Overview
Laudo is a community-based local business recommendation app built for trusted friend networks. This Privacy Policy explains what data we collect, how we use it, and your rights regarding that data.
Laudo is operated by Giancarlo Bracero ("we," "us," or "our"). By using Laudo, you agree to the practices described below.
Information We Collect
| Data | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Email address | Account creation and verification |
| Display name | Identifying you to other community members |
| Profile photo | Optional, displayed on your profile |
| Date of birth | Age verification (we do not permit users under 13) and personalising your experience. Never shown publicly. |
| Gender | Optional. Used to personalise your experience and for anonymised aggregate insights. Never shown publicly. |
| Precise location | Your exact GPS coordinates, used to search for nearby businesses via Google Places API. We do not retain your precise location beyond what is necessary to process the search request. |
| Approximate location | A coarsened location at roughly neighborhood or city level, stored alongside activity events to improve recommendation relevance over time. |
| Ratings and reviews | Sharing business recommendations with your communities |
| Messages and threads | Community discussions and business recommendations |
| Friend connections | Building your trusted network for recommendations |
| Push notification token | Delivering notifications about friend requests, replies, and community activity |
| Your phone number | Used for three purposes: (1) invite verification, meaning your phone must match the phone number your inviter tied to your invite, so invite codes can't be forwarded and redeemed by someone else; (2) contact matching, so you can find friends you already know who are on Laudo; (3) discoverability, so friends who run contact matching can find you. You can turn off discoverability or remove your phone number entirely at any time in Settings → Personal Info. |
| Phone numbers from your contacts | Used for two purposes. Contact matching: when you choose to find friends from your contacts, your device sends phone numbers from your contacts to our servers to check against Laudo users. We match and discard. Only the user IDs of matched Laudo users are saved; the phone numbers from your contacts are not retained on our servers beyond the time needed to perform the comparison, though they may briefly transit server infrastructure (including our hosting provider Supabase) during processing. Inviting a friend: when you invite a specific friend, we read the selected contact's phone number to pre-fill the invite form. We do not upload or store your contacts list for this flow. |
| Usage and behavioral data | Businesses you search, view, and rate; navigation patterns; approximate location at time of interaction |
| Device and session data | Device type, OS version, and session identifiers used for app functionality and security |
How We Use Your Data
We use your data to provide and improve the Laudo experience: to display business recommendations from your friends and communities, enable friend connections and messaging, send push notifications, show nearby businesses, and maintain platform safety through content moderation.
We collect behavioral data (such as which businesses you search for, view, and rate) to understand how people use Laudo and improve recommendation quality over time. This data, combined with profile information such as age range and gender, may also be used to show you relevant offers or promotions from businesses inside the app. Any promoted content will be clearly labeled or otherwise identifiable as promoted content, and never confused with organic friend recommendations. Targeting is based on your in-app behavior and profile information. We do not share your individual data with advertisers.
We may use anonymized, aggregate data (including aggregate age and gender distributions) to provide businesses with insights about how Laudo users interact with their category or location. Aggregate data means data that has been combined and anonymized such that it cannot reasonably be used to identify any individual user. These insights never identify individual users.
Contact Matching
Laudo offers an optional feature that helps you find friends you already know who are on Laudo. This feature only runs when you choose to turn it on. We will never access your contacts without your permission.
How it works:
- When you tap "Find friends from your contacts," iOS will ask you to grant Laudo permission to read your contacts. You can decline, and nothing happens.
- If you allow it, your device sends the phone numbers from your contacts to our servers. We compare them against Laudo users who have chosen to be discoverable by phone.
- We match and discard. The phone numbers from your contacts are used only for this comparison and are not retained on our servers beyond the time needed to perform it. We only save the Laudo user IDs of the friends we matched. We do not save the phone numbers themselves, and we do not save any record of contacts who didn't match.
- The matched friends appear in your People → Suggested list with a "Contacts" label so you know how they were found.
Your controls:
- Turn off discoverability. In Settings → Personal Info, you can toggle "Allow others to find me by phone" off. Other people running contact matching will no longer be able to find you, even if your number is in their phone.
- Remove your phone number. In Settings → Personal Info, you can remove your phone number entirely. This also removes you from anyone else's existing contact match list. Note that removing your phone number would prevent you from redeeming another invite if you ever signed up again in the future.
- Revoke Contacts permission. You can revoke Laudo's access to your contacts at any time in iOS Settings → Laudo → Contacts. The next time you open Laudo, any contact matches previously saved for you will be deleted automatically.
- Block individual users. Blocking a user in Laudo excludes them from all contact matching in both directions.
Contact matching is rate-limited to prevent misuse. We do not use contact matching data for advertising, and we do not share it with third parties.
Sensitive Personal Information
Date of birth, gender, and precise geolocation are considered sensitive personal information under applicable law. We collect and use this data only for the purposes stated in this policy: age verification, personalisation, anonymised aggregate insights, and (for precise geolocation) searching for nearby businesses. We do not use this data for any other purpose without your consent, and we do not disclose it to third parties. We do not retain your precise geolocation beyond what is necessary to process a search request (see Location Data below).
If you are under 16 years of age, all of your personal information on Laudo is treated as sensitive personal information and is subject to heightened protection. We do not sell or share personal information of users under 16 for advertising purposes under any circumstances. If you wish to limit how we use your personal information, you may request deletion of specific data fields (such as date of birth or gender) without deleting your account by contacting us at [email protected], or by using the "Manage My Data" option in Settings.
Children's Privacy and COPPA
Laudo is not intended for use by anyone under the age of 13. We collect date of birth during account setup and use it to block access for anyone under 13. We do not knowingly collect, store, or process personal information from children under 13. If we become aware that we have inadvertently collected personal information from a child under 13, we will delete it promptly.
Because we collect date of birth, we have actual knowledge of users' ages under applicable law. If a user enters a date of birth indicating they are under 13, we deny access and do not store their date of birth or any other personal information.
If you believe a child under 13 has created an account on Laudo, please contact us immediately at [email protected].
Data Retention
We retain your personal data for as long as your account is active. If you delete your account voluntarily, your personal data (including ratings, threads, messages, friend connections, date of birth, and gender) is permanently deleted or anonymized within 30 days, subject to any legal or operational retention needs (for example, data that is part of an active dispute or required by law to be preserved).
After any account deletion, we retain a minimal internal record consisting of your internal user ID, the date of deletion, and counts of past activity (such as how many ratings or threads you created). This record contains no personally identifying information and is used for audit and platform integrity purposes.
If your account is terminated by us for violating these terms (see our Terms of Service), a one-way cryptographic hash of your email address and phone number is retained indefinitely to prevent re-signup. A hash is a scrambled, irreversible code: it cannot be used to recover your original email or phone number, and it serves no purpose other than checking whether a future signup attempt matches a previously banned account. All other personal data is permanently deleted at the time of termination.
You may also request deletion of specific data fields such as date of birth or gender without deleting your account. See "Your Rights" below.
We may retain certain limited data beyond account deletion where required by law, to resolve disputes, prevent fraud, or maintain platform security. Anonymized or aggregated data derived from your usage may be retained indefinitely as it cannot identify you.
Cookies and Device Tracking
Laudo is a mobile app and does not use browser cookies. However, we and our service providers may collect certain device identifiers and session data (such as device type, OS version, and app session tokens) to operate the app, maintain security, and understand usage patterns. We do not use cross-site tracking or share device identifiers with third-party advertisers.
Third-Party Services
Laudo uses the following third-party services to operate:
| Service | What It Does |
|---|---|
| Supabase | Hosts our database, handles authentication, and stores profile photos |
| Google Places API | Provides business search results and business details |
| Apple Push Notification Service | Delivers push notifications to your device |
| Resend | Sends transactional emails such as invite codes |
These services process data according to their own privacy policies. We share only the minimum data necessary for each service to function and take appropriate measures to ensure they handle your data in accordance with applicable law. We encourage you to review their privacy policies for more information.
Data Storage and Security
Your data is stored securely on Supabase's infrastructure. We use encrypted connections (HTTPS) for all data transmission and require authenticated access for all API requests. Profile photos are stored in secure cloud storage with access controls. Sensitive fields such as date of birth and gender are stored with row-level security controls that prevent any user from accessing another user's sensitive data.
In the event of a data breach that affects your personal information, we will notify affected users as required by applicable law and take prompt steps to contain and remediate the incident.
Your Rights
You have the right to access, correct, delete, or limit the use of your personal data at any time.
- Delete your account: You can permanently delete your account from Settings within the app. This removes all your personal data including ratings, threads, messages, friend connections, date of birth, and gender within 30 days. A minimal internal record (your internal user ID, deletion date, and activity counts) is retained for audit purposes with no personally identifying information. See Data Retention above for full details.
- Manage specific data fields: You can update or delete your date of birth and gender at any time by going to Settings → Personal Info in the app, or by emailing [email protected].
- Limit use of sensitive data: If you are under 16, or if you wish to limit how we use your sensitive personal information, contact us at [email protected] and we will process your request within 45 days.
- Access your data: You can request a copy of the personal data we hold about you by emailing [email protected].
- Correct your data: You can update your display name, headline, date of birth, and gender directly in the app. For other corrections, contact us.
- Phone number and contact matching: You can turn off "Allow others to find me by phone" or remove your phone number entirely at any time in Settings → Personal Info. See the Contact Matching section above for full details on how the feature works and what controls you have.
We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of these rights.
Location Data
Laudo collects two types of location data:
- Precise location: your exact GPS coordinates, collected when you search for nearby businesses. Sent to Google Places API to return relevant results. We do not retain your precise location beyond what is necessary to process the search request.
- Approximate location: a coarsened location at roughly neighborhood or city level, stored alongside behavioral events such as when you view or rate a business, to improve recommendation quality and relevance over time.
We do not track your movements continuously or build a location history. You can revoke location access at any time in your device settings, though this will limit the app's ability to show nearby businesses.
International Users and GDPR
Laudo is based in the United States. If you are located in the European Economic Area (EEA), United Kingdom, or Switzerland, your data may be transferred to and processed in the United States. We rely on Standard Contractual Clauses approved by the European Commission as the transfer safeguard for data transferred from the EEA to the United States.
If you are located in the EEA, we process your personal data on the basis of legitimate interests and, where applicable, contractual necessity to provide the service. You have the following rights under applicable law:
- Access: request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
- Rectification: request correction of inaccurate or incomplete data.
- Erasure: request deletion of your personal data in certain circumstances.
- Restriction: request that we limit processing of your data in certain circumstances.
- Portability: request your data in a structured, machine-readable format.
- Object: object to processing based on legitimate interests at any time. We will cease processing unless we can demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds.
- Withdraw consent: where processing is based on consent, you may withdraw it at any time without affecting the lawfulness of prior processing.
- Lodge a complaint: you have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection supervisory authority if you believe your rights have been violated.
To exercise any of these rights, contact us at support@getlaudo.com. We aim to respond within 30 days.
Changes to This Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make significant changes, we will notify you through the app or via email. Your continued use of Laudo after changes are posted constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.
Contact Us
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, wish to exercise your data rights, or have concerns about how your data is handled, contact us at support@getlaudo.com. We aim to respond to all requests within 45 days.