Privacy Policy

Effective date: April 6, 2026

Probed ("we," "us," or "our") operates the website at probed.space (the "Service"). This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you visit our Service. By using the Service, you consent to the data practices described in this policy.

1. Information We Collect

1.1 Information You Provide

Account Information: When you register for an account, we collect your email address and a password. Your password is cryptographically hashed before storage and is never stored in plain text.
Preferences: If you use features such as favorites, watchlists, or notification settings, we store your selections to provide a personalized experience.
Email Subscriptions: If you opt in to periodic communications (such as Daily Digests), we store your subscription preferences alongside your account.
Waitlist: If you join our waitlist, we collect your email address and, optionally, the referral source through which you discovered the Service.
Communications: If you contact us directly, we may retain the content of your communications for support and record-keeping purposes.
Submissions and Requests: If you submit a link, post, sighting report, correction, removal request, or follow-up material, we collect the content you provide, related URLs, structured details, and any contact name or email you choose to provide. If you later sign in using the same email address, we may allow you to associate prior anonymous submissions with your account.

1.2 Information Collected Automatically

Usage Data: We collect information about how you interact with the Service, including pages visited, features used, referring URLs, and timestamps, through analytics tools.
Live Traffic Analytics: We may collect current page paths, coarse location metadata supplied by our hosting provider, browser/device class, and recent activity timestamps to operate internal admin traffic dashboards. We do not store raw IP addresses in the application database for this feature.
Device and Browser Data: We may collect your browser type, operating system, screen resolution, language preference, and general device information.
IP Address: Your IP address may be collected by our analytics and infrastructure providers.
Submission Safety Signals: To protect the submission system, we may collect or derive a hashed version of your IP address, your browser user agent, submission timestamps, and duplicate-detection fingerprints. We use hashed IP values for rate limiting and abuse prevention and do not store raw IP addresses in the application database for this purpose.
Human Verification Data: For some anonymous submission flows, we use Cloudflare Turnstile. Cloudflare may receive your IP address, challenge token, browser information, and related security signals to help determine whether a request is likely human. We may store limited verification metadata, such as verification time, hostname, and action.
Cookies and Similar Technologies: We use cookies and similar technologies as described in Section 4 below.

1.3 Push Notifications

If you opt in to browser push notifications, your browser generates a push subscription token that we use to send you notifications. This token is associated with your device and browser, not with your personal identity. You can revoke push notification permissions at any time through your browser settings.

2. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to:

Provide, maintain, and improve the Service, including delivering personalized content feeds and notifications.
Process and fulfill your account registration and manage your preferences.
Send you communications you have requested, such as Daily Digests and service updates.
Review, moderate, respond to, and document submissions, corrections, removal requests, and related follow-up communications.
Allow signed-in users to claim prior anonymous submissions that were submitted using the same email address.
Analyze usage patterns to improve the Service, identify issues, and develop new features.
Process user-provided location search queries to render maps or enrich location-based features.
Detect, prevent, and respond to fraud, abuse, security incidents, and technical issues.
Comply with legal obligations and enforce our Terms of Service.

We do not use your personal information to train or fine-tune artificial intelligence or machine learning models. Our automated content processing systems are used primarily on publicly available third-party content and, where a community submission is approved for publication, on the approved content and related metadata needed to process it. We do not use account passwords, private support emails, or routine account settings for this purpose.

3. Information Sharing and Disclosure

We do not sell your personal information. We share information only in the following limited circumstances:

3.1 Service Providers

We use third-party service providers to operate and improve the Service. These providers process data on our behalf and are contractually obligated to use your information only for the purposes we specify. Categories of providers include:

Cloud infrastructure, database hosting, and authentication: for storing account data, preferences, submission records, and application data, and for managing secure user sign-in and session management. This includes Supabase and related hosting or content delivery providers.
Analytics services: for understanding how the Service is used. We use Google Analytics 4.
Email delivery services: for sending communications you have requested and operational messages about your submissions or account. We use Resend for email delivery.
Human verification and abuse-prevention services: for validating anonymous submission attempts and reducing spam or automated abuse. This includes Cloudflare Turnstile when enabled.
Content processing services: for automated classification, summarization, and organization of public source material and approved or published submissions. This includes AI providers such as OpenAI. We do not send account passwords to these services.
Map and geolocation services: for rendering interactive maps and processing user-provided location search queries. This includes MapTiler when enabled.
Hosting and content delivery: for serving the application and static assets and, in some cases, providing coarse location or request metadata used for operations and security.

3.2 Public and Approved Submission Content

If you submit material that is approved for publication, the substance of that submission may be incorporated into a public item, feed entry, or related Service content. Public content may be visible to other users, search engines, archives, and third parties. We generally do not publish the contact name or contact email you provide solely for submission follow-up unless you intentionally include that information in the content itself, choose to make it public elsewhere, or we are required to do so by law.

3.3 Legal Requirements

We may disclose your information if required to do so by law, regulation, legal process, or governmental request, or when we believe disclosure is necessary to protect our rights, your safety, or the safety of others, investigate fraud, or respond to a government request.

3.4 Business Transfers

In the event of a merger, acquisition, reorganization, or sale of assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction. We will notify you via email or a prominent notice on the Service before your information becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

3.5 YouTube API Services

The Service uses YouTube API Services to retrieve official video and channel metadata, check whether certain videos may be embedded inline, and render YouTube-backed playback surfaces. We do not collect YouTube account credentials from you for these features.

When you choose to play an embedded YouTube video or open a YouTube link from the Service, YouTube and Google may receive information such as your device details, IP address, cookies, and playback activity under their own terms and privacy policies. You can learn more at YouTube's Terms of Service and Google's Privacy Policy.

If we store YouTube channel subscriber metrics, we retain those current counts and historical points for no longer than a rolling 30-day window unless a different retention period is required by law or explicitly authorized by the relevant channel owner.

4. Cookies and Tracking Technologies

4.1 Essential Cookies

We use essential cookies to manage your authentication session and keep you signed in. These cookies are strictly necessary for the Service to function and cannot be disabled without losing access to authenticated features.

4.2 Analytics Cookies

We use Google Analytics 4 to collect aggregated usage data. Google Analytics uses cookies to distinguish unique users and sessions. You can learn more about Google's data practices at Google's Privacy Policy.

4.3 Managing Cookies

Most web browsers allow you to control cookies through their settings. You can set your browser to refuse cookies, delete existing cookies, or alert you when cookies are being set. Note that disabling essential cookies may prevent you from using certain features of the Service.

You may also opt out of Google Analytics tracking by installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.

5. Data Retention

Account Data: We retain your account information for as long as your account is active. If you delete your account, we will delete or anonymize your personal data within a reasonable period, except where retention is required by law.
Waitlist Data: Waitlist email addresses are retained until the waitlist is no longer active or you request removal.
Usage and Analytics Data: Aggregated analytics data is retained according to our analytics provider's standard retention policies.
Submission Data: We retain submission records, related contact details, anti-abuse signals, duplicate-detection metadata, follow-up communications, and moderation history for as long as needed to operate and document the submission process, investigate abuse, and comply with legal obligations.
YouTube API Data and Metrics: YouTube-backed video and channel metadata is retained only as needed to operate the relevant feature, and YouTube subscriber metrics are retained for no longer than a rolling 30-day window unless a longer period is required by law or separately authorized.
Public Content Derived from Approved Submissions: If an approved submission is incorporated into a public item or published record, that public content may remain available even if the originating submission record or associated account is later deleted or anonymized.
Communications: We retain records of email communications we send to you for operational and compliance purposes.

6. Data Security

We implement reasonable administrative, technical, and physical security measures to protect your information, including:

Encryption of data in transit using TLS/SSL.
Cryptographic hashing of passwords (passwords are never stored in plain text).
Row-level security policies that restrict database access to authorized users and operations.
Access controls that limit employee and system access to personal data on a need-to-know basis.

While we strive to protect your information, no method of transmission over the Internet or electronic storage is 100% secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security.

7. Your Rights and Choices

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have the following rights regarding your personal information:

Access: Request a copy of the personal information we hold about you.
Correction: Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information.
Deletion: Request deletion of your personal information, subject to legal retention requirements.
Account Deletion: Signed-in users may request deletion of their account through the Service. Deleting an account does not necessarily remove public content previously created from an approved submission.
Data Portability: Request a copy of your data in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format.
Opt-Out of Communications: Unsubscribe from email communications at any time through your account settings or by following the unsubscribe link in any email.
Withdraw Consent: Where processing is based on consent, you may withdraw consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of processing before withdrawal.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at probedspace@gmail.com. We will respond within the timeframe required by applicable law.

8. Children's Privacy

The Service is not directed to children under the age of 13 (or under 16 in jurisdictions where GDPR applies). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If we become aware that a child has provided us with personal information without parental consent, we will take steps to delete that information. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us at probedspace@gmail.com.

9. International Data Transfers

The Service is operated from the United States. If you access the Service from outside the United States, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States and other countries where our service providers operate. Data protection laws in these jurisdictions may differ from those in your home country.

By using the Service, you consent to the transfer of your information to the United States and other jurisdictions as described in this policy. Where required by applicable law (such as the GDPR), we take steps intended to support lawful cross-border transfer mechanisms, including contractual commitments from relevant service providers.

10. European Economic Area (EEA) and UK Users

If you are located in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, we process your personal data under the following lawful bases:

Contract: Processing necessary to provide the Service you have requested (e.g., account management, communications).
Legitimate Interests: Processing necessary for our legitimate interests (e.g., improving the Service, security, analytics), provided those interests are not overridden by your data protection rights.
Consent: Where you have given explicit consent (e.g., marketing communications, push notifications). You may withdraw consent at any time.
Legal Obligation: Processing necessary to comply with applicable legal requirements.

Under the GDPR, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection supervisory authority.

11. California Privacy Rights

If you are a California resident, you have rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and its amendments, including:

Right to Know: You may request that we disclose the categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you, the categories of sources from which we collected it, the business purpose for collecting it, and the categories of third parties with whom we shared it.
Right to Delete: You may request that we delete personal information we have collected from you, subject to certain exceptions.
Right to Correct: You may request that we correct inaccurate personal information we maintain about you.
Right to Opt-Out of Sale: We do not sell personal information. If this changes, we will provide a "Do Not Sell My Personal Information" link.
Right to Non-Discrimination: We will not discriminate against you for exercising your CCPA rights.

Categories of personal information we collect may include identifiers and contact information (such as email address, account ID, and, if provided, contact name); internet or electronic network activity (such as browsing history and usage data); geolocation information derived from user-provided search queries or coarse location metadata; submission content and correspondence; and inferences drawn from the above.

To exercise your California privacy rights, contact us at probedspace@gmail.com.

12. Do Not Track

Some web browsers transmit "Do Not Track" (DNT) signals. Because there is no uniform standard for interpreting DNT signals, the Service does not currently respond to DNT signals. Third-party services we use, such as analytics providers, may continue to collect information about your activity as described in their own privacy policies. We will update this policy if a standard is established in the future.

13. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make material changes, we will notify you by revising the effective date at the top of this page and, where appropriate, providing additional notice (such as via email or a prominent notice on the Service). Your continued use of the Service after any changes indicates your acceptance of the updated policy.

14. Contact Us

If you have any questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy or our data practices, please contact us at probedspace@gmail.com.