Privacy Policy

Last updated

For Genesis by Parafield, our app for iPhone and iPad.

Parafield Inc. ("Parafield," "we," "us," or "our") makes Genesis by Parafield, our app for iPhone and iPad (the "Genesis app" or "the app"). This Privacy Policy covers the Genesis app. This website, parafield.app, sets no cookies and runs no analytics. Our other websites (parafield.ai, app.parafield.ai, and Genesis Reader and the Genesis demo at genesis.parafield.ai) are covered by the Parafield Privacy Policy.

1. Your Parafield account

You need a Parafield account to start using the Genesis app. You sign in with Apple, with Google, or with an email address and password. Sign-in is provided by Amazon Cognito, part of Amazon Web Services (AWS), in the United States, at login.parafield.ai. An account created with Sign in with Apple works only in the Genesis app for now. Parafield is moving parafield.ai, app.parafield.ai and Genesis Reader to this same sign-in service. Until it has, an account you already have on those websites stays separate from the account you use in the Genesis app.

Your Parafield account holds:

  • your email address and whether it is verified. If you use Sign in with Apple and choose Hide My Email, this is a relay address Apple creates for us;
  • your name, if Apple or Google shares it with us when you sign in;
  • for Google sign-in, a link to your Google profile picture; the Genesis app doesn't use it;
  • an account ID, the ID Apple or Google uses for you with us, and internal identifiers Parafield uses to link the account to its services;
  • for email accounts, your password, which Amazon Cognito stores in a form we cannot read, and any two-step verification you turn on;
  • when the account was created and last changed.

When you sign in, AWS WAF and the sign-in service record each request, including your IP address, the address requested and your browser or app details, to protect accounts against abuse. These records never include passwords, authorization headers or cookies. We keep them for 30 days. AWS CloudTrail keeps audit records of sign-in and account events, including IP address and app details, for 180 days.

For email accounts, we send verification and password-reset codes through our email provider, Resend, and keep a delivery record (your address, the subject, and whether the email was delivered, opened or clicked) for 180 days. If you try to create an account with email, we record a pseudonymous event in PostHog, made from a one-way hash of your email address and without the address itself, to see whether sign-up works. The app's own usage data is described below, under Usage data and crash reports.

Apple and Google handle your sign-in with them under their own privacy policies. We never receive your Apple or Google password.

The app keeps the sign-in tokens it receives in the iOS Keychain, only on that device. It uses them with the sign-in service, to keep you signed in, to sign you out (which revokes them) and to delete your account. It also uses them with our Genesis delivery service, to sync and delete the information kept with your account. It sends them nowhere else.

2. Information kept with your account

So that your stories follow you to other devices and when you reinstall the app, the app keeps the following with your Parafield account on our servers. They run on AWS in the United States.

  • Your library, your saved and finished stories, and when you saved or finished them.
  • Your listening progress.
  • Your listening history: your most recent 1,000 listens, each with the story, its genre, how many seconds you listened, and when.
  • The listener profile you set up: your name, date of birth or age, gender, how you heard about Genesis, why you listen, and when you joined.
  • Your taste and listening habits: the genres, authors and ideas you like, about how much time you spend on social media feeds each day, how much you want to listen, and your reminder times.
  • Your profile photo, as a JPEG copy at most 512 pixels on its longer side.

Signing out keeps this information with your account. Deleting your account in the app deletes it, as described below.

3. Information that stays on your device

The app also keeps a copy of the information above on your device. The following stays only on your device and is not kept with your account: your playback and display settings, your downloads, your notification settings, and the Share usage data switch.

The app keeps your account's email address and ID on the device too. It keeps them after you sign out, until you delete the account or the app. Device backups, such as iCloud Backup, include this information if you use them. The app uses the iOS photo picker, so it sees only the photo you pick, and it keeps that photo without its location or other metadata. Listening reminders are local notifications scheduled on your device.

4. Usage data and crash reports

The app sends anonymous usage events and crash reports to PostHog (PostHog Inc., in the United States), our analytics provider. This is on unless you turn it off. To turn it off, tap Profile, then Settings, then Privacy, and turn off Share usage data. That stops both usage events and crash reports.

The app never sends your account ID, name or email address with them. Each event carries a random ID that the app creates on your device. We don't create person profiles. Your IP address is not stored and is not used to look up your location. Instead, the app sends the country of your App Store account.

The app sends events when:

  • you view an onboarding step or finish onboarding;
  • you open a story, a genre page or search;
  • a story starts playing, reaches 25, 50 or 75 percent, finishes, fails or stalls;
  • you change sound or playback settings, set the sleep timer, show or hide the transcript, save a story or remove it from your saved stories, or set reminders;
  • the app is opened, moved to the background, installed or updated.

A crash report contains the stack trace and the signal, and is sent the next time you open the app. Each event and report also carries the kind of build (debug, qa or appstore) and standard details that PostHog's app library adds: app version and build, whether the app came from the App Store or TestFlight, operating system and version, device model and type, language, time zone, screen size, and whether the device is on Wi-Fi or mobile data.

5. New-story notifications

New-story notifications are off until you turn them on. To turn them on, tap Profile, then Settings, then Notifications, and turn on New stories. The app then sends our Genesis delivery service, on AWS in the United States, your device's Apple push token, the Apple push environment, the topic (new stories), your device's language and region, and its time zone. This record is not linked to your Parafield account, name, email address or IP address. We use it only to send one notification each time we publish new stories.

Turning New stories off deletes the record. We also delete records that Apple reports are no longer valid. Old copies are gone within two days.

6. Browsing and playing stories

To show the catalogue and play a story, the app sends requests to our Genesis delivery service, which runs on AWS in the United States. Audio, transcripts and cover images are delivered through Amazon CloudFront.

  • These requests name only what they ask for, such as a page of the catalogue or the story you play. They don't include your Parafield account, sign-in tokens, name, email address, advertising identifier or any device identifier, even when you are signed in.
  • Like any internet request, they carry your IP address and basic technical details. AWS uses them to deliver the response. The delivery service keeps no access logs and does not record IP addresses or which stories you play from these requests. Your listening history reaches us through your account, and the anonymous usage events name the stories you play, as described above.
  • AWS Lambda records basic operational data for each request (a request ID, its duration and the memory used). We keep it for 14 days. Playback links expire after 30 minutes and contain no personal information.

7. What the app does not do

The Genesis app contains no advertising or tracking tools, and it does not track you across other companies' apps or websites. It does not record your screen or replay your sessions. It offers no purchases or subscriptions. It does not access your location, microphone, camera or contacts.

8. Deleting your account

In the app, tap Profile, then Settings, then Delete account. The app first deletes the information kept with your account from our servers. It then deletes your Parafield account from the sign-in service right away, signs you out, and removes your Genesis profile, library and history from that device. Old copies on our servers are gone within two days. If you also sign in elsewhere at Parafield with this same account, that stops working too.

If the app tells you the account is also used on Parafield's websites, it doesn't delete it in the app. Delete it from Settings in your account menu at app.parafield.ai, or email support@parafield.ai from the account's address and we will delete it. In that case the app only signs you out, and the information kept with your account stays on our servers, even after you delete the account at app.parafield.ai. To have it deleted, email us from the account's address.

Deleting the account in the Genesis app does not delete information other Parafield services keep. Deleting your account at app.parafield.ai deletes your Parafield AI projects. To have your Genesis Reader purchases, reading progress and bookmarks deleted, email support@parafield.ai. Sign-in records age out within 30 days, AWS audit records within 180 days, and email delivery records within 180 days.

If you used Sign in with Apple, you can also stop using it with us in the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad: tap your name, then Sign-In & Security, then Sign in with Apple.

9. Apple

Apple distributes the app through the App Store under Apple's own privacy policy. Apple may give us App Store statistics and, if you chose to share them in iOS settings, crash reports. These do not tell us who you are.

10. When you leave the app

Help and policy links open this website, parafield.app, in your web browser; earlier versions of the app may open parafield.ai, where the Parafield Privacy Policy applies. The support link opens your email app; if you email us, we use your message and address only to answer you, and keep them in our support mailbox until you ask us to delete them. When you share your listener card, it goes only to the app or person you pick in the iOS share sheet.

11. Service providers

  • Amazon Web Services: sign-in (Amazon Cognito, with AWS WAF, Amazon CloudWatch Logs and AWS CloudTrail for its security records), the delivery service, which also syncs the information kept with your account and keeps new-story notification records (Amazon API Gateway, AWS Lambda), and storage and delivery (Amazon S3, Amazon CloudFront).
  • Apple and Google: sign-in with your Apple or Google account, as independent companies under their own privacy policies; Apple also distributes the app and delivers push notifications.
  • Resend: verification and password-reset emails for email accounts.
  • PostHog: the app's anonymous usage events and crash reports, and the pseudonymous email sign-up event described above.
  • Google Workspace: our support mailbox.

These providers process information only on our behalf, under agreements that require them to protect it at least as well as this policy describes.

12. Retention and your choices

  • Your Parafield account: kept until you delete it.
  • Information kept with your account: kept until you delete your account in the app or ask us to delete it. Old copies are gone within two days after that. Listening history keeps only your most recent 1,000 listens.
  • New-story notification record: kept while New stories is on. It is deleted when you turn New stories off or when Apple reports it is no longer valid. Old copies are gone within two days.
  • Sign-in records: 30 days.
  • AWS audit records: 180 days.
  • Email delivery records: 180 days.
  • Information on your device: kept until you delete your account in the app, or delete the app (Offload App keeps it). After an under-13 deletion, the profile stays so you can keep listening.
  • Delivery service operational data: 14 days.
  • Usage events and crash reports in PostHog: kept with our product analytics. They are not linked to your account, so deleting your account does not remove them.
  • Email sign-up event in PostHog: kept with our product analytics. Deleting your account does not remove it; to have it deleted, email support@parafield.ai from the address you used.
  • Support emails: kept in our support mailbox until you ask us to delete them.

You can change your photo, name and gender in the app, and see the email address of your account in Profile, Details. You can turn off reminders in the app or in iOS Settings, turn New stories on or off in Profile, Settings, Notifications, and turn off Share usage data in Profile, Settings, Privacy. You can sign out at any time and delete your account in the app. For anything else, including a copy of the information in your account, email support@parafield.ai. See also Genesis help.

If you are in the European Union, the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom: we use the information in your Parafield account to provide the account you asked for (performance of a contract), and we keep security records because we have a legitimate interest in protecting the service. This information is processed in the United States by Parafield Inc. and our service providers, with safeguards such as the European Commission's standard contractual clauses. You can also complain to your data protection authority.

13. Children

A Parafield account is for people 13 or older, or the minimum age of digital consent where they live. When you set up the app, it asks for your date of birth. If it gives an age under 13, the app deletes the account you signed in with, or signs out of an account also used on Parafield's websites, and you can keep using Genesis without an account. Your answers then stay only on your device. If you believe a child under 13 has a Parafield account, email support@parafield.ai and we will delete it.

The app is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child under 13 has given us personal information, contact us and we will promptly delete it.

14. Your rights

You have the right to:

  • Access the personal information we hold about you.
  • Correct inaccurate information. You can change your photo, name and gender in the app (Profile, then Details); for anything else, contact us.
  • Delete your account and associated data. You can do this in the app (Section 8 explains what that removes), or by contacting us.
  • Export your data by contacting us at the address below.
  • Withdraw consent for analytics at any time.

To exercise any of these rights, write to support@parafield.ai or contact@parafield.ai.

15. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make changes, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top of this page. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

16. Contact us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or our data practices, contact us at:

Parafield Inc.
Genesis app support: support@parafield.ai
Email: contact@parafield.ai