Privacy Policy

Last updated: 13 September 2026

This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, and share information when you use Cite, and when you use our website at joincite.com. It is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.

1. Information we collect

We collect information in a few different ways when you use Cite:

• Account information: your email address, name, username, and password or authentication tokens.
• Profile details: a display name, avatar, or other optional details you choose to provide.
• Location information: approximate or precise location from your device (when you grant permission) and locations you add to pins, events, reports, or area alerts. If you enable alerts about your surroundings, we store your most recently reported position so we can tell whether an alert covers where you are, and so we can check that a vote on an alert came from inside the area it describes.
• User content: pins, events, reports, area alerts, reviews, comments, chat messages, and photos or media you upload.
• Information about other people that you provide: an area alert reported as a missing person requires a name, an age, when and where the person was last seen, a description of what they were wearing, a photograph, and a contact telephone number. This is information about someone other than you. See section 4.
• Waitlist information: if you join the Android waitlist on joincite.com, we collect the email address you enter and the fact that you asked about the Android version. You do not need an account to do this, and joining the waitlist does not create one.
• Billing information: if your business buys a plan or a sponsored placement, the email address it is billed to, what was bought, and the identifiers our payment processor gives us for the customer and the subscription. HandyPay collects your card details directly; we never see or store them.
• Notification information: a push token issued by your device, and the per-category notification settings you choose.
• Usage and device information: IP address, device type, operating system, app version, crash logs, and how you interact with the app.

2. How we use information

We use the information we collect to:

• Provide and maintain the Service, including authentication, saving your preferences, and showing you relevant pins, events, reports and alerts.
• Operate location-based features, such as surfacing nearby content and matching alerts to where you are.
• Send you a short confirmation by email when you join the waitlist, so you know the address reached us and works, and then tell you once, by email, when Cite becomes available on Android. We do not use a waitlist address for anything else, and we do not sell or share it.
• Send push notifications you have not switched off, including alerts covering where you are, changes to events you said you would attend, reports at places you saved, and activity on things you posted.
• Promote safety and integrity by detecting, preventing, and responding to abuse, spam, or harmful behaviour.
• Analyse usage and improve the Service.
• Communicate with you about updates, security alerts, support messages, and important changes to the Service.

3. Legal bases for processing (where applicable)

Where data protection laws require a legal basis, we rely on performance of our contract with you, our legitimate interests in operating and securing the Service, your consent where we ask for it (for example device location and push notifications), and compliance with legal obligations.

4. Alerts about other people

Cite lets you raise an area alert about a missing person. Because that alert names and pictures somebody other than you, it is treated differently from every other kind of content:

• It cannot be posted anonymously. The account that posts it is recorded and can be contacted about it.
• The details you supply (name, age, photograph, description, last-seen time and a contact telephone number) are shown to other users, are included in notifications, and are included in the message produced when anyone shares the alert outside the app.
• A new missing-person alert is shown only to people inside the area you draw until two people in that area confirm it. Once confirmed, it is shown at the normal search radius and notified to people nearby.
• By posting one you confirm that you are entitled to share that person’s details for this purpose, and that doing so is not against the wishes of the person concerned or of anybody responsible for them.

If you are the person named in an alert, or are responsible for them, you can ask us to take it down at any time by contacting us at cite@joincite.com. You do not need an account to make that request. Any user can also report an alert from within the app, which can hide it from everyone pending review.

Alerts of this kind expire on their own and are removed from the map when they do. An alert that has been reported and hidden is retained rather than deleted, so that a wrongly hidden alert can be restored and a deliberately false one can be acted on.

5. How we share information

We do not sell your personal information. We may share information with service providers that help us operate the Service (hosting, databases, storage, analytics, logging, error monitoring and the sending of email, including waitlist addresses given to our email provider so that the messages described in section 2 can be delivered), with map and geolocation providers, when required by law or to protect the rights, property or safety of Cite, our users or others, and in aggregated or de-identified form.

Payments. Purchases on joincite.com are sold by Cite and processed by HandyPay. When you pay, you give your card details, billing address and email address to HandyPay, which handles them under its own privacy policy. We never see or store a card number. HandyPay tells us whether the payment went through, and we keep what was bought and the identifiers for the customer and the subscription.

Content you post is shared with other users by design. Pins, events, reports and area alerts are shown on the map to anybody using the Service in that area. When you say you are going to an event, your display name and avatar are shown to other people looking at that event.

Photographs you upload are stored so that they can be displayed in the app, and the web address of an uploaded photograph is not secret. Anybody who has that address, for example because a message containing the alert or pin was forwarded on, can open the photograph without an account and without being logged in. Please do not upload a photograph you would not want seen outside the app.

The Service also produces a shareable message for pins, events, reports and alerts. That message is written by you and sent by you, through whatever app you choose. Once you send it, where it travels is outside our control.

6. International transfers

We and our service providers may process information in countries other than the one you live in. Where required, we take steps to ensure appropriate safeguards are in place.

7. Data retention

We retain information for as long as necessary to provide the Service and to meet legal obligations. In general:

• Account information is kept while you have an active account. If you delete your account, we may keep limited information for a period for security, backup or legal reasons.
• User content such as pins, events, reports and alerts may remain available to other users after you delete your account, unless you delete that content first or we remove it as part of moderation.
• Area alerts expire on their own, after a period that depends on what they describe (hours for a fire or a gas leak, up to two weeks for a missing person), and are removed from the map when they do.
• A record that a notification was sent to you about a particular thing is kept briefly so the same notification is not sent twice, and is deleted after thirty days.
• The most recent location you reported is kept only while it is recent enough to be useful, and is replaced each time your device reports a new one.
• A waitlist address is kept until Cite launches on Android and the launch message has been sent, and is deleted within three months of that. You can ask us to remove it before then.
• Logs and analytics data are kept for a limited time.

8. Your choices and rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, object to or restrict the processing of your personal information, and to withdraw consent.

You can choose which push notifications you receive under Settings, where each category can be switched off individually. Alerts covering where you are cannot be switched off inside the app, because they carry warnings such as flooding and gas leaks; you can stop all notifications from Cite using your device settings, which will stop those too. You can also stop sharing your location at any time in your device settings.

To be taken off the waitlist, email us and we will delete the address. You do not need an account, and we will not ask you for one.

You can exercise some rights directly in the app, for example by editing your profile or deleting content you have posted. For other requests, contact us at cite@joincite.com. We may need to verify your identity before responding.

9. Children

The Service is not directed to children under the age required by the laws of your country. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, contact us and we will take appropriate steps.

10. Changes to this Policy

We may update this Policy from time to time. If we make material changes we will take reasonable steps to notify you, such as updating the date at the top of this page or providing an in-app notice.

11. Contact

Questions about this Policy can be sent to cite@joincite.com.