This policy explains what personal data Pet-it processes, why, who we share it with, how long we keep it and how you can exercise your rights. It applies to the Pet-it app and the petit-app.com website, and is designed to comply with the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), its UK version, U.S. state privacy laws (including California's CCPA/CPRA), the U.S. Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and Argentine Law 25,326.
1. Summary
- We use your data to make the app work: your account, your pets, what you post, your messages and nearby alerts.
- We do not sell your personal data.
- The location we store for alerts is approximate (about 1 km).
- Your contacts are only used if you tap "Find friends", and we do not store them.
- Personalized ads only appear if you consent.
- You can download your data and delete your account from the app.
2. Who is responsible
The data controller is Pablo Travi, who operates Pet-it from Argentina ("Pet-it", "we" or "us" in this policy). For any privacy question, email us at contactopetit.app@gmail.com. We have not appointed a data protection officer because we are not required to.
3. What data we process
| Data | Where it comes from | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Account: email, username, password (stored encrypted by Firebase; we do not store it), phone number (optional), profile photo and, if you sign in with Google or Apple, the identifier of that account. | You, Google or Apple. | Create and manage your account, sign you in, contact you. |
| Pets: name, species, breed, date of birth, gender, description, links, photos, status (for example, lost), privacy and co-owners. Health and routines: vaccines, check-ups, notes and reminders. | You. | Show the pet's profile. Health records and routines are only visible to its owners. |
| Content: posts, photos, videos, stories, comments, likes, follows, saved posts, lost, found and adoption listings, community posts, professional profiles and reviews. | You. | Publish and display it according to the privacy you choose. |
| Messages: chat content, who you talk to, whether you read messages and an "online" indicator that lasts about a minute. | You and the other person. | Let you chat. |
| Location: your approximate location (rounded to about 1 km) for nearby alerts; the area you choose for the feed (about 2 km); and the location you mark when publishing a listing or a professional profile. | Your phone, if you allow it, or what you mark on the map. | Show you what happens nearby and alert you about lost pets in your area. |
| Contacts (optional): emails and phone numbers of your contacts, only when you tap "Find friends". | Your phone, if you allow it. | Show you which contacts already use Pet-it. See "Contacts" below. |
| Device and technical use: notification token, operating system, app version, IP address and server technical logs. | Your phone and our servers. | Send notifications, keep the service secure, prevent abuse and fix errors. |
| Advertising: device advertising identifier, IP address and ad interactions. | The Google AdMob SDK on your phone. | Show and measure ads. See "Advertising". |
| Support and reports: your name, email and message when you write to us; the reports you make and, if you report a conversation, a copy of up to 10 of the reported messages. | You. | Reply to you and moderate content. |
We do not ask for or process sensitive data such as people's health, ethnic origin, religion, sexual orientation or biometric data. Please do not include it in what you post.
4. Why we use your data and on what legal basis
| Purpose | Legal basis (GDPR) |
|---|---|
| Provide the service: account, profiles, posts, stories, listings, community, professionals, chat, search and alerts. | Performance of a contract (Art. 6(1)(b)). |
| Use your phone's location and send you notifications. | Your consent, given through the phone permission and withdrawable in its settings (Art. 6(1)(a)), and performance of a contract. |
| Find friends in your contacts. | Your consent (Art. 6(1)(a)). |
| Show personalized ads and store or read information on the device for advertising. | Your consent (Art. 6(1)(a)). |
| Show non-personalized ads to fund the free service. | Legitimate interest (Art. 6(1)(f)). |
| Moderate content, analyze images, handle reports, prevent fraud and abuse, and protect the security of the service and of people. | Legitimate interest (Art. 6(1)(f)) and compliance with legal obligations such as the EU Digital Services Act (Art. 6(1)(c)). |
| Answer questions and rights requests. | Performance of a contract and compliance with legal obligations. |
| Comply with the law and respond to valid requests from authorities. | Legal obligation (Art. 6(1)(c)). |
We do not use your data to build profiles of your tastes and we do not sell information. We do not use analytics tools in the app.
5. What is public and what is not
- Visible to people using Pet-it (and findable in search): your username and profile photo; your pets' name, species, breed, gender and photo; listings, professional profiles, reviews and community posts.
- Depending on each pet's privacy: if public, anyone sees its posts and stories and can find its posts by their text or #hashtags; if private, only its owners and the followers you approved. A pet marked as lost becomes visible to everyone to help find it.
- Only for you and the other owners: health records, routines and your settings.
- Private between participants: chats, except for messages someone reports, which the Pet-it team reviews.
- Published location: posts show at most an approximate area; listings, an approximate location unless you choose to show the address; professional profiles, the address of the place.
6. Contacts
Only if you tap "Find friends" and grant permission does the app read the emails and phone numbers in your contacts. Since version 19 of the app, it turns them into digital fingerprints (SHA-256 hashes) on your phone and sends only those hashes; earlier versions send the data over an encrypted connection. On the server they are compared in memory with the hashes of existing accounts, we show you who already uses Pet-it, and they are discarded: we do not store your contacts. Your email and phone number (if you added one) are also stored as hashes so your contacts can find you.
7. Automated decisions
- Image analysis: Google Cloud Vision analyzes each photo when it is uploaded, and the result only decides whether it is accepted. We do not store the result or use facial recognition or face detection. If you believe a photo was rejected by mistake, ask for a human review.
- Reports: content with three reports is automatically hidden until a person reviews it, and we notify whoever posted it.
- Chat reports: if three different people report an account for its messages, starting new conversations is automatically limited for 7 days until a person reviews it, and we notify the account.
- Feed order: based on proximity, likes and date, not on your tastes.
None of these decisions produces legal effects on you. You can still ask us to have a person review them.
9. International transfers
Your data is stored on Google Cloud servers in São Paulo (Brazil), and some providers process it in other countries, including the United States. Pet-it is operated from Argentina, which the European Commission recognizes as providing an adequate level of protection. For other transfers outside the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, we rely on the European Commission's standard contractual clauses included in our providers' contracts and, where applicable, on the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework. You can ask us for a copy of these safeguards.
10. How long we keep data
| Data | Period |
|---|---|
| Account, profiles, pets, content and settings | While you have an account. When you delete it, they are erased within minutes (see "What happens when you delete your account"). |
| Posts, listings, professional profiles and community posts you delete | They stop being visible immediately and are permanently deleted, with their files, comments, likes and reviews, after 30 days. |
| Stories | 24 hours (7 days for happy-ending stories). They are deleted automatically when they expire, and their images within 9 days. |
| Chat messages | While the account of either participant exists; when both accounts are deleted, the conversation is erased. You can ask us by email to delete specific messages. |
| Notifications | While you have an account. |
| Technical record of an account deletion or suspension | 90 days. |
| Conversation reports, with the copy of the reported messages | 1 year. |
| Record of an account deletion process | 30 days after it finishes. |
| Server technical logs (IP, date, requested address) | Up to 30 days. |
| Support requests | As long as needed to resolve them and at most 2 years. |
| Advertising data | According to Google's policies. |
We may keep data longer only if a law requires it or to defend ourselves in an ongoing claim.
11. What happens when you delete your account
You can delete your account in Settings → Delete account (we ask for your password, or to type DELETE if you sign in with Google or Apple) or by writing to us. Your account stops working immediately and within minutes we erase your user, email, phone number, photo and settings; the pets you are the only owner of, with their posts, photos, videos, stories, health records and routines; your listings, professional profiles and community posts; the comments, likes and reviews you left; your saved posts, blocks, reports and notifications; and your sign-in with email, Google or Apple.
We keep the messages you sent, which the other person still sees with your name replaced by "Deleted account"; pets you share with other owners; and technical records and reports other people made about your account for the periods in the table above. More information on how to delete your account.
12. Your rights and how to exercise them
Wherever you are, you can:
- Access your data and take it with you: in Settings → Download my data you create a file with your account information.
- Correct it: from your profile and your pets' profiles.
- Delete it: by deleting content or your account.
- Object to processing based on legitimate interest and ask us to restrict the use of your data.
- Withdraw your consent (location, notifications, contacts, personalized ads) from the app or your phone settings, without affecting what was done before.
- Ask for a person to review an automated decision.
For any other request, email contactopetit.app@gmail.com from your account email. To protect your data we may ask you to confirm your identity. We reply within 30 days (45 days for U.S. residents), a period we may extend where the law allows; if so, we will let you know. We do not charge for handling your requests unless they are manifestly unfounded or excessive.
If you are not satisfied with our answer, you can file a complaint with the data protection authority of your country. In Argentina it is the Agency for Access to Public Information (argentina.gob.ar/aaip).
13. Additional information for U.S. residents
This section supplements the policy for residents of California and of the other states with privacy laws (such as Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah, Texas and Oregon).
Categories of data we collected in the last 12 months: identifiers (email, username, IP address, device and advertising identifiers); account records (phone number); activity information in the app (posts, interactions, messages); geolocation data (approximate for alerts, and precise only for the location of listings you decide to publish); audiovisual content (photos and videos); and support communications. Sources, purposes, recipients and retention periods are described in this policy.
Sensitive data: sign-in credentials and the precise location of listings you publish are used only to provide the service you asked for, so we do not use them to infer characteristics about you.
Sale and "sharing": we do not sell personal data. If you accept personalized ads, Google's SDK may use device identifiers for advertising based on your activity in other apps, which some laws consider "sharing" or "targeted advertising". You can opt out in Settings → Ad privacy when available, by turning off or resetting the advertising ID in Android settings, or by not allowing tracking on iOS. You can also email us.
Your rights: to know what data we hold and get a copy, delete it, correct it, and opt out of sale, "sharing" and targeted advertising. You can act through an authorized agent, who must prove their authority. We do not discriminate against you for exercising your rights.
Appeals: if we deny your request, you can appeal by emailing contactopetit.app@gmail.com with the subject "Appeal". We reply within 45 days; if you still disagree, you can contact your state's Attorney General.
California Shine the Light and Nevada: we do not share personal data with third parties for their own direct marketing and we do not sell covered data.
Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control signals: the website does not track its visitors, so there is nothing to turn off; the app does not receive these browser signals and offers the controls described above.
14. Additional information for the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Switzerland
The legal bases for each processing activity are in the section "Why we use your data". You have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, portability and objection, and the right to withdraw your consent at any time. You can file a complaint with the supervisory authority of the country where you live or work, or where the alleged infringement took place. The safeguards for transfers are in "International transfers".
15. Children
Pet-it is not directed to children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect their data. In countries where the minimum age to consent to online services is higher, users under that age need permission from a parent or guardian. If you know a child under 13 gave us data, email us and we will delete it.
16. Phone permissions
- Location (while using the app): for nearby content and alerts. Never in the background.
- Photos and camera: to post and change your profile photo. We only access the photos you choose.
- Contacts: only for "Find friends".
- Notifications: to tell you about activity, messages and alerts.
- Tracking (iOS): only for personalized ads.
You can grant or remove each permission at any time in your phone settings. The app keeps working, although some features may be limited.
17. On-device storage and cookies
The app stores on your phone your session, your preferences (language, autoplay, reminders), the area you chose, post drafts and your active pet. If you sign in with email, it stores your password in the phone's secure storage (Keychain or Keystore) to confirm sensitive changes; it is deleted when you sign out.
The petit-app.com website does not use cookies or tracking tools, and serves its fonts and libraries from our own server. Our hosting provider logs technical visit data (such as the IP address) for security.
18. Security
We protect your data with encrypted connections (HTTPS), Google Cloud encryption at rest, authentication on every request, rules that prevent direct access to the database, signed expiring links to display the photos and videos of posts and stories, and restricted access for the team. No system is infallible: if an incident affects your data, we will notify you and the authorities as required by law.
19. Changes to this policy
If we make significant changes, we will notify you in the app or by email before they apply. The date of the last update is at the top of this page.
20. Contact
Pet-it — Pablo Travi, Argentina. Email: contactopetit.app@gmail.com.