Privacy Policy
Effective date: October 27, 2026
1. Summary (the short version)
- We collect only what we need to run a safe, verified, professional collaboration platform for adults.
- ID verification is done by a specialist vendor. We keep the result, not your ID images.
- Your legal name is never shown publicly. Your two profiles (if you have both a Talent and a Producer profile) are never publicly linked.
- We store our data in Canada (AWS Canada regions). Some vendors may process limited data outside Canada; we list them below.
- We do not sell your personal information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.
- We do not handle card numbers. Payments are processed by a third-party processor.
- You can access, correct, download and delete your information, and withdraw consent, as described in section 10. You can download your data and delete your account yourself in the app (Settings → Privacy & data). Deletion has a 30-day grace period so you can change your mind.
2. Who is responsible for your information
Whiskrs (“we”, “us”) operates the Whiskrs app and website at whiskrs.app (the “Service”). We are responsible for personal information under our control.
Privacy Officer (person in charge of the protection of personal information): our Privacy Officer, who can be reached at [email protected].
3. Information we collect
3.1 Information you give us
| Category | Examples | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Account | Email address, phone number (optional, for login security), password (hashed), date of birth / over-18 confirmation | Create and secure your account; confirm eligibility |
| Profile | Display name, role (Talent or Producer), city or region, niche tags, bio, availability calendar, portfolio links | Show your profile to members on the other side; matching |
| Media uploads | Photos and videos you upload, captions, visibility settings | Portfolio display; moderation |
| Messages and activity | Meows, intros, chat messages, photos shared in chat, read receipts (when turned on), gig posts, applications, reviews, reports, blocks and mutes | Provide messaging and gigs; safety and enforcement |
| Plan and billing | Plan type, billing period, transaction records, the last 4 digits and expiry of your card (from the processor), billing address and province (for tax) | Subscriptions, receipts, tax compliance, fraud prevention |
| Collab payments (when offered) | Agreed rate, date and scope; payout status; payout account details collected by our payment partner | Escrow and deposit operation; tax reporting |
| Support and appeals | Your emails and in-app requests | Help you; handle appeals |
| Notifications and preferences | In-app notifications we send you, which ones you have read, your per-type notification choices (in app / email), your marketing-email consent and the date you gave or withdrew it | Show your notification inbox; respect your choices; prove CASL consent |
| Privacy requests | Record that you downloaded your data or asked to delete your account, when, and the outcome | Meet our accountability duties; limit abuse of the download feature |
3.2 Identity and age verification information
Before you can use social features, you must verify your identity and age with a specialist third-party identity verification vendor. During verification:
- The vendor collects: an image of your government-issued ID, a selfie or short liveness video, and device signals used to detect fraud. The vendor extracts data from your ID (such as your legal name, date of birth, document number and expiry) and compares your selfie to your ID photo using facial-comparison technology. This involves creating a biometric template (a mathematical representation of facial features).
- We receive: a pass/fail result, your verified date of birth or an over-18 flag, the date of verification, a vendor reference ID and, if needed for payouts or legal duties, your verified legal name. We do not receive or store your ID images, selfie or biometric template.
- Vendor retention: the vendor deletes ID images, selfies and biometric templates within 30 days of the verification decision, except where it must keep them longer by law or for fraud prevention as set out in its own privacy notice.
- We ask for your express consent to biometric verification at the start of the flow. If you do not consent, manual review of your ID by a trained reviewer is available, or you will not be able to use social features.
3.3 Information collected automatically
- Device and log data: IP address, device type, operating system, app version, timestamps and error logs, used for security, fraud prevention and debugging.
- Approximate location: derived from the city you choose and, for security, from your IP address. We do not collect precise GPS location.
- Cookies and similar technologies: strictly necessary cookies for login and security. We do not use third-party analytics on our website. We do not use third-party advertising cookies.
- Photo metadata: we strip location (EXIF/GPS) data from uploaded photos and videos before storage.
3.4 Information from others
- Reports, reviews and messages that other members submit about you.
- Verification results from our verification vendor.
- Payment status from our payment processor.
- Hash-matching results from child-safety tools (for example, industry hash lists of known child sexual abuse material).
3.5 Sensitive information
Because of what the Service is for, the fact that you have an account may itself reveal that you work in adult or adjacent industries. We treat all account information as sensitive and protect it accordingly. We do not ask about health, sexual orientation, race or religion, and we ask you not to include such information in your profile.
4. How we use your information
We use personal information only for the purposes below, or for other purposes you consent to or the law permits:
Provide the Service: create your account and profiles, show cross-side profiles in Discover, deliver Meows, intros and messages, run the gig board, reviews, availability and notifications.
Verify age and identity, and prevent duplicate, fake or banned accounts.
Keep people safe: moderate content (automatically and by people), investigate reports, enforce our Terms and Guidelines, detect scams, solicitation and off-platform payment pressure, and keep records of enforcement.
Payments: process subscriptions and (when offered) collab payments, handle refunds and disputes, prevent fraud and chargebacks, and meet tax and accounting duties.
Communicate with you: in-app notifications (new Meows, intros, messages, review requests, gig activity, moderation decisions and updates on reports you filed) and service emails (security, receipts, renewals, policy changes, account deletion notices). You choose which notification types you get in the app and by email in Settings → Notifications; notices about safety, moderation decisions and your account always appear in the app. Marketing emails are sent only with your express consent under Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL), which you give or withdraw with a separate switch in Settings → Privacy & data; we record the date. Every marketing email will include an unsubscribe link.
Improve the Service using aggregated or de-identified data where possible.
Legal compliance: respond to lawful requests, meet mandatory reporting duties, and establish or defend legal claims.
Automated processing. We use automated tools to scan uploads (for nudity, violence and known child sexual abuse material) and to flag text patterns (for example, solicitation, contact details, or payment-scam language). Where a decision about you is made exclusively by automated processing, we will tell you, and you may ask for the personal information used, the main factors behind the decision, and a review by a person. One account-level measure is applied automatically: if a verified member in good standing reports an account for a suspected minor, intimate or private material shared without consent, or threats or violence, that account is placed under a temporary review (see Terms of Service s. 11.2A) until a moderator checks the report. We tell the member their account is under review, a person reviews every case, and the member can ask for that review and the factors behind it.
Messages. We do not read your private messages as a routine practice. Messages may be scanned automatically for safety patterns, and may be reviewed by trained staff when a message is reported, when automated tools flag it, or when required to investigate a safety or legal issue.
Before a message is sent, the app checks it automatically for contact details (such as phone numbers, email addresses or messaging-app handles) and for requests to pay outside Whiskrs escrow. If it finds one, you see a reminder and the other person sees a safety tip. Nothing is blocked. If this happens repeatedly, we record how many times (not the message text) so our safety team can check for scams. Photos shared in a chat go through the same automated checks as other uploads and are reviewed by a trained moderator before the other person can see them. After that, only the two people in the chat can see them. Read receipts show when the other person has read your messages. You can turn them off in Settings → Privacy; then you don’t send them and don’t see other people’s.
5. Consent
By creating an account you consent to the collection, use and disclosure described in this Policy for the purposes in section 4. We ask for separate, express consent for biometric verification, for marketing emails, and for any optional feature that needs it. You may withdraw consent at any time (section 10), subject to legal or contractual restrictions; withdrawing consent to essential processing (such as verification) means we cannot provide the Service.
6. Who we share information with
We do not sell or rent personal information. We share it only as follows:
- Other members: your public profile (display name, role, city, niche tags, bio, approved portfolio, rating summary, availability) is visible only to members on the other side (Producers see Talent; Talent see Producers). Your legal name, email, phone, date of birth, verification data and the link between your two profiles are never shown to other members.
- Service providers, under written contracts that limit their use of the information to providing services to us and require appropriate safeguards:
| Provider type | Name | Location of processing |
|---|---|---|
| Cloud hosting and storage | Amazon Web Services | Canada (ca-central-1 Montreal / ca-west-1 Calgary) |
| Identity and age verification | Specialist identity verification vendor | Canada or the United States |
| Payment processing (subscriptions and, later, collab payments) | Specialist payment processor (for example CCBill or Segpay) | United States, Canada or the EU |
| Content moderation (image/text classification) | Image and text classification provider | Canada or the United States |
| Child-safety hash matching | Child-safety hash-matching provider (for example Project Arachnid Shield or PhotoDNA) | Canada or the United States |
| Email delivery | Transactional email provider | Canada or the United States |
| Customer support tools | Email and help-desk provider | Canada or the United States |
- Legal and safety: to comply with law, a court order, a warrant or another lawful request; to report suspected child sexual abuse or exploitation material to the Canadian Centre for Child Protection and police as required by law; or where we believe disclosure is needed to protect someone from serious harm. We require valid legal process for law-enforcement requests except in emergencies, and we will notify affected users where lawful and safe. Law-enforcement requests can be sent to [email protected].
- Business transfers: if we are involved in a merger, financing, acquisition or sale of assets, information may be disclosed to the other party under confidentiality obligations and used only for the same purposes.
7. Where your information is stored
We host our databases, files and backups in Canada. Some of our vendors (listed above) may process limited information outside Canada or outside your province, for example in the United States or the European Union. When information is processed outside Canada it is subject to the laws of that jurisdiction, and may be accessible to its courts, law enforcement and national security authorities. We use contracts and safeguards to protect it.
8. How long we keep information
We keep personal information only as long as needed for the purposes above, then delete or anonymise it.
| Information | Retention |
|---|---|
| Account and profile data | While your account is open. When you ask to delete your account, your profiles are hidden immediately and everything is permanently deleted 30 days later (the grace period, during which you can cancel). |
| Verification result, date and vendor reference ID | Life of the account plus 3 years, to prevent banned or under-age users from rejoining and to evidence our age checks |
| ID images, selfies, biometric templates | Not stored by us. Vendor deletes within 30 days of decision |
| Photos and videos | Until you delete them or your account (the stored files are deleted with the account); photos a moderator rejects are deleted 30 days after the decision; removed from backups within 35 days |
| Messages | Until an account in the conversation is deleted. A copy of up to the last 20 messages is kept with a report when the reporter chooses to attach them (see “Reports” below) |
| Notifications | Read notifications for 90 days; all notifications at most 365 days |
| Reports, moderation and enforcement records | 5 years after the case closes, including after the reporter or the reported member deletes their account. The report keeps the evidence captured when it was filed (a snapshot of the reported profile, message or review, and any attached chat messages) so we can act on repeat abuse; the reporter’s profile link is removed when the reporter deletes their account. Ban records for as long as needed to enforce the ban |
| Banned accounts | If a banned member deletes their account, we keep a one-way hash of their email address (not the address itself) to stop them rejoining, for 5 years |
| Staff audit log | Record of staff actions (who did what, when) kept for 6 years; it is not deleted with a member account |
| Privacy request log | Kept after deletion without your email address (date, type, outcome) for 3 years, so we can show we handled the request |
| Subscription and payment records | 6 years from the end of the tax year they relate to (Canada Revenue Agency books-and-records rule). If a deletion request comes while a collab payment (escrow) record is open or must be kept, we pause the deletion and tell you; the rest of the account is deleted when the record can be released |
| Child-safety case records | If an upload matches known child sexual abuse material, we keep the file’s hashes and details, the upload’s technical data (IP address, browser, time) and an encrypted copy of the file in a restricted store. The encrypted copy is kept until police are notified, then for the period the law requires (currently 21 days, or longer where amended law requires), or longer under a legal hold, and is then destroyed. The case record is kept for 5 years |
| Security logs | 12 months |
| Breach records | At least 24 months (PIPEDA) |
Information subject to a legal hold, an investigation, a dispute or a mandatory-reporting preservation duty is kept until that matter ends. Scheduled deletions are carried out by an automatic daily job; if an account is under an open urgent safety report or a temporary review, the job pauses its deletion until the review ends, and each run is logged without names or email addresses. Our staff can put a scheduled account deletion on hold for these reasons (for example an open urgent safety report); every hold and release is recorded in the staff audit log.
9. How we protect information
We use administrative, technical and physical safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the information, including: encryption in transit (TLS) and at rest; field-level encryption for verification references and legal names; strict role-based staff access with logging; multi-factor authentication for staff; separation of the two profiles of a dual-role account in every public surface and API; removal of photo location metadata; regular security testing; and vendor due diligence. No system is perfectly secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
10. Your rights and choices
Subject to legal limits, you can:
- Access the personal information we hold about you and learn how it has been used and disclosed;
- Correct inaccurate or incomplete information (most profile data can be edited in the app);
- Withdraw consent to processing (for example, marketing emails, or optional features);
- Download your data yourself from Settings → Privacy & data → Download my data: a structured JSON file (a commonly used technological format) with your account, profiles, chats, Meows, intros, gigs and applications, reviews you wrote and received, reports you filed (with their status), blocks, notifications and settings, plus links valid for 24 hours to download your own photos. You can do this up to 3 times a day.
- Delete your account yourself from Settings → Privacy & data → Delete my account. We ask you to confirm your password (or sign in again) and type DELETE. Your profiles disappear from Whiskrs straight away, any Pro plan stops renewing, and everything is permanently deleted 30 days later unless you cancel by signing in. Some records are kept as described in section 8.
- Pause a profile to hide it from Discover and gigs without deleting anything.
- Data portability: receive a copy of the computerised personal information you provided, in a structured, commonly used technological format [Quebec right since September 2024; we offer it to all users]. The download above provides this;
- Ask about automated decisions and request human review (section 4);
- De-indexation / cessation of dissemination (Quebec): ask us to stop disseminating your information or de-index a hyperlink where the legal criteria are met; and
- Complain to us, and to the regulator (section 13).
What the download does not include: moderators’ internal notes and evidence gathered for safety reviews, reports other members filed about you, and other people’s personal information (for example the other person’s private details in a chat). You can still ask for access to these by email; we will provide what the law requires, removing information about other people and anything we may lawfully withhold (for example to protect a reporter’s safety or an ongoing investigation), and tell you why.
To make a request, contact the Privacy Officer at [email protected]. We will verify your identity before responding and will respond within 30 days (or tell you if we need an extension as the law allows). Requests are free unless the law allows a reasonable fee, in which case we will tell you first.
11. Privacy breaches
If a breach of security safeguards involving your personal information creates a real risk of significant harm (PIPEDA), or a confidentiality incident presents a risk of serious injury (Quebec), we will:
- report it to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada and, where applicable, the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec, as soon as feasible;
- notify you directly as soon as feasible, explaining what happened, what information was involved, what we are doing, and steps you can take;
- notify other organisations (such as the verification vendor or payment processor) that may be able to reduce the harm; and
- keep a record of every breach or confidentiality incident for at least 24 months, whether or not it is reportable.
Given the sensitivity of the Service, we will treat any unauthorised disclosure that could reveal someone’s membership, legal name, or the link between their profiles as likely to create a real risk of significant harm.
12. Children
The Service is only for adults (18+, or the age of majority where you live). We do not knowingly collect information from minors. If we learn that a minor has tried to use the Service, we block the account, delete their information except what we must keep to prevent re-registration and to meet legal duties, and report to authorities where required.
13. Provincial notes
- Ontario. Ontario does not have a general private-sector privacy law; PIPEDA applies to our commercial activities in Ontario. Ontario residents may complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (www.priv.gc.ca).
- Quebec. The Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector, as amended by Law 25, applies to the personal information of Quebec residents. Quebec residents may complain to the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec (www.cai.gouv.qc.ca). A French version of this Policy will be provided before we offer the Service in Quebec. Privacy-protective settings are on by default.
- Alberta and British Columbia. If we serve these provinces, their Personal Information Protection Acts may apply instead of PIPEDA for activities within those provinces.
14. Changes to this Policy
We will post updates here with a new effective date and, for material changes, notify you in the app or by email before they take effect. If a change requires new consent, we will ask for it.
15. Contact us
Privacy Officer, Whiskrs Email: [email protected]