Privacy Policy Taaly

Last updated: 21.05.2024

Welcome to Taaly's Privacy Statement!

Hey there! We know privacy statements can sometimes be long, but trust us, it's worth understanding how we at Taaly handle your data. If you're short on time, here's the gist:

Privacy Guarantee: At Taaly, we respect your privacy. This means we do not monitor, record, or store the content of your audio calls, video calls, or Taaly Party calls. We do retain message data, including timestamps and topics, but rest assured, this information is not shared with third parties unless legally required.
Data Control: You have full control over your personal data. You can download, edit, or delete your data at any time via the "My Profile" tab.
Data Security: The security of your data is of utmost importance to us. We store your data on secure, restricted database servers, ensuring encryption from your device to our servers. As Taaly serves a global community, be aware that we may store data on international servers, and note that encryption standards may vary by region.
Community Standards: To maintain a safe and respectful community, we reserve the right to restrict access to Taaly in cases of misconduct. We take any form of abuse seriously and our human moderators review reports of misconduct thoroughly, which may result in a ban from our app. For reporting purposes, you can choose to share specific messages with our moderators.

This is a brief overview of our commitment to your privacy and safety on Taaly. For more detailed information, please review the full policy.

Privacy Statement

This statement provides details on how we handle personal data at Taaly when you use our mobile apps or website. We respect the data shared with us by our members and take its protection very seriously.

Taaly is made in the Netherlands, and as a company based in the European Union, we are committed to complying with, and often exceeding, European data protection standards for all our members where possible.

Take the time to read these details to fully understand how we handle your data and keep it safe.

Contact

Taaly B.V.

Padangstraat 25H

1094AN Amsterdam

Netherlands

You can contact us directly at support@taaly.nl.

Privacy Officer

For all requests regarding the security of your data, please contact our privacy officer at privacy@taaly.nl.

1. Personal Data

Personal data is any information about an identified or identifiable person. This includes the following categories of personal data that we process:

Your contact details (such as first or last name, email address, phone number) are required to use Taaly's services.
Information within your profile (such as your age, gender, place of residence, interests, language level, last work experience, and highest education level, mother tongue, other languages spoken, country of origin, birth year, and gender) is optional.
Personal images you provide within your profile are optional.
Personal video you provide within your profile is optional.
Information you share within your messages (images, voice messages, comments, corrections, topics).
Your correspondence with us.
Log files with information about your visit to our website and apps.
Online identifiers (such as cookie IDs, IP addresses).
Achievements (such as language certificates) are optional.
Activity on our apps and websites (e.g., clicks, viewed screens, visited pages).

2. Purposes of Use

Personal data is collected by us only to the extent and for the purpose for which you provide the data to us, e.g., for registering an account. We use and store your personal data as part of our services for the following purposes, with your explicit consent:

Creating a public user profile for you on Taaly.
Providing a curated community exclusively for language learners, with access limited to members.
Sending information relevant to the service, e.g., via email or push notification (e.g., updates about your membership status, missed calls/messages, new followers).
Finding Taaly partners nearby.
Understanding how Taaly is used and optimizing the service.
Helping keep our community safe, friendly, and responsible in both one-on-one chats, parties, clubs, and group chats, including by encouraging authentic communication.
For correspondence with you.
For processing contracts with you.
For quality assurance and statistics.
For your participation in our contests.
For your participation in our events.
For your participation in our surveys.
To consider your membership application and for community moderation.
To improve our service.

Sharing with Third Parties

Your personal data will not be shared with third parties unless you have given explicit consent or we are required to disclose it – for example, under court orders or administrative authorities. To enable functionality and for usage analysis and marketing purposes, we collect information.

3. Legal Basis

Your data is processed according to the following legal provisions:

Art. 6(1)(a) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): Consent – Your data is processed based on your explicit consent. This means you must give consent before we process your personal data. This consent can be withdrawn at any time.
Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR, to establish and perform the agreement, e.g., to participate in the community.
To comply with legal obligations, Art. 6(1)(c) GDPR.
Concerning messages you share with your Taaly partners, both in one-on-one chats, Taaly parties, and group chats, based on your legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

Additionally, with particular attention to statistical data and online identification data based on legitimate interests, per Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (see below).

Legitimate Interests

When processing your data, we pursue the following legitimate interests:

Providing and improving our service;
Protection against abuse;
Statistics and service analysis;
Enhancing the integrity and credibility of our Community.

4. Data Sources

Unless otherwise stated, we obtain the data from you (including via the devices you use).

5. Data Transfer to Third Countries

Data is transferred to countries outside the European Economic Area. We only transfer personal data to third countries where the EU Commission has confirmed an adequate level of protection or if we can ensure careful handling of personal data through contractual arrangements or other appropriate safeguards, such as certifications or proven compliance with international security standards.

USA (Adequacy Decision/Standard Contractual Clauses)

6. Retention Period

We retain your data:

If you have consented as part of the processing, until you withdraw your consent (e.g., by deleting your account);
If we need the data to fulfill a contract, until the contractual relationship with you ends or statutory retention periods expire;
If we use the data based on a legitimate interest, until your overriding interest requires us to delete or anonymize it;

Note: If you delete your account, your personal information is deleted, but we retain the messages you sent to a Taaly Partner;

If you delete your account, we will continue to store the email address associated with the account so that we can process deletion requests after you delete your account;
We will also continue to store your Taaly ID so that we can respond to user inquiries after an account is deleted;
We retain applications for Community membership, including your personal information, for at least one day. After this period, you can permanently delete all personal data from Taaly using the "Delete my application" button in the app.

To ensure that Taaly remains a safe place for language learners, we take violations of our community rules very seriously. Therefore, we may retain anonymous personal identifiers for up to 24 months and during that period prevent access to the Community on this basis.

7. Our Policy on Children's Information

Children and young people under the age of 16 are not allowed to use Taaly. If you live in the European Economic Area (EEA), you may only use Taaly if you are older than the age at which you can consent to data processing under the laws of your country or if we have received verifiable parental consent for your use of Taaly. If you are a parent and discover that your child is using Taaly and you do not wish this, please contact support@taaly.nl.

8. Cookies

Cookies and similar technologies are very small text files or pieces of code that often contain a unique identification code. When you visit a website or use a mobile application, a computer asks your computer or mobile device for permission to store this file on your computer or mobile device and access information. Information collected through cookies and similar technologies may include the date and time of the visit and how you use a particular website or mobile application.

We need cookies to: (a) remember information so that you do not have to re-enter it during your visit or the next time you visit the site; (b) provide customized, personalized content and information; (c) deliver our Service and monitor its effectiveness; (d) monitor and aggregate metrics such as total number of visitors, traffic, and demographic patterns; (e) diagnose or fix technological problems; (f) give you efficient access to your information after you log in; (g) keep you logged in; and (h) keep the Taaly community safe for members.

Change or withdraw cookie consent: You can change or withdraw consent for setting cookies by clicking the "Change your cookie consent" button at the bottom of this page.

9. Data Recipients

We use your personal information only within the company and only pass it on to companies involved in performing the contracts concluded with you or otherwise involved in providing the relevant service. We pass on the following customer data to third parties:

To analyze how Taaly is used by our members and to optimize the service and design, pseudonymous usage and personal data are shared with Google Analytics and Firebase Analytics.
To communicate information relevant to the service via email or push notification, names, device IDs, email addresses, and other personal information may be shared with Brevo (https://www.brevo.com) and Customer.io (https://customer.io/). You can manage which types of messages you receive in the profile settings, completely disable push notifications for Taaly in your device settings, and unsubscribe from email notifications in each individual email.

9.1 Registration and Authentication

By registering or authenticating, users allow Taaly to identify them securely and give them access to its services. Depending on what is described below, third parties may provide registration and authentication services. In this case, Taaly may access certain data stored by these third parties for registration or identification purposes, with the user's express consent:

Firebase Authentication (Google Inc.): Firebase Authentication is a registration and authentication service provided by Google Inc. To simplify the registration and authentication process, Firebase Authentication can use third-party identity providers and store the information on its platform. Collected personal data: email. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.
Google OAuth (Google Inc.): Google OAuth is a registration and authentication service provided by Google Inc. and connected to the Google network. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.
Sign in with Apple (Apple Inc.): Sign in with Apple is a registration and authentication service provided by Apple Inc. In cases where users are required to provide their email address, Sign in with Apple can generate a private forwarding address on behalf of users that automatically forwards messages to their verified personal email account – thus shielding their actual email address from the owner. Processed personal data: email address; first name; last name; User ID. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.

9.2 Hosting and Backend Infrastructure

This type of service has the purpose of hosting data and files that enable Taaly to function and be distributed, as well as providing a ready-made infrastructure to run specific features or parts of Taaly. Some of these services operate through geographically distributed servers, making it difficult to determine the actual location where the personal data is stored.

Google Cloud Platform (Google Inc.): Google Cloud Platform is a hosting and backend service provided by Google Inc. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy as the primary hosting and infrastructure provider of Taaly. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.
Firebase: Firebase is an app development platform that helps you build and grow apps and games. It is a group of backend and frontend services supported by Google. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.
Azure: Azure is a hosting and backend service provided by Microsoft Ireland Operations Ltd. A wide range of personal data, including login information, images, and message content, is stored on Taaly's Azure infrastructure as a key hosting and infrastructure provider. Processing location: Netherlands - Privacy Policy.

9.3 Processing Payments

Payment processing services allow Taaly to process payments. To ensure greater security, Taaly does not process or store credit card information and uses only the information necessary to carry out the transaction with the financial intermediaries handling the transaction. Some of these services may also enable the sending of timed messages to you, such as emails with invoices or notifications regarding the payment.

Payments processed via the Apple App Store (Apple Inc.): Taaly uses a payment service provided by Apple Inc. that allows the Owner to offer the purchase of the app itself or in-app purchases. Personal data processed to complete purchases is processed by Apple as described in the App Store's privacy policy. Processed personal data: payment data. Processing location: EU - Privacy Policy.
Payments processed via the Google Play Store (Google Ireland Limited): Taaly uses a payment service provided by Google Ireland Limited that allows the Owner to offer the purchase of the app itself or in-app purchases. Personal data processed to complete purchases is processed by Google as described in the Google Play Store's privacy policy. Processed personal data: payment data. Processing location: Ireland - Privacy Policy.

9.3 Processing Payments

Some of these services may also enable the sending of timed messages to you, such as emails with invoices or notifications regarding the payment.

9.4 Infrastructure Monitoring

This type of service allows Taaly to monitor the use and behavior of its service components to improve functionality, performance, operation, maintenance, and troubleshooting. The personal data processed depends on the characteristics and mode of implementation of these services, whose function is to filter the activities of Taaly.

Crashlytics (Google Inc.): Crashlytics is a monitoring service offered by Google Inc. to help Taaly improve the stability of the app and reduce app crashes. Collected personal data: geographic position, unique device IDs for advertising (Google Advertiser ID or IDFA, for example), and various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Firebase Crash Reporting (Google Inc.): Firebase Crash Reporting is a monitoring service offered by Google Inc. to improve the stability of the app and reduce app crashes. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Firebase Performance Monitoring (Google Inc.): Firebase Performance Monitoring is a monitoring service offered by Google Inc. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Smartlook.com, s.r.o.: Comprehensive product analytics & visual user insights. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: Czech Republic, EU – Privacy Policy.

9.5 Managing Contacts and Sending Messages

This type of service makes it possible to communicate with users outside the app, for example via push notifications and email. They can manage a database of email contacts, phone contacts, or other contact information to communicate with the user. These services can also collect data about the date and time the message was viewed by the user, as well as when the user interacted with it, such as by clicking on links in the message.

Firebase Cloud Messaging (Google Inc.): Firebase Cloud Messaging is a message sending service offered by Google Inc. Firebase Cloud Messaging allows the Owner to send messages and notifications to users on platforms such as Android, iOS, and the web. Messages can be sent to individual devices, groups of devices, or specific topics or user segments. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Brevo (SendInblue, Inc.): Brevo is an email address management and message sending service provided by SendInblue, Inc. Collected personal data: email address and various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Customer.io (Peaberry Software, Inc): Customer.io is a user communication and database management service provided by Peaberry Software, Inc. Processed personal data: email address; Tracker; various types of personal data. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Algolia (Algolia, Inc): Algolia is a real-time hosted search. Taaly uses it to improve the search service. Processing locations: EU – Privacy Policy.
ConnectyCube.com (ConnectyCube): manages a web service that supports mobile and web apps. The ConnectyCube service can store information about mobile/desktop devices it communicates with via our APIs or mobile applications or websites. Processing locations: Germany – Privacy Policy.

9.6 Web and Mobile Analytics

The services in this section allow us to monitor and analyze web and mobile traffic and can be used to track how Taaly is used by users.

Analytics collected directly (Taaly): Taaly uses an internal analytics system that does not involve third parties. Collected personal data: cookies and usage information.
Google Analytics (Google Inc.): Google Analytics is a web analysis service provided by Google Inc. (“Google”). Google uses the collected data to track and examine the use of Taaly, to prepare reports on its activities, and share them with other Google services. Google may use the collected data to contextualize and personalize the ads of its own advertising network. Collected personal data: cookies and usage data. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy – Opt Out.
Google Analytics for Firebase (Google Inc.): Google Analytics for Firebase or Firebase Analytics is an analytics service provided by Google Inc. To understand Google's use of data, see Google's partner policy. Firebase Analytics may share data with other tools provided by Firebase, such as Crash Reporting, Authentication, Remote Config, or Notifications. Users can refer to this privacy policy for a detailed explanation about the other tools used by the Owner. Taaly uses identifiers for mobile devices (including Android Advertising ID or Advertising Identifier for iOS, respectively) and technologies similar to cookies to run the Firebase Analytics service. Users can opt out of certain Firebase features through applicable device settings, such as device advertising settings for mobile phones or by following the instructions in other Firebase-related sections of this privacy policy, if available. Collected personal data: cookies, unique device IDs for advertising (Google Advertiser ID or IDFA, for example), and usage data. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Smartlook.com, (smartlook s.r.o.)**: Comprehensive product analytics & visual user insights. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: Czech Republic, EU – Privacy Policy.
TestFlight (Apple Inc.): TestFlight is an analytics service provided by Apple Inc. Collected personal data: cookies, email address, and usage data. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.

9.7 Managing Support and Contact Requests

Our customer support platform allows us to manage support and contact requests received via email or other means, such as the contact form. The personal data processed depends on the information provided by the user in the messages and the means of communication used (e.g., email address).

9.8 Advertising

We do not run ads.

9.9 Performance and Feature Testing (A/B Testing)

The services in this section allow Taaly to track and analyze the user response concerning web traffic or behavior regarding changes in the structure, text, or any other component of Taaly.

Firebase Remote Config (Google Inc.): Firebase Remote Config is an A/B testing and configuration service provided by Google Inc. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.
Google Optimize (Google Inc.): Google Optimize is an A/B testing, website testing, and personalization tool provided by Google Inc. Collected personal data: various types of data as specified in the service's privacy policy. Processing location: EU – Privacy Policy.

10. Your Rights

As a user of Taaly, you have the right to information, correction, objection, complaint, deletion, and blocking of your personal data. More specifically:

You have the right to request information about whether and which personal data is being processed by our company. You also have the right to request that your personal data be modified or changed.
Under certain circumstances, you have the right to request the deletion of your personal data, for example by tapping "Delete Account" in "My Profile/Settings".
Under certain conditions, you have the right to request the restriction of the processing of your personal data.
You can revoke your consent to the processing and use of your data at any time, in whole or in part, with effect for the future.
You have the right to receive your personal data in a common, structured, and machine-readable format, for example by contacting us.
If you have questions, comments, complaints, or requests regarding our data protection statement and the processing of your personal data, you can also contact our Privacy Officer in detail.
You also have the right to file a complaint with the responsible supervisory authority if you believe that the processing of your personal data is contrary to legal regulations.

11. Obligation or Obligation to Provide Data

Unless expressly stated, the provision of data is neither required nor obligatory at the time of collection.