Privacy Policy
Last updated: 12 October 2026Anchor helps you build good habits and break bad ones. To do that, it handles information about your daily life — and some of it, like a habit to stop drinking or a note about a hard evening, is health data. This policy explains, in plain language, what we collect, why, who helps us process it and what you can do about it.
01The short version
- We collect what Anchor needs to work: your account, your habits and check-ins, and what you choose to write in the app.
- Because some of it is health data, we ask for your explicit consent before processing it (GDPR art. 9(2)(a)). You can withdraw it at any time.
- Confessions are encrypted at rest and are never shown to our staff or to anyone else.
- Anchor AI is powered by OpenAI. Your reflections and coach chats are sent to it only to generate replies and are never used to train AI models.
- Health and Screen Time data stay on your phone. Only the resulting check-in (for example “Move 30 minutes — done”) is sent to us.
- Our database is in the European Union. We do not sell your data and we do not show ads.
- You can export everything or delete your account from inside the app, at any time.
02Who is responsible for your data
The data controller is [COMPANY LEGAL NAME] SRL, a company registered in Romania under number [REGISTRATION NO.], with its registered office at [ADDRESS] (“Anchor”, “we”, “us”).
Contact us about privacy at [CONTACT EMAIL]. Our data protection officer, if appointed, can be reached at [DPO EMAIL if any].
03Health data and your consent
Information about habits such as drinking, smoking, gambling, sleep, exercise or eating, and anything you write about cravings, slips or how you feel, can reveal information about your health. Under the GDPR this is a special category of data (art. 9).
We process it only with your explicit consent, which you give in the app when you create your account. Joining Harbor with a sensitive habit (for example alcohol or gambling) asks for a separate consent, because other members will see that you are in that crew — under an alias, never your name.
You can withdraw consent at any time in Profile → Data & account. Withdrawing does not affect processing that already happened. Because Anchor cannot track habits without this data, withdrawing consent for the core app means deleting your account or the data concerned; we will tell you exactly what will be deleted before you confirm.
04What we collect and why
| Data | What it is | Why we use it | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Account | Email address, optional display name, sign-in identifier from Apple or Google, time zone, language. Sign-in is handled by Clerk. | To create your account, sign you in and keep it secure. | Contract (art. 6(1)(b)) |
| Habits and progress | Habits you add, reminders, check-ins, streaks, XP, levels, shields, your “why”, older days you log or fix. | To run the habit tracker and its rewards. | Contract; explicit consent where the habit concerns health (art. 9(2)(a)) |
| Urge moments | Urge strength before and after, the need you named, the thought you spotted and your answer, redirects you chose, whether you waited or used the timer. | To help you through an urge and show your own best answers next time. | Explicit consent (art. 9(2)(a)) |
| “What works for me” | Near-miss reflections, helpers and saved redirects. | To build your personal playbook, which Anchor AI uses first. | Explicit consent |
| Evening check-in and confessions | How the day went (easy, close call, slip) and anything you choose to write or say. Confession text is encrypted at rest with a separate key. | To close the day and to prepare your weekly follow-up. | Explicit consent |
| Reflections and coach chats | Your answers to reflection questions, messages to Anchor AI and its replies, plans you accept. | To coach you. Processed by OpenAI to generate replies. | Explicit consent |
| Harbor | Alias, colour, crews you join, posts, reactions, tips, reports and blocks, your age confirmation. | To run crews and tips, and to keep the community safe. | Explicit consent; legitimate interest in moderation and safety (art. 6(1)(f)) |
| Purchases | Plan, product, trial and renewal dates, store transaction identifiers. We never see your card details — payment is handled by Apple or Google. | To give you Pro and handle support requests. | Contract; legal obligation for accounting records (art. 6(1)(c)) |
| Referrals and buddy | Your invite code, who joined through it, your buddy pairing. A buddy only sees totals (habits done today, streak, level) — never habit names, reflections or chats. | To credit Pro days and run the buddy feature. | Contract |
| Notifications | Push token and device platform, your notification and quiet-hour settings. | To send reminders, the evening check-in and weekly follow-up. | Contract; your device permission |
| Health and Screen Time (optional, Pro) | Read on your device only. We receive the derived check-in (for example “Move 30 minutes — done”), never step counts, sleep data or app usage. | To tick habits off automatically. | Explicit consent |
| Diagnostics (optional) | Crash reports (device model, OS and app version, error trace) via Sentry and product usage events (screens opened, features used) via PostHog. Never habit names, confessions, reflections or chat text. | To fix bugs and improve the app. | Consent, which you can change in the app |
| Support | Emails you send us and our replies. | To help you. | Contract; legitimate interest |
We do not use your data for advertising, we do not sell it and we do not build profiles for anyone else.
05Anchor AI and automated suggestions
Anchor AI summarises your reflections, finds patterns (for example “workdays around 18:00, when tired”) and suggests small changes. When you ask it something, the relevant context — your habits, recent check-ins, reflections and playbook — is sent to our AI provider, OpenAI, to generate the reply.
OpenAI processes this data on our behalf, does not use it to train its models and deletes it after a limited period under our agreement [CONFIRM RETENTION TERMS AND CONTRACTING ENTITY WITH OPENAI].
Suggestions are only suggestions. Anchor makes no decisions that have legal or similarly significant effects on you (GDPR art. 22). If something you write suggests you may be in crisis, the app shows support resources straight away; we record only that resources were shown, not what you wrote.
06Who processes data for us
We use a small number of service providers (processors) bound by data processing agreements. They may use the data only to provide their service to us.
| Provider | What for | Location |
|---|---|---|
| [HOSTING PROVIDER] | Servers and the main database | European Union ([REGION]) |
| Clerk, Inc. | Sign-in and account security | United States |
| OpenAI [CONFIRM ENTITY] | Anchor AI replies, summaries and weekly plans | United States |
| RevenueCat, Inc. | Managing subscriptions bought through Apple and Google | United States |
| Expo (650 Industries, Inc.) | Delivering push notifications | United States |
| Functional Software, Inc. (Sentry) — optional | Crash reports | [EU or US REGION] |
| PostHog, Inc. — optional | Product usage analytics without content | [EU REGION] |
| [EMAIL PROVIDER] | Support email | [LOCATION] |
Apple and Google act as independent controllers for purchases made in their stores and for delivering notifications to your device; their own privacy policies apply.
07Where your data is stored
Our database and servers are in the European Union. Some providers above are based in the United States. Where data leaves the European Economic Area, we rely on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework for certified providers or on the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses, with additional safeguards such as encryption in transit.
08How we protect it
- All traffic between the app and our servers is encrypted (TLS).
- Confession text is additionally encrypted in our database (AES-256-GCM) with a separate key.
- Our admin tools never show confessions, reflections or coach chat text, and every admin action is logged.
- Access is limited to the few people who need it to run Anchor.
- Backups are encrypted and kept in the EU.
09How long we keep it
- While your account exists, we keep your account and habit data so the app works.
- Confessions, reflections and coach chats can be deleted by you at any time, individually or all at once.
- When you delete your account, we delete your data from our live systems straight away and from backups within [BACKUP RETENTION, e.g. 35 days].
- Harbor posts: when you leave Harbor or delete your account, your posts are detached from you and shown as “Former member”. Write to us if you want specific posts removed.
- Inactive accounts are deleted after [INACTIVITY PERIOD, e.g. 24 months] without sign-in, after we warn you by email.
- Purchase records are kept as long as accounting and tax law requires.
- Moderation records (reports, actions, safety events without message text) are kept for 12 months.
- Diagnostics: crash reports for [e.g. 90 days], usage analytics for [e.g. 12 months].
10Your rights
You have the right to access, correct, delete, restrict and port your data, to object to processing based on legitimate interest, and to withdraw consent at any time. Most of this you can do yourself:
- Export: Profile → Data & account → Export my data gives you a copy of everything in a machine-readable file.
- Delete: Profile → Data & account → Delete my account removes your account and all associated data. You can also delete your account by email, and see exactly what is deleted and kept.
- Delete specific things: confessions, coach data and individual habits can be deleted where they appear.
For anything else, write to [CONTACT EMAIL]. We reply within one month. You can also complain to the Romanian data protection authority, ANSPDCP (Autoritatea Națională de Supraveghere a Prelucrării Datelor cu Caracter Personal, dataprotection.ro), or to the authority in the EU country where you live.
11Age
Anchor is for people aged 16 and over. Harbor is for adults only (18+). We do not knowingly collect data from children; if you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.
12This website
This website uses no cookies, no analytics and no third-party trackers; fonts are served from our own domain. If you switch language, your choice is stored in your browser’s local storage, on your device only. Our hosting provider keeps short-lived server logs (IP address, time, page requested) to keep the site secure, based on our legitimate interest.
13Changes to this policy
If we change this policy in a way that matters, we will tell you in the app before the change takes effect. If a change needs your consent, we will ask for it.
14Contact
[COMPANY LEGAL NAME] SRL · [ADDRESS] · [CONTACT EMAIL] · Data protection officer: [DPO EMAIL if any]