Privacy Policy

Last updated: October 10, 2026

Acoustic Beacon connects signals from participating speakers with offers and information inside a consumer app. Our merchant platform lets businesses manage that content. This policy describes the current website, merchant service, and pre-release consumer implementation; the mobile apps are not yet publicly available.

Microphone and acoustic signals

With permission, the consumer app accesses the microphone to detect Acoustic Beacon audio signals. Raw microphone samples are analyzed locally in temporary device memory. The current implementation does not make stored audio recordings or upload, transmit, or persist raw microphone audio. Temporary samples are necessary to recognize a signal; this is not a claim that the microphone never captures sound. Listening operates in the foreground and can be stopped in the app or by revoking microphone permission.

When connected to the content service, the app sends the validated beacon identifier to our backend to retrieve its campaign and offers. This request does not include microphone audio, your name, a consumer account, or a device identifier. A beacon identifier identifies a source, not a person. Network requests still reveal connection information to the services handling them.

Location and maps

With your permission, the app accesses your device location to center the map and place locally observed detection pins. Location is intended to support nearby discovery. The current production repository does not send your coordinates to the Acoustic Beacon backend, store them in its database, or perform a location-based offer search. Position and detection pins remain in app memory rather than being saved as location history.

The map downloads tiles from OpenStreetMap. Its tile service receives your IP address and requests for the displayed area. Centering the map on yourself can therefore reveal your approximate location to that provider. Map tiles may be cached on your device. Declining location permission does not prevent acoustic detection. You can revoke location access in device settings.

Saved content, preferences, and diagnostics

Saved offer snapshots, onboarding completion, appearance, and haptic preferences are stored locally on the phone. There is no consumer account or cloud synchronization in the current implementation. Signal diagnostics, such as recognized symbols, timing, and validation results, are held locally for troubleshooting; these are not stored audio recordings. Removing saved offers or clearing app data removes local information, subject to any backups controlled by your device platform.

Merchant information

Merchant registration stores business name, contact name, email, an optional website, directory preference, and account role. Passwords are stored as salted password hashes, not plaintext. We also store account identifiers, creation/update times, enabled status, and session-token hashes and expiry times. Business records can contain descriptions, addresses, city, country, and coordinates when supplied through supported management/provisioning processes; the public signup form does not request these location fields.

We store offers and their descriptions, terms, image links, availability dates and status; campaigns and linked offers; and beacon identifiers, ownership and campaign assignments. Authorized users use this information to operate the service. Active public offers may include merchant identity and supplied business location information. If you opt into the Businesses directory, your business name and website are public. You can turn that listing off in your Merchant Account settings. This does not remove independently published active offers.

Optional consumer activity and estimated reach

Activity sharing is off by default. In the consumer app, Settings → Share usage activity explains the collection before you choose to enable it. The installation-reach version requires a new opt-in even if you previously agreed to session-only activity. Offer retrieval itself does not require analytics consent.

If enabled, the app sends event type (successful attributed detection or retrieval, visible offer impression, offer open or save), discovery source (acoustic, map or saved), public beacon/campaign/offer identifiers, random event and session identifiers, and a random identifier stored on this app installation across launches. This is not a hardware identifier or advertising ID and does not contain your name, email, audio or location. The backend assigns receipt time and stores a business-specific hash of the installation identifier, rather than the raw installation identifier. Authorized merchants receive aggregate counts, not installation identifiers.

Estimated unique reach counts distinct opted-in installation hashes engaging with each merchant in the selected period. It does not count or identify unique people. Shared devices, reinstalling, clearing data, restored backups, or turning sharing off and on can change the estimate. Old events without reliable installation identifiers are not assigned invented reach values. Total interactions and individual event counts remain separate. Public demo metrics are fictional and isolated.

Turn Share usage activity off to stop future event sends and remove the local installation identifier. Turning it back on creates a new identifier. Previously received records are not automatically deleted by opting out; the retention and request process below applies. App activity is optional, client-reported and not used for cross-company behavioral advertising.

Website forms and analytics

The contact form sends your name, email, optional company and website, subject, and message to Netlify Forms. The updates form sends the email address you provide. We use these submissions to respond and provide requested updates. Do not send passwords, payment details, or sensitive personal information in forms.

The homepage loads Google Analytics to help understand website use. Google receives technical and usage information such as pages visited, browser/device information, network information, and cookie-based identifiers; it can derive approximate location from network information. These website measurements are separate from consumer beacon-event reporting. Browser cookie controls or tracking protection can restrict this collection. Google Analytics account settings and provider retention settings are managed outside the application.

Cookies, storage, and security logs

The merchant service uses an essential secure, HttpOnly, SameSite session cookie named __Host-ab_session, with an eight-hour expiry. Sign-out invalidates the server session. Browser scripts do not store passwords or session tokens in local storage. The current dashboard and public demo do not use persistent browser local storage for workspace data; demo edits remain in memory. Google Analytics may set analytics cookies on the marketing site.

Sign-in and signup abuse protection stores attempt counters associated with a hash of the submitted email, plus shared counters and expiry times. The application database does not intentionally store visitor IP addresses, advertising IDs or hardware device identifiers. Optional app activity stores the pseudonymous business-specific installation hashes described above. Hosting providers and ordinary server access logs can nevertheless process request paths, response status, timestamps, connection addresses and other technical metadata. A beacon ID in a request path may appear in logs. This is different from an acoustic detection-history database. No remote crash-reporting SDK was found in the current app.

Service providers and sharing

Netlify hosts the public website and processes forms; Northflank hosts the backend/dashboard; Supabase hosts the PostgreSQL database; Google Analytics processes homepage analytics; and OpenStreetMap provides map tiles. These services process information needed for their functions. Their infrastructure and processing locations may be outside your state or country. External offer images are fetched from the image host selected for that offer, and opening an external website deliberately sends you to that site's own privacy practices.

We use information to provide content, administer accounts, respond to requests, measure website use, and protect against abuse. We may disclose information to service providers for these purposes, when legally required, or as reasonably necessary to protect rights and security. We do not sell personal information. The current consumer app has no advertising SDK and does not use consumer app data for cross-company behavioral advertising. This does not remove the separate website analytics processing described above.

Retention and security

We retain account and content records while needed to operate the account and service, and handle deletion requests manually. There is currently no general automatic deletion schedule for accounts, offers, activity records, or form submissions. Expired sessions and rate counters are cleaned up during later authentication activity; expiry does not imply immediate removal from every backup. Provider logs, form records, analytics and database backups have separately configured retention periods. Information may need to be retained for security, fraud prevention, disputes, or legal obligations.

We use HTTPS in production, password hashing, protected sessions, and account-based authorization. No system can guarantee absolute security. Do not share your password or submit secrets through contact forms.

Your choices and rights

Depending on applicable law, you may have rights to access, correct, delete or obtain a copy of personal information, or object to certain processing. Visit Privacy Choices to make a request, including a merchant account deletion request. We may verify identity and authority before acting and will explain any limitations. Where applicable, you may appeal a decision through the same contact route or complain to the relevant regulator. We will not discriminate against you for exercising applicable privacy rights.

Children, changes, and contact

Acoustic Beacon is not directed to children under 13. We do not knowingly seek personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided information, contact us so we can investigate and address it. Merchant accounts must be established by adults authorized to act for their businesses.

We may update this policy as the service changes and will revise the date above. For material changes, we will provide additional notice where required. Contact Acoustic Beacon through our Contact page; use “Privacy request” as the subject for privacy matters.