Privacy policy

Porcupine isn't open yet. This policy covers the website, the Quills Check and the waitlist, and what we're committing to for the app. Before the app opens, we'll update it with the app's details.

Porcupine and porcupinechat.com are run by Porcupine Chat Inc., a company incorporated in British Columbia, Canada (incorporation number BC1612473). In this policy, “we” and “us” mean Porcupine Chat Inc. Our Founder and Privacy Officer is responsible for how Porcupine handles personal information. For any privacy question or request, email privacy@porcupinechat.com.

Early access

If you sign up, we keep your email, how you think you'd use Porcupine and when you signed up. We use them only to tell you about Porcupine opening, and we don't add you to any other list.

Mixed Signals

We save how you read each made-up message, with nothing about you attached, so everyone can see how others read the same words, and we can see how the game is used.

The texting style quiz

We keep daily totals of how the quiz is used, such as how far people get, which replies they pick, which style they get and their answers to “Does this sound like you?”. Your browser sends us your picks and result so we can add to those totals, and we never store them together or with anything about you. If you share your result, the link holds your result and nothing else.

The Quills Check

What you type goes through our server to OpenAI to make your result, along with the kind of relationship, if you pick one (such as a partner or a coworker). We don't save it or put it in our logs or analytics, and OpenAI doesn't train its models on it. To keep the check free, we count how many checks come from each connection each day, using a scrambled code that's deleted soon after the day ends. We also keep daily totals of how the check is used, such as which kind of check people run, which version they copy and their answers to “Did this check help?”. They aren't linked to anyone and never include your words. Please check only messages you wrote or that were sent to you, and leave out names.

Email

Email to us passes through Cloudflare to our inbox, which runs on Google's Gmail. We use it only to answer you.

Every visit

Like every website, ours receives technical details such as your IP address and browser type when a page loads. Cloudflare, which hosts the site, uses them to deliver pages and stop abuse, and Google receives them when it delivers the site's fonts.

We use PostHog to understand how people use the site, so we can make it better. It sees which pages are visited, records how people move through them, and notes general details such as your browser, device type and rough location. It never sees the words on the page or anything you type, and we never connect it to your email.

When you sign up, play Mixed Signals or use the Quills Check, Cloudflare Turnstile checks that you're a person, not a bot, using details from your browser and device. We receive only whether the check passed.

Your browser

We don't use cookies for advertising or to follow you across other sites. The site saves a few things in your browser so it works as you'd expect, such as your Mixed Signals readings and that you've confirmed you're 19 or older, and PostHog may save a code to keep track of a visit. You can clear them by clearing this site's data in your browser.

When Porcupine opens, it will handle more sensitive things, such as what you write before Porcupine rewrites it, messages you paste in and your private notes. Here's what we're committing to:

• The other person sees only what you approve. Your original words, private notes, Porcupine's tips for you and what you've learned stay with you.
• If something you told Porcupine privately could help the other person understand, Porcupine asks first, and shares it only if you say yes. A tip for you never draws on what the other person told Porcupine privately.
• Messages you paste in, and what you tell Porcupine happened, are used only to help you.
• We'll use only AI services that don't train their models on what we send them, and name them here before the app opens. We don't train AI models on your conversations either.
• Your conversations will be stored encrypted, with the keys kept on your own devices, so we can't read them. To help with a message, the AI has to read it, so your words are readable on our server only while the AI is working on them, and they're never saved there in readable form.
• We never put the words of your conversations in our logs, analytics, error reports or notifications.

Only the services that help us run Porcupine, and only what each one needs:

• Cloudflare hosts the site, stores the waitlist, checks for bots and forwards our email.
• Google delivers the site's fonts and runs our inbox.
• OpenAI makes the Quills Check's results.
• PostHog shows us how the site is used, never what you type.

We'd also share information if the law requires it, or to protect someone's safety or Porcupine's rights. If Porcupine is involved in a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization, bankruptcy or sale of some or all of its assets, your information may be shared with the other party while the deal is being considered, and transferred as part of it, as the law allows.

These services may store and process information in the United States and other countries, where authorities may be able to access it under those countries' laws.

We keep your waitlist email until you ask us to remove it or we stop running the waitlist. What you type in the Quills Check isn't kept. PostHog deletes what it has after 30 days. We keep emails you send us as long as we need them to answer you. Daily totals and Mixed Signals readings aren't linked to anyone, so we may keep them.

Wherever you live, you can ask us what personal information we have about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it, including taking you off the waitlist. Email privacy@porcupinechat.com from the address you signed up with, and we'll answer within 30 days. Every email we send has a way to unsubscribe.

To keep PostHog from running, turn on Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track in your browser. What PostHog has isn't tied to you, so we can't look up your visits in it.

If you're not happy with our answer, you can complain to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Columbia, or to the privacy regulator where you live.

Porcupine is for adults 19 and older, and we don't knowingly collect information from anyone younger. If you believe someone under 19 has signed up, email us and we'll delete their information.

We use reasonable safeguards to protect your information: the site works only over a secure connection, the waitlist is stored encrypted, where only the people who run Porcupine can see it, and our accounts use secure sign-in. No way of storing or sending information online is completely secure, so we can't guarantee it. If a breach affects your information, we'll notify you and the authorities as the law requires.

When this policy changes, we'll post the new version here and update the date at the top.