Privacy Policy

1. Information We Collect

Account and identity information: your name, email address, password, and optional details such as date of birth, phone number, and postal address, plus, where you provide them, known aliases, business or entity names, and social media handles.

Sensitive identity and financial information, only where a feature requires it: your Social Security number and government or financial identifiers (used for identity verification and for card and banking features), and payment, card, bank-account, transaction, and balance details.

Privacy and security data we process to deliver the Service: the data brokers and third parties where your information appears, the requests we submit on your behalf and their responses, breach and dark-web findings, your privacy score and reports, alerts, and monitoring enrollments.

Feature-specific data: for masked email and phone, your real contact details plus forwarded message content and call or message metadata and consent records; for virtual cards and banking, cardholder and linked-account details and transactions; for threat protection and the browser extension, the web addresses you visit or download and information about files you choose to check; for the AI assistant, the questions you ask and the account context used to answer them.

If you turn on broker-reply forwarding, the data-broker replies your mail provider forwards to us. This is limited to mail from the data brokers we cover and the privacy-request vendors they answer through, it is off unless you set it up, and it is described in full in Section 6.

Usage, device, and log information: IP address, browser and device information, user agent, and interactions with the Service, used to operate, secure, and improve it.

2. Sensitive Information

Some features require sensitive information, such as your Social Security number for identity verification or your financial details for card and banking features. We collect and use this information only to provide the feature you request and to meet related legal and verification requirements, we do not sell it, and we apply heightened safeguards, including encryption of Social Security numbers at rest. You choose whether to use features that require sensitive information.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use your information to provide and operate the Service and its features, to submit opt-out and deletion requests on your behalf, to monitor for breaches, exposures, and threats, to provision and operate masked contact details and payment or banking instruments you request, to generate scores and reports, to power the AI assistant, to verify identity and prevent fraud, to process payments, to communicate with you, to secure and improve the Service, and to comply with law.

We use the sensitive personal information you provide only to deliver the Service you request and to meet legal obligations. We do not sell your personal information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

4. How We Share Information

To fulfill your requests: to submit opt-out, deletion, and access requests to data brokers and other parties as your authorized agent, and to operate features you use, we share the specific information needed for that purpose with the relevant party or provider.

With service providers and feature partners: providers that host our infrastructure, process payments, issue cards and provide banking, verify identity, monitor for breaches and threats, deliver masked email, phone, and mail, and provide artificial-intelligence functionality, each bound by confidentiality and data-protection obligations and permitted to use your information only to provide their service to us.

For legal reasons: when required by law, to respond to lawful requests, or to protect the rights, safety, and property of you, us, our partners, or others.

In a business transfer: if we are involved in a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, subject to this Policy.

Text messaging: Privatus does not sell or share your SMS opt-in data or personal information with third parties for marketing purposes. No mobile information will be shared with third parties or affiliates for marketing or promotional purposes. Text messaging originator opt-in data and consent are excluded from all of the categories above and will not be shared with any third parties. Information is shared with our telecommunications providers only as needed to deliver the text messages you request.

5. Third-Party Feature Providers

Many features are delivered with third-party sub-processors, including categories such as cloud hosting and database providers, payment processors, card issuers and banking or bank-linking partners, identity-verification providers, breach and dark-web monitoring providers, threat-intelligence providers, masked-email, telephony, and physical-mail providers, artificial-intelligence providers, and scheduling and analytics providers.

When you use a feature, the information needed to perform it flows to the relevant provider, and their handling of that information is also governed by their own terms and privacy practices. A current list of these categories, and specific providers where we can name them, is available on request at admin@joinprivatus.com.

Voice input to the AI assistant works differently and is worth stating plainly. Speech is converted to text by your own web browser, using the speech recognition built into it, which in most browsers sends the audio to the browser vendor for transcription under that vendor's privacy policy rather than ours. Privatus never receives or stores your voice audio. We receive only the transcribed text, which is treated exactly as if you had typed it. Spoken replies from the assistant are generated by a text-to-speech provider from that text. Typing to the assistant avoids the browser speech path entirely.

6. Broker-Reply Forwarding (Optional)

Data brokers confirm deletions by emailing you rather than us, because the request identifies you by your own address. Those confirmations never reach your broker list, which is why a completed removal can keep showing as pending. Broker-reply forwarding is the optional feature that closes that gap, and it is off unless you set it up.

It forwards broker mail only. We give you a filter file for your mail provider that matches the sending domains of the data brokers we cover and the privacy-request vendors they answer through, and forwards only those messages to an address we operate for your account. Mail from anyone else is never forwarded and never reaches us. We do not ask for, and do not want, access to your mailbox or a copy of your inbox.

Some mail providers, including iCloud and Yahoo, can only forward everything or nothing. We do not recommend using this feature on those providers, and the Service works without it. You can forward individual broker replies by hand instead.

Setting it up requires a confirmation code that your mail provider sends to the forwarding address, which means it arrives with us rather than in your inbox. We show that code back to you so that you can enter it yourself. We do not use the confirmation link in that message to enable forwarding on your behalf.

We read a forwarded message only to match it to a data broker and to record the outcome of your request. Forwarded mail that we cannot attribute to a data broker is discarded and is not stored. You can stop forwarding at any time from your mail provider, without contacting us.

7. Data Retention

We keep your information for as long as your account is active and as needed to provide the Service, and thereafter as required to comply with legal, tax, financial, and recordkeeping obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. Some records tied to financial features may be retained longer where the law requires. You may request deletion as described below.

AI assistant conversations are an exception and are kept only briefly. Stored assistant transcripts are deleted automatically seven days after they are written, and you can delete the current conversation yourself at any time from the assistant.

Inbound mail, including anything reaching us through broker-reply forwarding, is an exception in the same way. The raw message is deleted automatically seven days after it arrives. What we keep beyond that is the outcome it established for your removal request, not the message.

8. Your Rights and Choices

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, delete, or receive a copy of your personal information, to limit the use of sensitive information, to opt out of certain processing, and to not be discriminated against for exercising these rights.

To exercise these rights, email admin@joinprivatus.com. We will verify your request and respond as required by applicable law. You may also update or delete much of your information from your account settings. Some information tied to legal or financial obligations may be retained even after a deletion request, as permitted by law.

9. Security

We use administrative, technical, and physical safeguards designed to protect your information, including encryption in transit, hashing of passwords, encryption of Social Security numbers at rest, role-based access controls, and audit logging. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

10. Children

The Service is not intended for anyone under 18, and we do not knowingly collect information from children. If you believe a child has provided us information, contact admin@joinprivatus.com and we will delete it.

11. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Policy from time to time. We will update the effective date and version above and, for material changes, provide notice where required. Your continued use of the Service means you accept the updated Policy.

12. Contact

Questions about this Policy or your information may be sent to admin@joinprivatus.com.