Privacy policy

Last updated: [date]

Draft for review. A lawyer reads this before it is published. Everything in yellow is still to fill in.

Two Little Ears is an app that reads your family’s own picture books aloud. You photograph the pages of a book you own, and the app reads each page aloud in a voice from the phone, or in a recorded voice of someone your child loves.

This policy says what information the app and this website use, where it is kept, and who else receives any of it. The app is made by [legal name of the company], [address] (“we”, “us”).

The short version

• Your books stay on your phone. The photos of your books, the words read from them, the recordings of people reading, and the names you type are kept only on your phone. We never receive them. We have no server that could hold them.
• We do not collect information about your child. The app has no accounts, no sign-in and no ads.
• Two companies receive a small amount of technical information from the app, described below: RevenueCat, which handles the Plus subscription, and Google, whose software reads the words on your pages.
• This website uses Google Analytics to count visits. That is about the website only, not the app.

What stays on your phone

The app keeps these things in its own storage on your phone, and nowhere else:

• the photos you take of your books’ covers and pages;
• the words the app reads from those photos, and any changes you make to them;
• the recordings you make of people reading your books, and their names and photos;
• the voice files the app makes when it reads a book aloud;
• the name of your bookshelf, and your settings.

We cannot see, open or receive any of this. The words on your pages are read on your phone, and the voice is made on your phone.

Deleting. You can delete a book or a reading in the app at any time, or delete everything in Settings → Your data. Removing the app from your phone also deletes everything it kept.

Backups of your phone. If you have turned on your phone’s own backup (Google backup on Android, iCloud Backup on iPhone), your phone may include the app’s books and recordings in that backup. That backup belongs to your Google or Apple account. We cannot see it. You can turn backups on or off in your phone’s settings.

Export a copy. Settings → Your data → Export a copy makes one file of your books and recordings, so you can keep them safe. The file stays on your phone until you choose where to send or save it.

The camera, the microphone and notifications

The app asks your permission before it uses any of these, and you can change your answer in your phone’s settings at any time.

• The camera is used only to photograph your books.
• The microphone is used only when you record someone reading a page.
• Notifications (Android) are used only to show the book that is playing on your lock screen, so you can pause it or turn a page without unlocking your phone.

What other companies receive from the app

RevenueCat, for the Plus subscription

When you buy Plus, or when the app checks whether you have Plus, the app talks to RevenueCat, the company that manages our subscriptions. RevenueCat receives: a random number that identifies this copy of the app (not your name), your purchase history and receipts from the store, the type of phone and its system version, and, as part of any internet connection, your IP address. Payment itself happens in Google Play or the App Store; we and RevenueCat never see your card details. We have turned off RevenueCat’s collection of advertising and device identifiers. RevenueCat’s privacy policy: revenuecat.com/privacy

Google, for reading the words on a page

The app reads the words in your photos with Google’s ML Kit, which runs on your phone. Your photos and the words in them are not sent to Google. ML Kit does send Google some technical information so that Google can check it is working: the make and model of your phone and its system version, the app’s name and version, a random number for this installation (not meant to identify you or your phone), and measurements such as how long reading a page took and whether it worked. For a book printed in Chinese, the app may download a language file from Google once. Google’s description: developers.google.com/ml-kit/android-data-disclosure

The voice

On Android the app uses Google’s text-to-speech engine on your phone to read a book aloud. The app chooses voices that work without the internet. If your phone needs to download a voice first, your phone downloads it from Google.

We do not sell or share information with anyone else. There are no advertising companies and no analytics companies in the app.

This website

This website, twolittleears.com, uses Google Analytics to count how many people visit, which pages they read and which buttons they press, for example the button to get the app. It helps us understand whether the page explains the app well.

Google Analytics uses cookies, and receives information such as the pages you visit, the type of device and browser you use, roughly where you are (the city or region, from your IP address), and the website you came from. We have turned off Google’s advertising features for this website, and we do not use this information to show you ads. Google’s description: policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites

You can stop Google Analytics on every website with Google’s browser add-on: tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout, or by blocking cookies in your browser. The website works the same without them.

Children

Two Little Ears is made for children aged 0 to 5, with a parent. Children use the bookshelf and listen to books; everything else, such as adding books, recording, settings, purchases and links out of the app, is behind a “for parents” screen that asks for a three-second press.

We do not ask children for any information, and the app does not collect personal information from children. The information described under “What other companies receive from the app” is technical information about the app and the phone, not about your child. This website is for parents.

Keeping information safe

What the app keeps stays inside the app’s own storage on your phone. Information sent to RevenueCat and Google is sent over encrypted connections.

How long information is kept

On your phone: until you delete it, or remove the app. RevenueCat keeps purchase records for as long as needed to manage your subscription and as the law requires [check RevenueCat’s retention terms]. Google Analytics keeps this website’s visit information for [2 or 14 months, as set in Google Analytics]. To ask for RevenueCat’s records about your copy of the app to be deleted, contact us.

Your choices and your rights

You can see, change and delete everything the app keeps, in the app itself. To ask about anything in this policy, or about information RevenueCat holds for us, contact us at the address below. If you are not happy with our answer, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (oaic.gov.au).

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we will put the new version here with a new date. If a change means the app uses information in a new way, we will say so in the app before it happens.

Contact

[privacy@twolittleears.com]
[legal name of the company, address]