Privacy Policy

This policy explains how SwapUs (“SwapUs”, “we”, “us”) handles personal data when you use the SwapUs website and app (the “Service”). SwapUs is operated by the platform owner identified in the Service once its contact details are configured. The platform owner is the controller of your personal data.

This policy applies to everyone who visits or uses the Service. It should be read together with our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines.

We collect only what we need to run a skill-exchange community:

• Account and profile: email address, display name, optional photo, bio, city, time zone, languages, and the skills you teach (with level, experience and any evidence you upload for verification).
• Learning goals and preferences: skills you want to learn, your current level, and preferences such as session format or teaching language.
• Availability: the weekly time slots you add.
• Swaps and sessions: swap requests, the skills offered in each direction, proposed times, both sessions of each swap, meeting links, confirmations, cancellations and reasons, disputes, no-show reports, feedback and ratings, learning tasks and project submissions.
• Achievements: the badges you have unlocked and when.
• Messages: direct messages you exchange with other members.
• Community content: anonymous posts, comments, images and reactions you create (see Community anonymity).
• Moderation and safety records: reports you file or that concern you, blocks, automated moderation results, moderator decisions, sanctions and appeals.
• Premium and payments: if you buy SwapUs Premium, the plan, amount, status and dates of your orders and the payment and order IDs from our payment partner, Razorpay. Razorpay collects your payment details directly; SwapUs never sees or stores your card, UPI or bank details.
• Profile views: when you are signed in and open another member's profile, we record that you viewed it (at most once per day). See What other members can see.
• AI usage logs: if you opt in to AI features, records of which feature was used, when, and basic usage information needed for quotas, abuse prevention and troubleshooting.
• Technical data: authentication cookies, and limited logs (such as IP address and request times) kept for security and rate limiting.

We do not sell personal data, and we do not use advertising trackers.

• To create and secure your account and provide the Service (performance of a contract).
• To suggest matches and explain why they were suggested.
• To schedule both sessions of each swap, send notifications you have enabled, and award achievements.
• To moderate content, investigate reports and disputes, enforce our policies and prevent abuse (legitimate interests).
• To provide optional AI features you have opted in to (consent).
• To comply with legal obligations.

Your public profile (display name, photo, bio, languages, teaching skills and their verification status, and ratings once enough people have left feedback, and achievements) is visible to other members. Your email address and private settings are not.

Participants in a session can see the details of that session and the messages exchanged with each other.

Premium members can see who viewed their profile in the last 30 days and who liked their posts. If you don't want to appear in anyone's “who viewed your profile” list, turn it off in Settings → Premium & billing; your visits are then not recorded.

Community posts and comments are shown under a random alias. They are never linked to your profile in the Service, and aliases are not reused across threads so your posts can’t easily be connected to each other.

Anonymity applies to other users. It does not necessarily apply to the platform operator or to legally authorised processes. We store a private link between you and your community content so you can manage it and so we can enforce our rules. That link is not readable through the normal app, including by the platform owner.

Identity can be disclosed only through an owner-only, audited workflow that requires a written justification, and only for:

• credible threats of violence or harm;
• severe abuse;
• child safety concerns;
• valid legal requests from authorities.

Most enforcement (for example, restricting an account that keeps posting abuse) is applied without revealing who the author is.

Before community text and images are published, they are checked by an automated moderation provider (currently OpenAI’s moderation service). The content, without your name or profile, is sent to the provider, which returns category scores (for example harassment or sexual content). Based on those scores, content may be published, held for human review, or blocked.

Moderation category scores are deleted after 90 days by default (the platform owner can configure this period). Moderator decisions and the reasons for them are kept as part of our safety records.

• AI features are opt-in. They are off until you enable them in Settings, and you can turn them off at any time.
• When you use an AI feature, we send only the minimum data needed for that task to the AI provider.
• AI output is labelled and can be wrong. AI never decides account restrictions, bans or dispute outcomes.
• Anonymous community posts are not used for AI training or to build a profile of you.

We share personal data only with:

• service providers that host and run the Service (such as our database, authentication and storage provider, and email delivery);
• the moderation and AI providers described above, for the purposes described;
• our payment partner, Razorpay, if you buy SwapUs Premium (to process the payment, prevent fraud and handle refunds);
• authorities, where required by law or through the identity disclosure process described above;
• a successor, if the Service is transferred, under equivalent protections.

Providers may process data in other countries. Where required, we rely on appropriate safeguards for such transfers.

We keep personal data for as long as your account is active and as needed to provide the Service. Moderation category scores are deleted after 90 days by default. Session history and audit records are kept for as long as needed to keep other members’ swap history accurate, resolve disputes and meet legal obligations.

You can delete your account from Settings. When you do:

• Upcoming sessions and open swap requests are cancelled, and your partners are notified.
• Your personal data, such as profile details, availability, learning preferences, evidence, notifications and saved items, is scrubbed or deleted.
• Your anonymous community posts and comments are removed, and the private link between you and them is deleted.
• Records of past sessions and audit logs are kept in de-identified form so other members’ swap history and the history of moderation decisions stay accurate.

Sessions that are in progress, awaiting confirmation or disputed must be finished or resolved before you can delete your account.

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to:

• access and receive a copy of your personal data;
• correct inaccurate data (most of it you can edit yourself in Settings);
• delete your account and data;
• object to or restrict certain processing;
• withdraw consent for AI features at any time;
• complain to your local data protection authority.

To exercise a right that isn’t available in Settings, contact the platform owner once their contact details are published on the Help page.

We use access controls enforced in the database, encryption in transit, role-restricted administrative tools and audit logs for sensitive actions. No system is perfectly secure; please use a strong, unique password and tell us about any suspected issue.

The Service is not intended for anyone under 16. If we learn an account belongs to someone under 16, we will close it.

We will update this page when our practices change and revise the “Last updated” date. For material changes we will notify you in the Service.