Privacy Policy

1. Information we collect

Information you give us

• Account details: the email address you sign in with, your display name and profile photo, and a phone number if you add one to your contact details. If you add them, your profile’s bio, banner and color. We also keep your language and time zone settings.
• Creator applications: your name, phone number, social media handles, the kind of content you make, why you’d like to join and how you heard about us, along with our review notes and the status of your intro call.
• Your world, if you’re a creator: your world’s address, name, photo, cover image, bio, niche and prices, its look (colors, background and any wallpaper photo you upload), and the Now line you set.
• Team invitations: if you invite someone to help run your world, their email address or phone number.
• Membership choices: the worlds and plans you choose, any VIP upgrades, and any notes or social handles you previously submitted with a request to join.
• Content and messages: the posts, stories, photos, videos, custom thumbnails, messages, private media offers, gifts, GIFs and world updates you create or send, the posts and stories you like or save, and your reactions, poll votes and replies on world updates.
• Custom video requests: the occasion, who the video is for, their name and how to say it, who it’s from, any birthday details you add (the month, the day and the age they’re turning) and what you’d like the creator to say. If you’re a creator, the videos you record or upload for these requests.
• Calls and live streams: booking details, the people taking part, audio or video mode, scheduled time and duration, payment references, connection events and call status. We do not record or store call audio or video. Audio and video are transmitted through our calling provider while you take part.
• Support and safety: your support conversations, the reports you make and the worlds you block.
• Referrals: your referral code.

When you upload a photo, the copies people see have hidden details such as its location removed. We keep the original file privately, and it isn’t shown to anyone. Videos that contain location data are refused.

OurWorld uses your camera and microphone only when you choose to: to take a photo or video to send, during a call, while you host a live stream or while you record a custom video. Your browser asks for permission before OurWorld can use them. Calls and live streams aren’t recorded. A custom video you record is uploaded only when you choose to send it.

Information created when you use OurWorld

• Memberships and purchases: the worlds you’ve joined or asked to join, your membership and VIP status, what you’ve bought, prices, dates, renewals, refunds and disputes, and payment references from Stripe.
• Creator earnings: for creators, your earnings, transfers and payout account status, including the country and the bank name and last four digits that Stripe shares with us.
• Sign-in and devices: how and when you signed in, when each session was last active, and your browser and device type, which comes from the information your browser sends.
• Notifications: your notification settings and choices, the notices we send you and whether they were delivered, and any worlds or conversations you’ve muted.
• Referrals: who referred you, if anyone, the people you refer, the rewards you earn and, if you set up reward payouts, your payout account’s status and your payouts.
• Posts and stories you’ve seen: when you open a post or watch a story to the end, we record it. A post shows only how many people opened it; under a story, the world’s team can see who watched it and who liked it.
• Statistics: when memberships start and end and when posts are published. These records use a scrambled identifier instead of your account ID. You can choose whether your activity counts toward them under Creator analytics in Privacy & security.
• Security records: records of important account changes and staff actions. We also use your IP address and email address to limit repeated attempts, such as too many requests for sign-in codes.
• Technical information: browser and device information, page or request details, timestamps and error reports that help us diagnose failures and protect the service. We limit personal information in these reports and restrict who can access them.

Information from other companies

• Google or Apple: if you sign in with them, we receive an ID for your account with them, your email address if they’ve verified it, and your name. We don’t receive your password.
• Stripe: whether payments succeed, and information about renewals, refunds, disputes and payouts.
• Our email provider: whether an email was delivered, bounced or marked as spam.

2. How we use your information

• To run OurWorld: to create and protect your account, sign you in, show you worlds, deliver posts, stories, messages and custom videos, and give you the access you’ve paid for.
• To handle payments: to confirm purchases, manage renewals, refunds and disputes, pay creators, and work out and pay referral rewards.
• To review creators: to assess creator applications and set up approved worlds.
• To contact you: to send sign-in codes, confirm your email address, and send the notifications you’ve chosen and important notices about your account and purchases.
• To keep OurWorld safe: to prevent fraud and abuse, review reports and enforce our Terms of Service.
• To help you: to answer your support requests and investigate technical problems.
• To understand how OurWorld is used: to count things like active accounts and memberships, and to show creators statistics about their world.
• To meet legal obligations: such as keeping financial records and responding to lawful requests.

We don’t sell your personal information, and we don’t use it for targeted advertising.

Our reasons for processing personal information

Where data protection law requires a legal basis, we process account, membership and purchase information to provide the services you request and perform our agreement with you. We rely on our legitimate interests to protect accounts, prevent abuse, provide support and fix technical problems, while considering your rights. We also process information to meet legal obligations, such as keeping financial records. Where we rely on consent for an optional feature, you can withdraw that consent through the relevant settings or by contacting us.

3. Who can see your information

Public world pages

If you’re a creator, anyone with your world’s link can see its profile, even without an account: your world’s address, name, photo, cover image, look, bio, Now line, prices, highlights and aggregate counts such as members and posts, with your posts shown locked. Signed-in people can also find your world in Discover and in search, with a few post previews. Paid or member-only content stays locked, or blurred in previews, until the viewer has the required access.

Creators and their teams

When you join or interact with a world, its creator can see your display name, profile photo and profile look (banner and color), your membership and VIP status in their world, what you’ve bought there and how much you’ve spent in total, your interactions with that world, and the messages, custom video requests and world update replies you send them, when you’ve read their messages, and whether you’re typing to them. Under each story, they can see who has watched it to the end and who liked it. If you previously submitted a request, they can also see the note and social media handle you included. Creators can invite team members to help run their world, and the creator decides what those team members can see and do. Creators see how many people liked or opened a post, not who. If you report a post or a world, we don’t tell the creator who reported it.

Other members

We do not publish a member directory or offer member-to-member messaging. Worlds show aggregate member counts. If you reply to a world update, only the creator and their team see your reply; other members see only the totals for replies, reactions and poll votes. During a live stream, other viewers can see gifts and GIFs you send. A paid gift shows your public display name; other member activity uses a generic member label. Your sign-in details and private conversations are not shown to other viewers.

OurWorld staff

Our team can see the information they need to do their jobs, such as reviewing creator applications, answering support requests, reviewing reports and handling payments. Our tools don’t let staff open your private conversations, but if a message is reported, the people reviewing the report can see what was reported. Messages aren’t end-to-end encrypted.

4. Companies that help us run OurWorld

We use these companies to provide OurWorld. They receive the information they need to do their part:

• Stripe processes payments and subscriptions, and runs the payout accounts of creators and of people paid referral rewards, including identity checks.
• Resend sends our emails, including sign-in codes.
• Cloudflare stores and delivers photos, videos and thumbnails.
• GIF providers, such as Klipy and Giphy, return search results and deliver images when you browse or send a GIF.
• LiveKit transmits audio and video for calls and live streams and processes connection and participant information needed to run them. OurWorld does not enable call recording.
• Error monitoring and operational alert providers receive technical diagnostics and limited error summaries so we can investigate outages and failures.
• Render hosts our servers and database.
• Vercel hosts our website.
• Google and Apple provide sign-in if you choose to use them.
• Google Fonts provides the font in our emails. If your email app loads it, Google receives your IP address.
• Push services run by browser makers, such as Google, Mozilla and Apple, deliver push notifications if you turn them on.
• Calendly handles intro call bookings for creator applicants who use the booking link we send.

When you use another company’s pages, such as Stripe’s checkout, that company’s privacy policy applies too.

5. Other times we share information

• To follow the law: when we believe in good faith that the law requires it, for example to respond to a valid legal request.
• To protect people: to prevent harm, fraud or abuse, or to protect the rights and safety of our users, OurWorld or others.
• If OurWorld changes hands: if OurWorld is part of a merger, acquisition or sale of assets, information may be transferred as part of that deal, and this policy will still apply to it.
• With your permission: when you ask us to.

6. Cookies and browser storage

We use cookies for sign-in, security and referral attribution. We don’t use advertising or analytics cookies.

• Sign-in cookie (__Host-ow_session) keeps you signed in. It lasts up to 30 days, and ends sooner if you don’t use OurWorld for 14 days.
• Security verification cookie (__Host-ow_mfa_device) remembers a trusted device where additional verification is enabled, so you aren’t asked for a code every time. It lasts 90 days.
• Google and Apple sign-in cookie (__Host-ow_oauth) connects a Google or Apple sign-in to the browser that started it. It lasts 10 minutes.
• Referral cookie (__Host-ow_ref) remembers a referral link you opened, so the person who invited you can be credited. It lasts up to 30 days.

We also keep a few things in your browser so they survive a reload: your appearance setting, message drafts and messages waiting to send, the lists of worlds you’ve loaded (for up to a day), which stories you’ve seen, and short-lived details that help you finish signing in, paying or uploading. For GIF search we keep a random ID, which the GIF provider receives with your search words instead of anything that identifies you. We also save some of our public files so OurWorld can show a page when you’re offline. Signing out removes your message drafts and saved lists from this browser, and clearing your browser data removes all of it. If you share a device, sign out when you’re done.

7. Emails and notifications

• Sign-in codes: when you sign in with email, we send a one-time code to that address.
• Account and activity emails: depending on your notification settings, we send account and security notices, payment and payout updates, application decisions, summaries of unread activity, and creator earnings recaps. You can manage these in notification settings. Sign-in codes and verification messages are sent when you request them.
• News from OurWorld: we post updates about OurWorld in What’s new in the app, and you may get a notice about them in your notifications. We don’t send them by email, push or text.
• Push notifications: if you turn them on, they only say that you have a new update. The details travel encrypted, so the push service can’t read them, and you see them only in the app.

We don’t send marketing emails or texts.

8. How long we keep information

We keep your information while your account is open, and afterwards for as long as we need it for the purposes in this policy. For example, we keep payment records for accounting, tax and dispute purposes, and safety records to prevent abuse. Some information is kept for shorter, fixed periods:

• Sign-in codes expire after 10 minutes, and their records are deleted 30 days later.
• The records we use to limit repeated attempts store IP addresses and email addresses only in scrambled form, and are deleted after a day.
• Updates that keep the app current in real time are kept for 24 hours.
• A data export can be downloaded for 72 hours. Then the file is deleted.
• Photos and videos you upload but never use are deleted after 30 days.
• Signed-in sessions expire after 30 days, or after 14 days without use.
• Stories show on a world for 24 hours. After that, a story stays in the world’s archive, which only the world’s team can see, unless the creator adds it to a highlight on their world. It’s kept until they delete it.

9. Your choices and rights

• Update your details: edit your profile and contact details in your account settings. You can also change the email you sign in with, connect or remove Google or Apple sign-in, and sign out of other devices.
• Notifications: choose what you hear about and how, and mute worlds or conversations.
• Download your data: in your account settings, choose Export your data. We prepare a file with your account information, memberships, purchases, messages, custom video requests, notifications, referrals, support requests and more. It doesn’t include the photo and video files themselves. You can request up to 3 exports a day, and each one can be downloaded for 72 hours. We may ask you to confirm it’s you first.
• Delete your account: in your account settings, choose Account deletion. After you confirm it’s you, we record your request and sign you out on your other devices. You can cancel the request while it’s pending. We don’t delete accounts automatically yet. Our team reviews each request and will contact you about it, including any information we have to keep, such as payment records. Asking us to delete your account doesn’t turn off renewals, so turn them off first.

If you cannot sign in, or your account is restricted, email contact@ourworld.space to request help with access, correction, export or deletion of your information.

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, delete or download your personal information, to object to or limit how we use it, and to withdraw your consent. To use these rights, use the controls above or email contact@ourworld.space. We’ll need to confirm the request comes from you and respond within the time required by applicable law. If we cannot fulfill a request, we’ll explain why. You may also be able to complain to your local data protection authority. To complain to us about how we handle your information, email the address above. Tell us what happened and what you’d like us to do, and we’ll look into it and reply.

10. Security

We protect your information with safeguards such as encrypted connections, sign-in codes and session tokens that we store only in scrambled form, links to private photos and videos that expire after a short time, and additional verification for supported accounts and sensitive actions. No system is completely secure, so keep your phone and sign-in accounts safe, and tell us if you notice anything unusual.

11. Where we process information

OurWorld’s servers and database are in the United States, and our service providers may process information in other countries. If you use OurWorld from outside the United States, your information is transferred to and processed in the United States. Privacy laws in those countries may differ from those where you live. Contact contact@ourworld.space for information about the providers and protections that apply to your information.

12. Age requirement

OurWorld is only for people aged 18 or older. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18, apart from what a member includes about the person a custom video is for, such as their name and the age they’re turning. If you think someone under 18 has an account or has given us their information, email contact@ourworld.space. We’ll look into it and remove the account and its information, except anything the law requires us to keep.

13. Changes to this policy

We’ll update this policy when our practices change, and we’ll change the date at the top of this page when we do. If a change is significant, we’ll tell you in the app or by email before it takes effect.

14. Contact us

Questions or requests about your privacy? Email contact@ourworld.space or use Help & support in your account.