Privacy Policy

Your privacy is important to us. It is EchoForge's policy to respect your privacy regarding any information we may collect from you across our website, https://readers-guild.com, and the ReadersGuild mobile application.

1. Information we collect

Log data

When you visit our website or use our app, our servers may automatically log the standard data provided by your web browser or device. It may include your computer’s Internet Protocol (IP) address, your browser type and version, the pages you visit, the time and date of your visit, the time spent on each page, and other details.

Device data

We may also collect data about the device you’re using to access our services. This data may include the device type, operating system, unique device identifiers, and device settings. In version 1.0, we do not collect GPS location data.

Personal information

We may ask for personal information, such as your:

• Email (used for magic link authentication via Supabase)
• Display name and username
• Avatar image
• Payment information (processed securely through RevenueCat and Apple/Google)

Business data

Business data refers to data that accumulates over the normal course of operation on our platform. This includes your reading sessions (minutes, pages read, book selections), social interactions (likes, comments, follows), and product analytics (via PostHog) to help us improve the experience.

Advertising and attribution

On iOS, we use your device's advertising identifier (IDFA) to measure how well our marketing works and understand which campaigns bring readers to the app. We only access this identifier if you grant permission through Apple's App Tracking Transparency prompt, and you can change your choice at any time in your device settings. This measurement is handled by our attribution provider, Singular, together with Apple's SKAdNetwork. We do not use this data to build advertising profiles or sell your information.

2. Legal bases for processing

We will process your personal information lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner. We collect and process information about you only where we have legal bases for doing so.

These legal bases depend on the services you use and how you use them, meaning we collect and use your information only where:

• it’s necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party (for example, providing the core reading tracker features);
• it satisfies a legitimate interest (such as for research and development, to improve the app, and to protect our legal rights);
• you give us consent to do so for a specific purpose; or
• we need to process your data to comply with a legal obligation.

3. Collection and use of information

We may collect, hold, use and disclose information for the following purposes:

• to provide you with the ReadersGuild platform's core features (timing sessions, social feed);
• to process subscriptions via RevenueCat;
• to enable social features like following other readers;
• to contact and communicate with you;
• for internal record keeping and administrative purposes; and
• to comply with our legal obligations.

4. Disclosure of personal information to third parties

We may disclose personal information to:

• Supabase (Authentication, Database, and Hosting);
• RevenueCat (Subscription and Revenue management);
• PostHog (Product analytics and error logging);
• Singular (Advertising attribution and marketing measurement);
• Our employees and contractors strictly for maintenance and support.

5. International transfers

The personal information we collect is stored and processed where our third-party providers maintain facilities. By providing us with your personal information, you consent to the disclosure to these overseas third parties. We ensure that any transfer of personal information is protected by appropriate safeguards.

6. Your rights and controlling your personal information

Choice and consent: By providing personal information to us, you consent to us collecting, holding, using and disclosing your personal information in accordance with this privacy policy.

Access and data portability: You may request details or a copy of the personal information that we hold about you. We provide a data export endpoint for this purpose.

Correction and Erasure: You may request that we erase the personal information we hold about you at any time. If you believe any information we hold is inaccurate, please contact us.

7. Cookies

We use “cookies” to collect information about you and your activity across our site. A cookie is a small piece of data that our website stores on your computer, so we can understand how you use our site and better serve you content.

8. Who processes data for us

We use a small number of providers to run ReadersGuild. Each handles only what it needs to, under its own terms and security commitments:

• Supabase — database, authentication, and file storage. Holds your account, library, reading sessions, and anything you post.
• RevenueCat — subscription status and entitlements. Payment itself is handled by Apple or Google; we never see your card.
• PostHog — product analytics, so we can see which parts of the app work and which do not.
• Resend — sends the emails you have asked for.
• Rippld — processes referrals and the rewards attached to them. It receives a referral code and an account identifier, and deliberately never receives names.
• Singular — measures which advertising brought readers to the app. See section 10.
• Cloudflare — content delivery, image hosting, and email routing.
• Google Books and Open Library — public book metadata and cover images. We send a search term, never anything about you.

9. How long we keep it

We keep your account and the things attached to it (library, reading sessions, posts, profile) for as long as your account is open, because they are the product.

If you delete your account, the deletion is immediate and irreversible. Your profile, library, reading sessions, posts, photos, and sign-in identity are removed from our live systems at once, not queued or held in a grace period. There is no undo, so please be sure before you confirm.

Two things outlive that. Encrypted backups held by our infrastructure provider are overwritten on a rolling schedule and are not used to restore individual accounts. And we may keep the minimum necessary to meet a legal, tax, or accounting obligation, or to resolve a dispute, for as long as that obligation lasts. Anonymized and aggregated statistics that can no longer identify you may be kept indefinitely.

10. Advertising, attribution, and identifiers

We do not show third-party advertising inside ReadersGuild, and we do not sell your personal information.

We do advertise ReadersGuild on other platforms, and we use Singular, a mobile measurement partner, to understand which campaigns actually bring readers in. Singular receives installation and event data along with device identifiers, and shares limited measurement data with the advertising networks that ran the campaign.

On iOS, Apple's App Tracking Transparency prompt controls this. If you decline, we do not access the advertising identifier (IDFA) and measurement falls back to Apple's privacy-preserving SKAdNetwork, which reports aggregate results and does not identify you. On Android you can reset or delete your advertising ID in system settings. Under California law, sharing data for cross-context behavioral advertising counts as “sharing,” and you can opt out as described in section 12.

11. Security

Data is encrypted in transit and at rest. Access to production systems is limited to those who need it and protected by multi-factor authentication. Row-level security rules in our database restrict every query to the data the requesting account is allowed to see, rather than relying on the app to ask nicely.

No system is perfectly secure, and we will not pretend otherwise. If we become aware of a breach affecting your personal information, we will notify you and the relevant supervisory authority as required by law.

12. California privacy rights

If you live in California, you may request access to the categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected, request deletion or correction, and opt out of the “sale” or “sharing” of personal information. We do not sell personal information. We do share advertising identifiers for measurement as described in section 10.

To exercise any of these rights, or to opt out of sharing for cross-context behavioral advertising, email [email protected] or decline the tracking prompt on iOS. We will not discriminate against you for exercising them.

13. Children

ReadersGuild is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you are under 18, you should have your parent or guardian's permission to use the Service.

If you believe a child under 13 has given us personal information, email [email protected] and we will delete the account and its data.

14. Limits of our policy

Our website may link to external sites that are not operated by us. Please be aware that we have no control over the content and policies of those sites, and cannot accept responsibility or liability for their respective privacy practices.

15. Changes to this policy

At our discretion, we may change our privacy policy to reflect current acceptable practices. Your continued use of this site or the app after any changes to this policy will be regarded as acceptance of our practices around privacy and personal information.