What changesWhat changes

The Privacy Policy as it is now applies until then.

What’s new:

• Hotline Plus and Hotline Hotspot. If you buy one, Apple takes the payment and we see which plan you have, what it cost and when it renews or ends, never your card. RevenueCat, a company that keeps track of purchases, joins the companies that handle data, which makes nine. It gets your account id (a random code), the id iOS gives Hotline for your iPhone, your iPhone’s model, iOS version, language and region, your App Store country, the app’s version, your network address and your purchases of the plans, never your name, number, email, card or location.
• Hotline Hotspot: if you and someone already on your map both switch it on and are on the same Wi-Fi, you see each other in Hotspot’s look. It needs Precise Location. Your phone sends only scrambled codes made from the Wi-Fi’s name and access point, which change every 15 minutes; we keep only your latest, for a few minutes, with your IP address scrambled, out of our nightly backups. Your answers after a string made in Hotspot are kept like the vote.
• Hotline Plus: members can see people nearby who were on in the last day but aren’t online right now, placed only roughly (never nearer than about a mile), for up to a day after they leave. Turning off “Visible nearby” hides you from that too. Plus members can also give a string one extra 24 hours to call and one extra 7 days of voice notes; we keep who added it and when, which only our team sees.
• Plus notes: if the person you send voice notes to has Plus, their iPhone turns your notes into text, on the phone only, to make their private notes. The text never leaves their phone and is never shown to anyone, and the notes sum up rather than quote.
• Counts of how Hotline is used, once we switch each one on: iOS’s own counts of crashes and freezes, how many people online each map open found, and answers to “Did you two meet?” and “Why not?”, kept only as totals that never carry your account.
• When more than nine people are near, they take turns on the map, and a pull brings you onto the other person’s map at their next turn. Hourly counts of the pulls you make, never whom, are kept for 7 days, so nobody can pull strings by the thousand.
• Who on our team approved your profile, and, if we ask you for a new picture, which one, the rule it broke, who asked and when.
• When our team reviews a report, it also sees how many other people blocked that person, how far the string had gone and how long you talked.
• Picture checks on your iPhone, before a picture uploads, for a face and for phone numbers, handles, links or QR codes. We keep only what the check found, while the picture is on your profile, and a picture you use anyway is looked at by a person.
• Apple’s age range: on an iPhone that can share it, the app may ask iOS whether you’re 18 or older. If it says you’re under 18, the profile leaves the map and the account is deleted.
• Picture fingerprints, once we switch them on: a code worked out from each picture on a profile, to find copies of a picture we removed and removed accounts that come back. They’re deleted with the picture, or kept 3 years when we banned the account or it was deleted after a report.
• A day and time to meet, if one of you suggests one in your 7 days, kept with the string.
• Block contacts, if the app offers it: only the phone numbers you choose to block reach us, used only to keep you off each other’s maps, and deleted when you unblock them or delete your account.
• More notifications: when a string becomes mutual, when you miss a call, when a voice note arrives, a pull on your string (at most one a day), reminders before a string’s time runs out, Hotline hour if we switch it on for your city, and a request for a new picture. None of the reminders comes at night where you last were on the map.
• Pictures the app has shown you can be kept on your iPhone, out of its backups, for up to 24 hours.
• If we ban a phone number, we keep it, with when and why, while the ban lasts. If we suspend a profile, we keep when, who on our team did it and your own “Visible nearby” setting until we let it back. Reports also keep when they were reviewed and by whom.
• Messages you email us, such as a three-day cancel of a plan, stay in our email, which Google hosts, until you ask us to delete them.
• The California part adds your plans and purchases, Apple’s answer on your age range, the numbers you block and your pictures’ fingerprints to the kinds of information it lists, and counts your Hotspot check-ins, and a doctor’s letter you send us, as sensitive information.

What’s different:

• Your sign-in sits in your iPhone’s Keychain, for that phone only, and our nightly backups leave out sign-in sessions and last locations.
• A new location reading replaces your saved point only once it’s about 400 m or more away, and the policy says more plainly how far someone faking their own position could narrow you down: to about 15 to 30 m over one to three hours, if your phone’s location jumps around.
• Private notes and nicknames are saved on your phone for your account, out of its backups, and deleted when you sign out or delete your account.
• Picture links already made keep working until they expire, which for the app is up to 24 hours. A replaced picture the app couldn’t delete stays in private storage until we clear it.
• Strings also keep when the vote began, when they loosened and when each of you was last sent a notification.
• Approval also keeps when your profile was complete, your place in line.
• Push tokens also go when a new password is chosen on another phone.
• “Tell a friend” isn’t only for while you wait for approval.
• “Nobody in the app sees where you are” still holds, with two exceptions: Hotspot can show two people who both switch it on that they’re on the same Wi-Fi, and Plus members can see, only roughly, people who were nearby in the last day.
• California privacy rights now lists what we’ll collect once each new feature is switched on or on sale.
• If a picture or voice note can’t be removed when you delete your account, the account waits, off the map and out of the line, until a later try removes every file.
• The website’s browser storage keeps two small things, not three.
• On older accounts that still hold an email address, “We don’t send emails” becomes “We don’t email you unless you write to us first”.

What stops being true:

• “We never ask for your age”: the app may ask iOS for Apple’s age range. We still never ask for your birthday or a bio.
• “The app has no analytics, advertising, crash-reporting or tracking tools in it”: it still has none from other companies, but once we switch them on, it sends us iOS’s own counts.
• “Your contacts are read on your iPhone and never sent to us”: the numbers you choose to block with Block contacts are.
• “Eight outside companies” and “no email service”: RevenueCat makes nine, and the policy now says no service sends emails for us.
• Private notes kept “only in the app’s memory” and gone when the app closes: they now stay on your phone until you sign out.
• “Someone who fakes their own position could narrow you down to your cell of about 200 m, but no further”.

The Terms of Use as they are now apply until then.

What’s new:

• The first paragraph is the notice California’s law on dating services requires, in the law’s own words: anyone who buys a plan can cancel it by email until midnight of the third business day after buying, not counting Sundays and holidays. The second paragraph says it in plain words.
• “Paid features” becomes “Hotline Plus and Hotspot”: what each plan adds, $20 and $10 a month, no free trial, monthly renewal through Apple until you cancel in Settings, refunds through Apple, the three-day cancel, what happens after a death or a disability, and what happens if a plan or Hotline stops.
• Deleting your account, signing out, deleting the app, a suspension and switching Hotspot off don’t cancel a plan: only cancelling in Settings does.
• A string made in Hotspot skips the call: you each say whether you talked in person and want to keep talking. Using Hotspot to find someone isn’t allowed, and we can’t promise Hotspot notices everyone on the same Wi-Fi.
• Your license to us also covers working out a picture’s fingerprint to find copies of it, and turning a voice note into text for a Plus member’s private notes.
• When the app checks a picture before it uploads, your iPhone does it, and a picture it flagged that you use anyway, or one that matches a picture we removed, is looked at by a person on our team.
• We may suspend a profile or ask for a new picture, as well as remove pictures or close an account.

What’s different:

• Notifications: we also let you know when a string becomes mutual, when you miss a call, when a voice note arrives, when someone nearby pulls your string, before a string’s time runs out, and when one of your pictures needs a change.
• “Your privacy” says that Plus members can see you for up to a day after you leave the app, placed only roughly, and that Hotspot shows two people who both switch it on that they’re on the same Wi-Fi.
• After the call, you each have 24 hours to choose whether to keep the string. Plus can add one extra 24 hours to call and one extra 7 days of voice notes, once each per string.

What stops being true:

• “Nothing in the app costs money today” and “we don’t extend” the app’s time limits.
• “We don’t ask for your age or check it”: on an iPhone that can share it, the app may ask iOS for Apple’s age range. We still don’t ask for your birthday.

The Community Guidelines as they are now apply until then.

What’s new:

• Hotspot: a string made in it skips the call. Never use it to find someone, and if you’re on the same Wi-Fi as someone, say hi only somewhere shared and public, take a no or no reply as your answer, and never follow anyone who leaves.
• Before a picture uploads, the app may check it on your iPhone and ask whether you want to pick another; if you use it anyway, a person on our team looks at it.
• If a picture breaks the rules, we may ask you for a new one, with the rule shown under that picture; your profile is off the map until a new one is in, and keeps its place in line.
• On an iPhone that can share it, the app may ask for Apple’s age range, and an account it says is under 18 leaves the map and is deleted.
• What we can do now includes suspending a profile and asking for a new picture.

Delete your account as it is now applies until then.

What’s new:

• A first part, “Cancel Plus or Hotspot first”: deleting your account doesn’t cancel a plan, so cancel it in your iPhone’s Settings.
• Deleted with your account: your plan record, any Hotspot check-in, Hotspot answers and extra time, numbers you blocked with Block contacts, Apple’s answer on your age range, what your iPhone’s picture checks found, your counts of pulls and your pictures’ fingerprints.
• What stays: a banned phone number while the ban lasts; your pictures’ fingerprints for 3 years if your number was banned or you had been reported (never for an account deleted for being under 18); messages you emailed us; Apple’s and RevenueCat’s own records of a plan; and the plan itself until you cancel it with Apple.
• If a picture or voice note can’t be removed just then, the account leaves the map and the line at once, and the waiting screen lets you try again.

What stops being true:

• Private notes and nicknames “were never saved anywhere”: they were kept on your phone, which deletes them when it signs you out.

Support as it is now applies until then.

• A new part, “Plus and Hotspot”: how to cancel in Settings, restore a purchase on a new iPhone, cancel by email within three business days of buying, and ask Apple for a refund.
• Before deleting your account, cancel any plan first.

The SMS Terms as they are now apply until then.

• “The app is free, and we never bill you for a text” becomes “Signing in is free, and we never bill you for a text”.

• A new page, Plus and Hotspot, sums up both plans, their prices and a short list of questions on paying, cancelling, refunds, what Hotspot shares and what free Hotline includes. The Terms of Use keep the full rules.
• Privacy & Terms, the list at the end of every legal page and the home page’s links add it, the home page as “Plans”. Privacy & Terms also says that Hotline is free to use and the plans are optional.