Privacy Policy

1. What We Do

Readcrumbs lets senders upload or paste documents and share them with readers, including as “required reading” assignments sent to named recipients. Readers can read, leave notes and bookmarks, react to content, and respond to checkpoints, with or without a Readcrumbs account. This policy describes what we collect and store as part of that process.

2. Accounts, Accountless Reading, and Required-Reading Recipients

• Accountless recipients: Most readers do not need a Readcrumbs account. Opening a shared link or a required-reading link creates a reading identity tied to a cookie on your device (see Section 5). “Accountless” describes how you sign in, not whether we store data — we still record the reading activity described in Section 4 for that identity.
• Named required-reading recipients: When a sender assigns a document as required reading, they may provide a recipient’s name, email address, and the campaign the recipient was assigned to. We associate that recipient’s reading activity and, if they acknowledge the document, acknowledgment evidence (Section 4) with the name and email the sender provided.
• Registered accounts: Senders and readers may also create an account (email and password, or Google sign-in) to manage documents, campaigns, or reading history across devices. See Section 6.

3. Data We Collect

• Account & Authentication: Email and password (stored as a salted hash), or name and account identifier from Google sign-in, if you create an account.
• Recipient Information: Name and email address a sender provides for a required-reading recipient, and the campaign/assignment it belongs to.
• Reading Activity & Evidence: Described in Section 4.
• Reader-Created Content: Notes, bookmarks, checkpoint responses, and reactions you create while reading. See Section 4.
• Sender Documents: Files or pasted text a sender submits to create a document. See Section 8.
• Payments: Handled by Stripe. See Section 10.
• Support: Information from emails or messages you send to our support team.

4. Reading Activity & Evidence

While a document is being read, we may record, per reading identity:

• Whether a shared or required-reading link was opened, and when.
• Reading position, furthest position reached, and whether the document was completed.
• Activity timestamps, such as first opened and last active.
• Checkpoint responses, where a document requires them to continue reading.
• For required-reading assignments: whether the recipient explicitly acknowledged the document, the time of acknowledgment, and a content fingerprint (a hash, not the document itself) identifying the exact version they acknowledged.

This activity reflects what happened in the app — that a link was opened, a document was scrolled through or acknowledged, and so on. It is not a measurement or guarantee of comprehension, and we do not represent it as one.

5. Cookies & Session Identity

We set a long-lived, first-party cookie that holds an opaque, randomly generated identifier — nothing else is stored in it, and we do not use it to fingerprint your browser or device. It lets us recognize you across visits so you can resume reading where you left off, without requiring an account. Reading activity described in Section 4 is linked to this identifier, and to your account instead if you’re signed in.

In production, the Service may load Google Analytics, which sets its own cookies to measure site usage, where it is configured. You can control or disable cookies in your browser, though parts of the Service — including resuming a reading session — may not work correctly without them.

6. Authentication & Linking Anonymous Activity

Creating an account is optional. If you read documents anonymously and later sign in or create an account from the same browser, we associate your prior anonymous reading activity — progress, notes, bookmarks, and similar evidence — with your account, so it isn’t lost when you sign in.

7. Reader-Created Content

Notes, bookmarks, checkpoint responses, and reactions you create while reading are stored against your reading identity or account. Notes are private by default; a note is only visible to the document’s sender if you explicitly mark it as shared with them.

8. Sender Documents

Senders may upload a PDF file or paste text to create a document. Uploaded files are stored with our cloud storage provider; pasted text is stored directly. We process document content to extract and display it to readers, generate previews, and support features such as required-reading campaigns and checkpoints.

You retain ownership of documents you upload or paste. You grant us a license to host, process, and display that content solely to operate the Service for you and the readers you share it with.

9. Required-Reading Links

Each required-reading recipient gets a unique link. Anyone with that link can open and read the assigned document as that recipient — the link itself, not a login, is what grants access. Senders should treat these links as sensitive and share them only with the intended recipient. Revoking or archiving the document, or removing a recipient who has not yet acknowledged it, invalidates their link.

10. Payments

Subscription and campaign payments are processed by Stripe. We do not receive or store full card numbers. We receive limited payment metadata from Stripe — such as your Stripe customer and subscription identifiers and checkout status — to manage your subscription or campaign purchase.

11. Analytics & Monitoring

Where configured, we use Google Analytics to understand aggregate usage of the Service. We also use standard error-monitoring tools to detect and diagnose bugs and outages. We configure these tools to avoid intentionally sending document or note content and default personal information, but as with any automated error-monitoring tool, we cannot guarantee that application data could never appear in an exception report.

12. Sharing

• Service providers: Stripe (payments), our cloud hosting and storage provider, and Google (sign-in, and analytics where configured).
• Senders: A document’s sender can see reading activity, evidence, and shared notes described in Sections 4 and 7 for readers of their documents.
• Legal: Where disclosure is required by law or to protect rights, property, or safety.
• Transfers: In case of a business acquisition or asset sale.

We do not sell personal information.

13. Data Retention & Deletion

Account deletion is a two-step process: requesting deletion immediately schedules your account for removal, and you can cancel the request using the link in the confirmation email during the grace period that follows. Deletion is not finalized any sooner than 30 days after the request. Our deletion process is designed to permanently delete your account and associated reading data, including uploaded documents, once that grace period has passed.

A sender can delete an unshared or revoked document outright. A document that has already been shared can instead be revoked or archived; either one immediately stops all reader access to it, including for readers already partway through it. Its stored file is removed when the associated account is deleted, as described above.

A sender can remove a required-reading recipient who has not yet acknowledged the document. Once a recipient has acknowledged, we intentionally keep that acknowledgment record — including the recipient’s name, email, and the acknowledgment evidence in Section 4 — as the sender’s record that the assignment was completed, even if the underlying reading session is later deleted. If you are a recipient and want an acknowledged record removed, contact us and we’ll work with you and the sender on your request; we cannot guarantee removal in every case, since doing so would erase the sender’s evidence of an assignment they relied on.

14. Security

15. Legal Bases for Processing

• Contract: Processing necessary to provide the Service you or your sender requested.
• Legitimate Interests: Analytics, service reliability, and abuse prevention.
• Consent: For analytics and cookies where legally required.
• Legal Obligation: Record-keeping, tax, and compliance purposes.

16. Your Rights

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have the right to access, correct, delete, restrict, or port your data, or object to certain processing. To exercise these rights, contact us at support@read-crumbs.com. Requests may be subject to the limits described in Section 13.

17. International Transfers

Your data is processed and stored in the United States. Where required, we implement safeguards such as Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) or equivalent mechanisms.

18. Children

The Service is not intended for children under 13 (or the minimum age required in your jurisdiction). We do not knowingly collect data from minors.

19. Changes

We may update this Privacy Policy periodically. When we make material changes, we will update the “Effective date.” Continued use of the Service after updates constitutes acceptance of the revised policy.