can turn notifications on or off in Settings. iOS asks you once for permission. If you turn them on, Apple's push service gives the app a push token for your device. We store it with your account, the language and the login session it was turned on in, and use it only to send you notifications. Each notification goes through the Apple Push Notification service and says only what happened and who did it, never the text of a post, comment or message. Turning notifications off in the app's Settings, logging out or deleting your account removes the token, and so does Apple telling us the token no longer works. If your session ends another way, we stop using the token straight away and delete it at our next clean-up. A notification already on its way may still arrive. Copies of a removed token may remain in our encrypted backups until they expire (35 days).
• Technical information: our hosting and database providers may keep server logs that include IP addresses, browser type and the time of a request. We have not yet checked exactly what each provider records or for how long.

We don't ask for game, console or friend data, contacts or payment details, and we don't collect precise location. We do use the approximate country of your connection, as described above. We don't add advertising trackers or analytics tools to the app. Our providers may still keep their own technical records.

Why we use it

• to create your account, sign you in and keep it secure;
• to show your profile and content to the people allowed to see it, and to show you feeds, search results and notifications;
• to send account emails, such as confirming your email address or resetting your password (we don't send marketing emails);
• to keep the community safe: handling reports, appeals and moderation, enforcing limits, and investigating abuse;
• to answer your Support requests, and to meet legal obligations.

We don't sell your personal information and we don't use it for advertising.

Who can see what

Your handle, display name, avatar and bio are visible to signed-in members, and your handle, display name and avatar appear next to your public posts and comments, including on shared post links. Posts and comments on a public account are visible to members, and anyone with a shared post link can read a public post and its comments. If your account is private, only you, approved followers and moderators can see your posts. When you are signed in, blocked members can't see your content and you can't see theirs. Blocking does not hide a public post from someone who is signed out and opens its link.

Signed-in members can see who follows a public account and whom it follows; a private account's lists are visible only to its owner, approved followers and moderators. Discover suggests members to follow, starting with people followed by people you follow, then people who follow you, staff, recently active members and new members.

Your email address is never shown to other members. Moderators can see reports, including who made them, but other members can't.

Your messages are visible only to you and the member you're talking to, and to moderators only when a message is reported.

When like notifications are on, a post's author sees the display name, username and avatar of members who liked it (only members they're allowed to see).

Your profile photo is visible only to signed-in members who can see your posts, and is never shown on shared links to people who aren't signed in.

Images in posts follow the post: only signed-in members who can see the post see them, and they stay hidden while the post is covered by a spoiler warning.

Direct messages (optional)

You can send one-to-one text messages to other members. In Settings you choose who can message you: everyone, people you follow (the default) or nobody. If your account is private, only people you follow can start a conversation with you. If you choose everyone, messages from people you don't follow arrive as requests that you can accept or delete; deleting a request deletes it for both of you and stops that member sending you another request for 30 days. We store each message's text, who sent it, which conversation it belongs to, when it was sent and how far each of you has read, so we can deliver messages and show your conversations. Messages are not end-to-end encrypted. They are stored with our database provider (Supabase), and our systems can read them. Moderators can't browse conversations. If a message is reported, moderators see that message and up to 10 earlier messages from the same conversation, and that copy is kept with the report even if the messages are later deleted. The person who reported it is never shown to the other member. Deleting a conversation removes it for you only. Once both of you have deleted it, its messages are deleted from our database. If either of you blocks the other, the conversation ends and disappears for both of you; its messages are kept for 30 days from that block only so that either of you can still report a message you received, and are then deleted. When you delete your account, your conversations (for the other member too) and messages are deleted, including messages kept only for reporting after a block, except copies of your messages that were already saved with a report about one of your messages, which are kept without a link to your account. Copies of your own messages saved as context with a report you made are deleted. A phone notification about a new message never includes the message or who sent it.

Service providers and overseas storage

We use these providers to run Vice Mate. They handle personal information only to provide their service to us:

• Supabase: database and sign-in. Our database is hosted in Sydney, Australia.
• Vercel: hosts the app. Requests pass through Vercel's global network, so they may be handled in countries other than Australia, including the United States. We have not yet confirmed where each type of log is processed.
• Google: sends account emails through a Gmail account (a temporary arrangement), and provides Google sign-in if you choose it.
• GitHub: stores our encrypted daily backups for up to 35 days. Backups are encrypted with a password that Vice Mate keeps; it is also stored as an encrypted GitHub Actions secret so the backup job can run. GitHub is based in the United States.
• YouTube: video posts load YouTube's privacy-enhanced player only when you press Play. YouTube's privacy policy then applies to that video.
• Apple: provides Sign in with Apple if you choose it, and distributes the iPhone app through the App Store and TestFlight.
• Your phone's push service (Apple, Google, Mozilla or Microsoft, depending on your phone and browser): delivers phone notifications, only if you turn them on.
• Apple Push Notification service: delivers notifications to the Vice Mate iPhone app, only if you turn them on in the app.

We may also share information if the law requires it, or to protect someone's safety.

Members outside Australia

Vice Mate is run from Australia and is open to members around the world. Your information is stored in Australia and processed by the providers above, some of which are outside Australia. We have not yet completed a review of which international data transfer, consent or lawful-basis rules apply to members in the European Union, the United Kingdom or elsewhere. This section will be updated after that review.

In the meantime, wherever you live, you can ask us what information we hold about you, ask us to correct it or delete it, or raise a concern, using Support or vicemate2026@gmail.com. We will tell you what we can and cannot do.

Members under 18

Accounts of members under 18 start private. They can change this in Settings, and can block anyone or report anything that worries them. We don't use members' information for advertising and we don't sell it. A parent or guardian who is concerned about a young person's account can contact us through Support or at vicemate2026@gmail.com, and we will review it.

Cookies

Vice Mate uses only the cookies it needs: sign-in cookies that keep you signed in, a cookie that remembers your theme (vm-theme), one that remembers your last feed tab (vm-tab), one that remembers the language you chose (vm-locale), one that remembers that you closed the Get started card (vm-gs), and, if a sign-up is refused because of age, a one-day cookie that stops the same browser trying again straight away. That cookie is only a convenience and is not an age check. We don't set advertising or tracking cookies. YouTube may set its own when you press Play. The app also keeps a few small settings on your device (local storage), such as a dismissed install banner, a post you haven't finished, and whether you've seen the notifications prompt.

How long we keep it

We keep your account and content until you delete your account. When you delete your account, we sign you out everywhere, hide everything at once and then permanently remove your sign-in identity, profile, profile photos, posts, images in your posts, likes, saves, follows, blocks, notifications, reveals and Support requests. A profile photo or image under a child-safety report is kept without a link to your account, as described above. Comments that others replied to stay as an empty placeholder with no text and no author, so the conversation still makes sense. The deletion page shows Complete only after we have checked that these records are gone.

Some records are kept after deletion for safety and accountability. We have not yet set final retention periods for them, and there is not yet an automatic job that deletes them when they expire. Until that is decided and built, they are kept until we remove them ourselves:

• a deletion receipt (account ID, status and dates);
• reports and appeals you wrote, with your name removed;
• reports, moderation actions and audit entries about your account;
• your email on the invite list, while sign-ups are invite-only (deleting your account does not currently remove it);
• copies inside our encrypted backups, until those backups expire (35 days). If we restore an old backup, a deleted account could briefly reappear until the deletion is applied again.

Your choices and rights

You can view and change your profile and settings at any time, make your account private, block members, and delete your account from Settings.

You can ask us for a copy of your personal information, or to correct it, through Support or by email. We don't yet have a self-service download, so we will respond to your request manually, as soon as we reasonably can, and within 30 days. We may need to confirm it's you first.

If you have a concern about how we handle your information, contact us first. If you're not satisfied with our reply, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (oaic.gov.au).

Security

Your data is protected in transit with HTTPS. Every read and write goes through checks in the database, staff tools require two-step verification, and backups are encrypted. No system is perfectly secure. If there is a data breach, we will tell affected people and regulators where we are required to.

Age

Our minimum age is 16 if you live in Australia and 13 anywhere else, and higher in the countries on our list. That is our own rule, and the list has not been checked by a lawyer. Your sign-in account exists before we ask your age. If the date of birth and country you give show you are below the minimum age, your account is locked and made private. It is not deleted. You can ask for a review, contact Support, sign out, or delete the account yourself, and staff can keep or lift the lock. Nothing in the age check deletes an account automatically. While an account is locked, its profile, posts and comments are hidden from other members, and it is kept until a staff member reviews it by hand. Members who joined before the check was added are asked to confirm their age once. Anyone can report an account they believe is under the minimum age. A moderator can then lock it, the member is told the reason and a case reference, and they can appeal. A 24-hour cookie in your browser stops the same browser starting a new sign-up straight after an under-minimum answer. The age check applies to signed-in accounts; public post links can still be opened by people who are signed out. If you believe a younger person has an account, tell us through Support or use Report in the app.

Changes and contact

If we change this notice in a significant way we will tell you in the app. Questions or requests: use Support in the app, or email vicemate2026@gmail.com.