Privacy Notice

Account information. To create an account we need an email address and a password. We store the password only as a salted hash — we never store or display the password itself. You may also give us a name, which is what appears on reviews you publish.

Content you publish. Reviews, ratings, spoiler flags, helpful votes, and your watchlist.

Usage and device information. Collected automatically when you use the Service: IP address, browser and device type, operating system, referring page, pages viewed, searches and filters used, and timestamps. We may derive an approximate location (typically country or region) from the IP address.

Cookies and similar technologies. A strictly-necessary cookie holds your signed-in session. Where we use analytics or preference cookies, we describe them in the cookie section below.

Support correspondence. If you email us, we keep the message and our reply so we can follow up.

• To run the Service — authenticate you, show your watchlist, attribute your reviews, and keep one review per person per title.
• Analytics and product improvement — we analyse how the Service is used (which titles are viewed and searched, which filters are used, where people drop out of a flow, which reviews are found helpful) to fix problems, prioritise work, and improve the catalogue and ranking. Wherever it is practical we do this on aggregated or de-identified data.
• Aggregated insights — we may produce and publish statistics derived from usage and review data, such as average audience ratings by film, the most-reviewed titles of a year, or how audience scores track critic scores. These outputs are aggregated and do not identify you.
• Safety and integrity — to detect fake reviews, vote manipulation, spam, scraping, and unauthorised access.
• Communication — service messages about your account. We will only send marketing email if you have opted in, and every marketing email carries an unsubscribe link.
• Legal compliance — to meet our obligations and to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.

• Performance of a contract — providing the account and features you asked for.
• Legitimate interests — securing and improving the Service, analytics, preventing abuse, and producing aggregated insights. We balance these against your rights and you can object (see 'Your choices').
• Consent — non-essential cookies and marketing email, which you can withdraw at any time.
• Legal obligation — where the law requires us to retain or disclose information.

We do not sell your personal information. We share it only with:

• Other users — the display name on your account and the content of any review you publish are public.
• Infrastructure and service providers — hosting, database, email delivery, error monitoring and analytics providers, acting on our instructions under contract. [List your processors here — e.g. hosting provider, database provider, analytics provider.]
• Legal and safety — where we are required to by law, or where disclosure is necessary to protect the rights, property or safety of Review4am, our users, or the public.
• Business transfer — if the business is merged, acquired, or sold, information may transfer as part of that transaction. We will tell you before your information becomes subject to a different privacy notice.

Our servers and providers are located in [region(s)]. If we transfer personal information out of the region it was collected in, we do so using an approved safeguard — typically standard contractual clauses — and take steps to ensure it remains protected.

• Account information — while your account is open, and for a short period afterwards to handle disputes and prevent re-registration abuse.
• Published reviews — retained after account deletion, but disassociated from your account and shown without your name, unless you delete them first. This keeps the ratings on a title page honest.
• Usage logs — typically retained for up to 24 months, then deleted or aggregated.
• Support email — up to 24 months from the last message.

Passwords are hashed with bcrypt. Sessions use signed, HTTP-only cookies, sent over HTTPS in production. Access to production data is limited to people who need it. No online service is completely secure, but we take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your information and will notify you and any regulator as required if a breach affects you.

• Access — ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you.
• Correction — fix inaccurate details, or edit your name at any time in your account.
• Deletion — delete individual reviews, your saved list, or your whole account.
• Objection and restriction — object to processing based on legitimate interests, including analytics profiling.
• Portability — receive your content in a machine-readable format.
• Withdraw consent — for cookies or marketing, at any time, without affecting past processing.
• Complain — to your local data protection authority.

To exercise any of these, email [privacy email]. We will verify your identity and respond within the period required by applicable law.

Strictly necessary: the cq_token session cookie, which keeps you signed in. The Service does not work without it.

Analytics and preferences: [list any analytics or preference cookies you add, their provider, purpose and lifetime]. You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings; blocking the session cookie will sign you out.

Review4am is not intended for anyone under 16 and we do not knowingly collect their personal information. If you believe a child has given us information, contact [privacy email] and we will delete it.

We may update this notice. If a change is material we will notify you by email or in the product before it takes effect. The “last updated” date at the top always reflects the current version.

[Company legal name], [registered address]. Privacy queries: [privacy email]. [If you are required to appoint a data protection officer or EU/UK representative, name them here.]

This notice describes what the Review4am codebase actually does today — email plus bcrypt password, a signed session cookie, reviews, votes and a saved list in Postgres. If you add an analytics SDK, an ad network, or a third-party login, this document must be updated before that ships. Replace every [bracketed placeholder] and have a qualified lawyer review it.