Privacy Policy

Effective date: September 1, 2025

Last Updated: May 27, 2026

This Privacy Policy explains what data Authorlytica (“we,” “our,” “us”) collects, how it’s used, and the rights you have. The Service is operated by Studio Adam Rendo in the Netherlands, who acts as the data controller.

1. Data We Collect

We only collect the data needed to run the Service:

Account data

  • Email address
  • Username
  • Optional profile picture
  • Optional demographic info (gender, birthday, country)

Writing data

  • Word counts
  • Writing sessions (duration, mood rating, notes – if you enter them)
  • Project titles and descriptions
  • Metadata used to calculate stats (streaks, averages, etc.)

Preferences

  • Daily word goal
  • Theme selection
  • Display formats (time, number, date)

Social data

If you use social features, we collect:

  • Friend connections (who you add/accept)
  • Activity feed posts (writing milestones, achievements)
  • Comments you post on friends' activities
  • Hearts/kudos you give to activities
  • Nudges you send or receive
  • Your timezone (auto-detected for "wrote today" badges)

Social privacy settings

You control:

  • Whether your "wrote today" badge is visible to friends
  • Whether friends can send you nudges
  • Whether friends can comment on your activities

Payment data

Payments are processed by Stripe.
We receive:

  • Subscription status
  • Payment dates
  • Limited card metadata (e.g., last four digits)

We never store full card details.

Technical data

  • IP address (standard server logs)
  • Browser and device type
  • Last login time
  • Error logs — including stack traces, error messages, and the request context that triggered them — used for debugging, security, reliability monitoring, and product improvement

Cookies & local storage

  • A single secure cookie for login
  • Local storage for options like theme

Our analytics provider (Umami) is configured to run without cookies and without cross-site identifiers. No advertising cookies or cross-site tracking. See the Cookie Policy for details.

Feedback

Any optional messages you send via app feedback forms or email. We may quote feedback publicly using first-name or username only. You can request removal at any time.

2. How Your Data Is Used

Your data is used only to:

  • Provide the core functionality of Authorlytica
  • Keep your account secure
  • Calculate your writing statistics and progress
  • Enable social features (friend connections, activity feed, comments, nudges)
  • Display "wrote today" status to your friends (timezone-aware)
  • Diagnose errors and improve reliability
  • Detect and prevent fraud, abuse, and security threats, including by analyzing patterns across accounts
  • Fix bugs, maintain performance, and prevent abuse
  • Send service updates and optional product announcements
  • Comply with legal obligations (e.g., payment records)

We access identifiable data only when necessary for maintenance, debugging, support, security, abuse investigation, content moderation, product improvement (including anonymization for aggregate analysis), enforcement of our Terms, or legal compliance.

Legal bases (GDPR Art. 6):

  • Contract performance: account data, writing data, subscription processing — needed to deliver the Service you signed up for.
  • Legitimate interests: security logs, error diagnostics, abuse prevention, service improvement, aggregated analytics, and product communications to existing users about the Service — proportionate to the purpose and balanced against your rights, with an easy unsubscribe for marketing emails.
  • Consent: optional demographic fields — you can withdraw consent at any time.
  • Legal obligation: payment records, tax records, responses to lawful requests from authorities.

3. Email Communications

By creating an account, you agree to receive both essential emails and non-essential product emails (listed below). You can unsubscribe from non-essential emails at any time; essential emails are required for the Service to function and cannot be disabled.

You will receive:

Essential emails (cannot unsubscribe):

  • Password resets
  • Security and account notifications
  • Important service updates

Non-essential emails (enabled by default; unsubscribe anytime):

  • Product news
  • Feature announcements
  • Helpful tips
  • Occasional in-product or email promotional content

4. Data Retention

  • Your data stays with us until you delete it or request account deletion.
  • You can reset all writing data from the Settings page.
  • You can export a full copy of your data from the Settings page at any time before deleting, so you don't lose your writing history. See §9 for details.
  • To delete your account entirely, email contact@adamrendo.com.
  • Data in backups is removed when those backups expire through normal rotation. Backups will not be restored in a way that reinstates data you have asked us to delete.
  • Certain records (e.g., payment history) may be kept longer if required by law.
  • Aggregated and anonymized data derived from your account (see §8) is not personal data under GDPR and may be retained indefinitely, including after account deletion.

5. Data Sharing

We do not sell or rent your identifiable personal data. We may license, publish, or sell aggregated, anonymized data products (see §8) — these cannot be linked back to you and are not considered personal data under GDPR.

We share personal data only with trusted providers who help run the Service:

  • Stripe (payments)
  • AWS and Fly.io (hosting and infrastructure)
  • FastMail and Brevo (email delivery and communications)
  • Cloudflare (IP-based country/currency detection)
  • Umami (privacy-focused, cookieless analytics)
  • Authorities if required by law

Some providers may process data outside the EU. When that happens, we rely on recognized safeguards — including the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) — to protect your data.

We may add, change, or remove service providers at any time without individual notice. The current list above is indicative and may be updated as infrastructure evolves.

6. International Storage

The main application database is hosted in the EU (Netherlands).
Some processing (e.g., payment processing, email delivery, CDN caching) may occur outside the EU under appropriate safeguards.

7. Automated Processing

You are not subject to decisions based solely on automated processing that produce legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affect you (GDPR Art. 22). Automated calculations (streaks, stats, averages) are purely informational — used to display your writing progress.

8. Aggregated and Anonymized Data

We may aggregate and anonymize data from across all users to:

  • Improve the Service and develop new features
  • Analyze general usage patterns and writing trends
  • Publish statistics or insights (e.g. "writers in our community logged X million words last month")
  • Collaborate with academic researchers, journalists, publishers, and industry analysts on studies of writing behavior and productivity
  • Create, license, or sell commercial insights products, reports, or dashboards derived from aggregated data
  • Train internal machine-learning models on anonymized patterns (never on identifiable writing) to improve features such as genre detection, pacing analysis, goal recommendations, and comparison tools
  • Share anonymized metrics with prospective partners, investors, or in public content
  • Conduct sector-wide analysis, benchmarking, and market research

Anonymized data cannot be linked back to you as an individual and is not considered personal data under GDPR. It may be retained, used, and commercialized indefinitely, including after you delete your account.

We do not share individualized writing content, session notes, or project details — only statistics derived from aggregated datasets.

9. Your Rights (GDPR)

If you are in the EU or a similar jurisdiction, you have the right to:

  • Access your data
  • Correct inaccurate data
  • Delete your data
  • Export your data in machine-readable form
  • Restrict certain processing
  • Object to processing based on legitimate interests
  • Withdraw consent for optional communications

Self-service export. You don't need to email us to access or export your data. From the Settings page in the app, you can:

  • Click Export all data to download one complete file with your projects, every writing session, your settings, achievements, and basic profile information.
  • Click Sessions as CSV to download every session in sheet format (CSV), ready to open in Excel, Numbers, or Google Sheets.

Both options are free for all users, on every plan. There is no premium gate, no date-range limit, no request form. Your data is yours, and you can take it with you at any time. The other rights above (correct, delete, restrict, object, withdraw consent) are exercised by emailing contact@adamrendo.com.

To exercise any other right above, contact contact@adamrendo.com.
We aim to respond within 30 days, extendable by up to two additional months for complex requests as permitted by GDPR Art. 12(3). We will let you know if an extension is needed.

We may request reasonable proof of identity before acting on a rights request, as permitted by GDPR Recital 64, to protect against impersonation.

You may also file a complaint with your local data protection authority.
For the Netherlands, that is the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens.

10. Security

We use reasonable security measures appropriate to the scale and risk of the Service, including encryption in transit and secure credential storage. No system is perfectly secure, but we take reasonable steps to protect your data.

Data Breach

If a breach affects your personal data, we will notify you and relevant authorities as required by law.

11. Children’s Privacy

The Service is not intended for children under 13.
We do not knowingly collect data from children under 13.
If we learn this happened, we will delete the data promptly.

In the EU, the age of digital consent is 16 (or as set by local law, 13–16). Users aged 13–15 must have verifiable parental or guardian consent before creating an account where required by local law.

12. Business Changes

If Authorlytica is ever transferred, merged, or acquired, users will be notified in advance and may delete their data before the change where possible. The new owner will be bound by this Privacy Policy in respect of personal data transferred to them. If the new owner later wishes to change the policy in ways that materially affect your personal data, they must notify you and give you an opportunity to delete your data before those changes take effect.

13. Additional Rights for U.S. Residents

Some U.S. states provide additional privacy rights.
If you are a U.S. resident, you may request:

  • Access to the personal information we hold
  • Correction of inaccurate information
  • Deletion of your data

We do not sell personal data.
We do not share data for targeted advertising.
We do not engage in profiling that produces significant effects.

Requests can be made by emailing contact@adamrendo.com.

14. Policy Updates

We may update this policy at any time, including to reflect changes in the Service, our practices, or the law. If changes materially affect how we use your personal data, we will notify users by email or in-app notice as required by applicable law. Non-material updates (typos, clarifications, sub-processor list changes, formatting) may be made without prior notice.

Your continued use of the Service after the effective date of an update constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

Contact
For any privacy questions or requests:
contact@adamrendo.com