Privacy Policy

This policy explains what personal information 2016Chat collects, why we collect it, how long we keep it, who we share it with, and the rights you have over it.

Last updated: 23 June 2026

Who we are

2016Chat is a mobile app for nearby social discovery and messaging. The app is operated by an individual developer (a sole trader), referred to in this policy as "the Operator", "we", "us", or "our".

For the purposes of UK and EU data protection law, the Operator is the "data controller" for personal information processed through 2016Chat.

Operator: Josh (sole trader), United Kingdom
Privacy contact: privacy@2016chat.com

Who this applies to and where

2016Chat is available to people in the United Kingdom, the European Economic Area (EEA), the United States, and other regions. Your local data protection law applies to you automatically: if you are in the UK or EEA, UK GDPR / EU GDPR rights apply; if you are in California, the CCPA/CPRA applies. This policy is written to cover all of these. Region-specific rights are described in the sections below.

Minimum age (13+) and younger users

2016Chat is intended for people aged 13 and over. The app asks for your date of birth during sign-up and blocks anyone under 13 from creating an account. The service is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 13. If we learn that we hold information about a child under 13, we will delete it.

If you are between 13 and 17, please use 2016Chat with the involvement of a parent or guardian where appropriate. We apply extra care to users under 18: we minimise the data we use about them, we do not use their data for behavioural advertising (we do not run advertising at all), and we do not surface age-restricted (for example, nightlife) recommendations to under-18 accounts.

Information we collect

We only collect what we need to run the service. The main categories are:

Account information — your email address (for email/password sign-in, or supplied by Apple or Google when you use social sign-in), a unique account identifier, your chosen username, and your account status.
Profile information — the display name, short bio, and profile photo you choose, and whether your profile is set to be discoverable. When your profile is discoverable, this information is visible to other signed-in users.
Date of birth / age — collected at sign-up to confirm you meet the minimum age and to apply age-appropriate protections.
Precise location — if you grant location permission, your device's GPS location is used to power nearby discovery and location-based content. Your precise location and short-term location history are stored privately and are only accessible to you (and to our backend systems that operate the feature). Raw location history is kept only briefly (see Retention).
Approximate location — a deliberately coarsened version of your location (rounded to roughly a 1 km area) and your general city. This approximate location is what other discoverable users may see for "people nearby" features — never your exact position.
Messages and content — the messages you send in direct and group chats, which are visible to the members of those chats, and any content you submit (such as your profile photo).
Derived interest signals — to personalise suggestions, the app works out a broad interest category from your messages on your device (for example "food", "nightlife", or "events"). Only the resulting category and the matched keyword are stored under your account. The text of your messages is not stored or sent for this purpose.
Activity and usage data — in-app activity used to operate and improve features and recommendations: which cards you view or tap, places you save, and aggregate behaviour counters. These records use coarse context only (such as city, hour, day, and platform), not your exact location or message text.
Referral / invite information — if you join after a friend shares an invite link, we record which existing user invited you (their username and your new account) so we can understand how 2016Chat grows by word of mouth. This is stored privately, is not shown on your profile or to other users, and does not involve accessing your contacts or address book.
Notification token — if you enable notifications, a device messaging token so we can deliver chat notifications. It is stored privately and cleared on a best-effort basis when you sign out or request deletion.
Device, diagnostic, and security data — technical information needed to keep the service reliable and secure, including app integrity (App Check) signals and rate-limiting records used to prevent abuse. If the app crashes, a crash report (the error details, your device model, and operating-system version) is sent to us through Firebase Crashlytics so we can find and fix problems. These reports are used only to keep the app stable, are not used to track you, and are not linked to your identity.

We do not ask for or intentionally collect special-category data (such as health, religious, or political information). Please do not put such information in your profile or messages if you do not want it processed.

Why we use your information, and our legal basis

Under UK/EU GDPR we must have a "lawful basis" for each use. Ours are:

To provide the service you ask for — creating your account, showing nearby people and places, and delivering your chats. Legal basis: performance of a contract with you.
Location and notifications — using your device location for nearby features and sending push notifications. Legal basis: your consent, given through your device's permission settings, which you can withdraw at any time in your device settings.
Safety, moderation, and security — handling reports, blocking, automated and manual moderation, preventing spam, fraud, and abuse, and protecting the service and its users. Legal basis: our legitimate interests in keeping the service safe (and, where relevant, our legal obligations).
Improving the service and personalising recommendations — using activity data and derived interests to make suggestions more relevant and to improve features. Legal basis: our legitimate interests in operating and improving the product. You can limit this by limiting your in-app activity, and you can object (see Your rights).
Understanding how 2016Chat grows — recording which existing user invited a new user, to measure word-of-mouth growth. Legal basis: our legitimate interests in understanding and growing the service. We do not access your contacts or address book for this.
Support and legal compliance — responding to your requests and complying with applicable law, lawful requests, and dispute handling. Legal basis: legitimate interests and legal obligation.

Automated decisions about your account

To protect users at scale, an account may be automatically suspended if a high number of different users report it within a set period. This is designed to be hard to trigger and is always reversible. If your account is suspended and you believe it was a mistake, you can ask us to review it by emailing support@2016chat.com, and a person will review your appeal. We do not use automated decision-making with legal or similarly significant effects without offering this human review.

Who we share information with

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising or to track you across other apps and websites. We share information only with the service providers ("processors") that help us run 2016Chat, and where required by law.

Google / Firebase & Google Cloud — app hosting, sign-in, database, file storage, messaging/notifications, app-integrity checks, and serverless functions. Profile-photo safety screening uses Google Cloud Vision, and some AI-generated suggestion text uses Google's Gemini model. (Firebase privacy)
Google Maps Platform — nearby places and map imagery (Places and Static Maps). (Google privacy)
Ticketmaster — local events and shows.
NewsAPI — local news content.
MET Norway — weather data.
Apple and Google — if you choose "Sign in with Apple" or "Sign in with Google".

These providers act on our instructions under data-processing terms. We may also disclose information where reasonably necessary to comply with the law, enforce our Terms, prevent fraud or abuse, or protect the rights and safety of users.

International data transfers

2016Chat's database is hosted in the European Union, but some processing happens in the United States (for example, certain backend functions and providers such as Google, Apple, Ticketmaster, and NewsAPI). Where personal information is transferred outside the UK/EEA, it is protected by appropriate safeguards such as the providers' Standard Contractual Clauses and the UK International Data Transfer Addendum, together with their own technical and organisational measures.

How long we keep information (retention)

Raw location history — kept only short-term and routinely deleted (currently after about 7 days).
Account and profile data — kept for the life of your account. When you request deletion, your account enters a 30-day grace period (so you can change your mind by signing back in), after which private personal data is deleted or anonymised. See the Account Deletion page.
Messages — chat history may remain visible to the other members of a chat. When your account is deleted, your identity in shared chats is anonymised.
Operational data — short-lived caches and rate-limit records expire automatically.
Safety, security, and legal records — kept only for as long as needed for safety, fraud prevention, dispute handling, and legal compliance.

Where we no longer need information to identify you, we may keep it in anonymous or aggregated form.

Your rights (UK and EEA)

If you are in the UK or EEA, you have the right to: access your information; have inaccurate information corrected; have your information deleted; restrict or object to certain processing; data portability; and withdraw consent (for example, by turning off location or notifications in your device settings) at any time without affecting earlier processing.

To exercise any of these, email privacy@2016chat.com. You can also delete your account from within the app (Profile → Delete account).

If you are unhappy with how we handle your information, you have the right to complain to your data protection regulator. In the UK this is the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk. In the EEA, you may complain to your local supervisory authority.

Your rights (California)

If you are a California resident, you have the right to know what personal information we collect and how we use it, to request access and deletion, to correct inaccurate information, and to not be discriminated against for exercising your rights. We do not sell your personal information and do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising. To make a request, email privacy@2016chat.com.

Security

We use technical and organisational measures to protect your information, including app-integrity verification (App Check), encryption of data in transit, strict access rules that keep sensitive data (such as exact location, email, and notification tokens) private to you, and rate limiting to resist abuse. No system can be guaranteed perfectly secure, but we work to protect your information and to respond appropriately to any incident.

Cookies and the website

This website (2016chat.com) uses no cookies, no analytics, no tracking, and no third-party scripts. The 2016Chat app stores some data on your device (such as sign-in state and cached content) so the app can function.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. We will change the "Last updated" date above, and where changes are material we will take reasonable steps to make them known.