Privacy Policy

This policy explains what information Gists collects, why, where it is kept and the choices you have. Gists is run by Goadvert iAdvertise (Private) Limited ("we", "us"), 21 Glenara Avenue South, Eastlea, Harare, Zimbabwe, which is responsible for your information. We follow Zimbabwe's Cyber and Data Protection Act and treat everyone, wherever they live, with the same care.

What we collect

• Account details: your name, username, email address, password (stored scrambled, never readable) and date of birth. Your birthday is never shown to anyone; we use it to check your age.
• If you sign in with Google or Apple: the name, email address and account ID they share with us. We never see your Google or Apple password.
• Profile: photo, bio and settings such as private account, message requests and theme.
• What you share: Gists (photos, voice notes, text), captions, comments, reactions, saves, follows and blocks.
• Messages: your one-to-one and group chats, so they can be delivered and shown to the people in them.
• Reports you send, and reports others make about you.
• Device and technical data: a push-notification token for your phone if you allow notifications, your IP address, browser or device type, and sign-in times, used to keep accounts secure and stop abuse.

We don't sell your information, we don't show ads based on it, and we don't use your private messages for anything except delivering them, keeping Gists safe and handling reports.

How we use it

• To run Gists: your account, feed, profile, chats and notifications.
• To keep people safe: age checks, protections for 17-year-olds, blocking, reviewing reports and stopping spam and abuse.
• To contact you about your account, such as password resets and important changes.
• To fix problems and improve Gists.
• When the law requires it.

Who can see what

• Your name, username, photo, bio and follower counts are public.
• Your Gists are seen by everyone if your account is public, or only by approved followers if it is private (or if you choose "Followers" when posting).
• Messages are seen only by the people in that chat.
• People you block can't see your Gists or contact you.

Where it is kept

We use a few trusted companies to run Gists. They only handle your information on our instructions:

• Vultr: our server in Johannesburg, South Africa, which holds the database (accounts, messages, comments) and its backups.
• Cloudflare: stores photos and voice notes (in Europe), protects the website and delivers it quickly.
• Resend: sends our emails (servers in Ireland).
• Google and Apple: sign-in if you choose it, and phone notifications.
• Expo: passes notifications on to Google and Apple for the Gists app.

This means your information may be stored outside your own country. We choose providers with strong security and we keep what we share with them to the minimum needed.

How long we keep it

• Your information stays while your account exists.
• A deleted Gist disappears at once and its files are erased within 30 days. Uploads you started but never posted are erased within 2 days.
• When you delete your account we erase your profile, Gists and their files, comments, reactions, saves and follows straight away. Messages you sent in chats stay in the other people's chats, shown as from a deleted account, because they are part of their conversations too.
• Copies in our backups are cleared out on their normal schedule (within about 30 days).
• We may keep a record longer when the law requires it or to deal with a serious report.

Your rights

You can see and change most of your information in your profile and Settings, and delete your account at any time. You can also ask us for a copy of your information, ask us to correct or erase it, or object to how we use it, by writing to [email protected]. We reply within 30 days. If you are unhappy with our answer, you can complain to the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ), the data protection authority, or to the authority where you live.

Security

Gists uses encrypted connections (HTTPS), scrambled passwords, private file storage and limited staff access. No system is perfect, so please use a strong password that you don't use anywhere else.

Age

Gists is for people aged 17 and older. If we learn that someone younger has an account, we delete it. If you believe a child is using Gists, tell us at [email protected].

Cookies

The website uses only the cookies it needs to work: keeping you signed in and protecting forms from misuse. Your theme choice is saved with your account, not in a cookie. We don't use advertising or tracking cookies.

Changes

If we change this policy in a way that matters, we will tell you on Gists or by email before it takes effect.