UNCOVER PLACES — PRIVACY POLICY

1. Who We Are

UNCOVER Places is operated by Francisco Sobral, Porto, Portugal.

For privacy-related questions, contact support@uncoverplaces.com.

2. Information We Collect

Depending on the features you use, UNCOVER may process the following information. Information marked as required is needed to provide the corresponding feature; everything else is optional.

Account Information

• Required to create an account: first name, last name, email address, mobile phone number, a password (stored by our authentication provider, never in readable form), and authentication identifiers.
• If you sign in with Google: the identifiers and basic profile information that Google shares with us, such as your name, email address, and profile picture.
• Optional: a username or display name, a short bio, a profile photo, and your interests.
• Account preferences: language, currency, notification choices, and privacy settings.

Location Information

When you grant permission, the app uses your device location while it is in use. See Location Permissions below.

Journey Information

• Preferences you choose when creating a journey, such as city, duration, mood, pace, interests, and starting point.
• Journeys you create, save, purchase, start, or complete, the places you add or remove, and your progress through a journey.
• Favorites, collections, and recently viewed places and journeys.
• Moments you choose to create: titles, notes, photos or videos, and the location and time they were captured.
• Reviews and ratings you submit, and progress, stamps, and achievements earned in the app.

Purchase Information

• Orders, items purchased, prices, promotional codes, payment status, and the content you have access to.
• Billing details you provide, such as billing name, email, phone number, and address.
• Payment card details are entered directly into a form provided by our payment processor, Stripe. UNCOVER does not receive or store your full card number or security code. We store references provided by Stripe (such as customer and transaction identifiers). If you choose to save a card, it is stored by Stripe.

Technical Information

Technical information necessary to operate, secure, diagnose, and improve the application, such as server logs of requests and payment events.

Support Communications

If you contact us, we process your email address and the content of your message.

3. How We Use Information

Personal information may be used to:

• Create and maintain user accounts.
• Authenticate users and protect account access.
• Provide destination discovery and personalized journeys.
• Enable location-based recommendations, walking routes, and journey check-ins.
• Manage purchases and access to acquired content.
• Respond to support requests.
• Maintain application security and reliability.
• Comply with applicable legal obligations, including tax and accounting obligations.

UNCOVER does not sell personal information and does not use third-party advertising or analytics tools in the app or on this website.

4. Legal Bases

Where the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) applies, we rely on the following legal bases:

5. Location Permissions

UNCOVER may request permission to access your device location. Location is used only while the app is in use; the app does not collect location in the background.

• Your most recent position and city may be kept on your device to speed up nearby results. Each new position replaces the previous one; the app does not build a location history on your device.
• When you start a journey, the starting coordinates are stored with that journey.
• When you check in at a stop during a journey, the coordinates and accuracy of the check-in are stored to confirm your arrival.
• Moments you create may include the location where they were captured.
• To calculate walking routes, your position and destination are sent to our routing provider.

You can manage or revoke location permissions at any time through your device settings. Some features, such as nearby discoveries and GPS check-ins, may not work without location access.

6. Service Providers

UNCOVER relies on the following providers to operate the service. They process personal information on our behalf or as independent providers under their own terms.

7. International Data Transfers

Some of our providers may process personal information outside the European Economic Area. Where this happens, transfers are protected by appropriate safeguards, such as European Commission adequacy decisions or Standard Contractual Clauses.

8. Data Retention

Personal information is retained only for periods justified by its processing purpose and applicable legal requirements:

• Account and journey information: while your account is active, and deleted or anonymized after a deletion request, except where retention is required by law.
• Purchase and transaction records: for the period required by tax and accounting law.
• Support emails: for as long as needed to resolve your request.
• Technical logs: for as long as needed to operate, secure, and troubleshoot the service.

9. Your Privacy Rights

Where applicable, you may have the right to:

• Access personal information.
• Correct inaccurate information.
• Request deletion.
• Restrict processing.
• Object to certain processing.
• Request data portability.
• Withdraw consent where processing is based on consent.
• Lodge a complaint with a competent supervisory authority. In Portugal, this is the Comissão Nacional de Proteção de Dados (CNPD).

To exercise your rights, email support@uncoverplaces.com from the email address linked to your account, describing your request. We may ask for additional information to verify your identity. We respond within the time limits set by applicable law. For deletion, see Account Deletion.

10. Security

UNCOVER implements technical and organizational measures intended to protect personal information, including access controls on our database and the use of a specialized payment processor for card data. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure.

11. Children's Privacy

UNCOVER is intended only for people aged 18 or over. Children and anyone under 18 may not create an account or use the app, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them.

If you believe someone under 18 has provided us with personal information, contact support@uncoverplaces.com and we will delete the account and associated information.

12. Changes to this Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy to reflect changes in our services, legal obligations, or data processing practices.

Material changes will be communicated where required by law.

13. Contact

For questions or privacy requests: support@uncoverplaces.com