Podtopia

4. Privacy Policy

Your privacy is important to us. This section describes what data the App collects, why, and how it is handled.

4.1 Local-First by Default

By default, the App operates entirely on your device for all podcast functionality. No account, login, or personal information is required to use the App. Your podcast subscriptions, listening history, playback progress, and preferences are stored locally on your device only unless you choose to enable Cloud Sync below. This local-first design does not apply to the advertising identifier used for ads, which is described in Section 4.3 below and is processed regardless of whether Cloud Sync is enabled.

4.2 Optional Cloud Sync

The App offers an optional Cloud Sync feature so your subscriptions, listening progress, and settings stay up to date across your devices. Cloud Sync is off by default and only activates if you choose to sign in.

If you enable Cloud Sync, we collect:

• Email address -- used solely to create and authenticate your account and to identify which synced data belongs to you
• Podcast subscriptions -- synced so the same shows appear on each of your devices
• Listening progress -- playback position and history, synced so you can pick up an episode where you left off on any device
• App settings and preferences -- synced so your setup is consistent across devices

We use your email address only to operate Cloud Sync -- to authenticate you and to associate your synced data with your account across your devices. We do not use your email for marketing, do not sell it, and do not share it with any third party other than the sync infrastructure provider described below, which processes it strictly on our behalf to provide this feature.

4.3 Advertising

The App displays advertisements served through Google AdMob. To serve and personalize these ads, AdMob collects your device's advertising identifier (the Android Advertising ID or Apple's IDFA) and related data such as general device information and ad interaction activity. This identifier may be used to show you ads based on your interests and to measure ad performance.

On iOS, we request your permission to use the advertising identifier for personalized ads via Apple's App Tracking Transparency framework. You can allow or deny this request when prompted, and change your choice at any time in Settings > Privacy & Security > Tracking. On Android, you can limit ad personalization or reset your advertising ID in Settings > Privacy > Ads. If you decline or opt out, the App will still show ads, but they will not be personalized to you.

Google AdMob processes this data under its own privacy policy. See Google's Privacy Policy and AdMob's data disclosure for details.

4.4 Data We Do NOT Collect

• No analytics or behavioral tracking beyond the advertising activity described in 4.3
• No contacts, photos, or other device files
• No location data
• No Cloud Sync data of any kind if you do not enable Cloud Sync

4.5 Third-Party Services

• Supabase -- provides authentication and database storage for Cloud Sync. When Cloud Sync is enabled, your email address, subscriptions, listening progress, and settings are stored on Supabase's infrastructure on our behalf. See Supabase's Privacy Policy for details on how they process data.
• Google AdMob -- provides advertising within the App, including use of the advertising identifier for ad personalization and measurement as described in 4.3. See Google's Privacy Policy for details on how they process data.

4.6 Data Storage

• Local data (subscriptions, listening history, playback progress, settings) is stored on your device using platform-standard storage
• Cloud Sync data (email address, subscriptions, listening progress, settings) is stored in our Supabase database only if you enable Cloud Sync
• Advertising data (advertising identifier and ad interaction data) is processed by Google AdMob as described in 4.3

4.7 Data Deletion

To delete your local data, uninstall the App or clear its data in your device settings. To disable Cloud Sync without deleting anything, sign out in the App's settings.

To permanently delete your account and all synced data from our servers, go to Settings > Account > Delete Account within the App -- this takes effect immediately and requires no further action on your part. You may also request deletion by contacting us at info@hacfapps.com.