Privacy Policy — Seekquel

Who We Are

Seekquel is a reading app and web service operated by Stratos Digital Marketing, a development agency registered in Tunisia. Stratos Digital Marketing decides what is collected here and why, and is the data controller for it. This Privacy Policy explains what we collect, what we do with it, who else sees it, and how you get it back or remove it. It covers the Seekquel app, the website at seekquel.app, and the add-ons we publish for KOReader and Calibre. You can reach us at [email protected].

Information We Collect

You give us your email address and display name when you create an account, or the name and email your Google or Apple account passes to us if you sign in that way. You give us your reading activity (books added, shelves, reading progress, reading sessions, ratings, reviews), the content you create (notes, captured passages, photos, messages, comments, asks, feedback posts and catalog contributions), and your Reading DNA preferences. We collect limited usage data such as device model, operating system, app version and in-app interactions, plus your IP address in server logs. If you arrive from a link carrying campaign parameters we record them, so we know which site or campaign sent you; if you answer the question about how you heard of us, we keep that answer; and if you invite someone by email, we keep the address you sent it to so the referral can be credited. If you turn on push notifications we store a device push token. If you connect a reading device or a desktop library, we store what it sends us, described in our Terms under Third-Party Devices. We do not show advertising in the app, we do not sell your personal information, and we do not build a profile of you from your activity on other apps or websites.

How We Use Your Information

We use your information to run the service: to keep your library and reading progress in sync, to compute your statistics, badges, streaks and goals, to generate recommendations from your Reading DNA and your ratings, to show your profile and activity to the people you have chosen to show them to, to send the notifications you have asked for, to credit a referral, and to answer you when you contact support. We use aggregate, non-identifying figures to understand which parts of the app are used and to decide what to build. We do not sell your personal information and we do not use it to target advertising.

The Legal Grounds We Rely On

If you are in the EU, the UK, or somewhere with similar law, these are the grounds we use. Running your account, syncing your library, delivering what you asked for and handling your subscription is performance of our contract with you. Analytics and non-essential cookies run on your consent, which you can withdraw at any time. Keeping the service secure, preventing abuse, moderating content and improving the product rely on our legitimate interests, weighed against your rights. Where the law requires us to keep or hand over something, we rely on that legal obligation.

Cookies and On-Device Storage

On the web we set two cookies the service cannot work without: one holds your sign-in token so pages arrive already signed in, and one records that you have finished onboarding so you are not sent back through it. Both are set whatever you choose, because without them the site cannot keep you logged in. Analytics sets one further cookie, and only if you agree; the banner on your first visit is where you decide, and you can change that answer at any time under Privacy settings. We also keep things in your browser's or your device's own storage, such as your theme, your language, view preferences, drafts you have not sent, and a cached copy of pages so the app opens quickly. That storage stays on your device, is never assembled into a profile, and goes when you clear your browser data or uninstall the app. We honour Do Not Track: if your browser sends it, we do not ask about analytics and we do not switch it on.

Analytics, and Your Choice About It

Product analytics runs through PostHog, which tells us which parts of the app are used and where people get stuck. Google Analytics is configured as an alternative provider and falls under the same consent, so your answer carries over if we ever switch. You are asked before any analytics is switched on, your answer is remembered, and you can change it at any time under Privacy settings. Declining is a real decline: no product analytics events are sent. Some technical logging (errors, request logs, security events) runs regardless, because the service cannot be operated or kept secure without it.

Third-Party Services

Book information comes from Open Library, ISBNdb, Google Books, The New York Times and other public sources, and no personal data is sent to any of them. Book descriptions, genres, characters and FAQs are drafted mostly by a model we run on our own hardware, with Google Gemini used for part of that work; neither is given personal data, only public information about the book. TypeSafe checks public comments, posts, asks and reviews for spam, abuse and spoilers: it is sent the words and the title of the book they are about, never your account details or your private messages, and it does not train on them. When a book you import does not match our catalogue by its exact title, TypeSafe is also sent that book's title and author, and those of the author's books we hold, to check whether it is one of them under another title. PostHog receives usage events if you have consented. Brevo delivers our account email and the optional weekly emails you switch on. Your address is stored in Brevo's contact list only while Seekquel Weekly email is enabled. Hetzner hosts our servers, and Cloudflare holds our encrypted backups. Discord receives our operational error alerts, which can include the technical details of a fault and the account number of the person who met it, so that we hear about a problem before you have to report it. Firebase Cloud Messaging delivers push notifications and processes a device push token. Apple and Google handle sign-in if you choose to use it. RevenueCat, together with the Apple App Store and Google Play, handles subscriptions and processes your purchase data. Giphy answers GIF searches, which we relay from our own servers so that Giphy never sees who searched; a GIF another reader has put in a review is loaded from Giphy when you view it, and Giphy sees your IP address at that moment. Bookshop.org, Better World Books and Libro.fm are linked from book pages. We send a book's ISBN, not your details, to Impact to find Better World Books offers. A Better World Books link passes through Impact for commission tracking; following a shop link is governed by that service's and the shop's policies. Each of these services is governed by its own privacy policy.

Where Your Data Is Held

Your data is stored on servers we rent and control in Germany, with encrypted connections (HTTPS), hashed passwords and access controls. Encrypted backups are held with Cloudflare. Several of the services listed above are based in the United States, so using them transfers your data there, under the European Commission's standard contractual clauses or an equivalent safeguard in the provider's own terms. We work from Tunisia, which the European Commission has not ruled offers equivalent protection, so our own access to your data is covered by the same safeguards. No system is completely secure, but we take reasonable precautions, and if a breach ever put your data at real risk we will tell you and the relevant authority as the law requires.

What Other People Can See

Your profile visibility, and more than twenty individual settings covering your currently-reading, stats, badges, challenges, reviews, followers, reading preferences, profile tabs, feed activity and who may message you, are yours to set under Privacy settings. A new account starts with a public profile and activity posting on, and you can change any of it at any time, or set your whole profile to followers-only or private. A few things are public wherever your profile sits, because they are addressed to other readers: a post on the feedback board, a request asking the community for a book, and anything you contribute to the shared book catalog. Catalog contributions (corrections, editions, characters, FAQs, community lists) stay in the catalog after you leave, because other readers' pages are built on them. They are no longer attached to your name.

How Long We Keep Things

We keep your account data for as long as your account exists, and remove it when you delete the account, as described below. A data export you request stays downloadable for 72 hours and is then deleted automatically, because it holds a copy of everything you have written. Server and diagnostic logs are kept for two weeks and then discarded. Encrypted backups roll over on a fixed schedule: daily copies for about two weeks, weekly copies for two months, and older monthly and yearly copies for up to two years, so a deleted account can survive in a backup until that backup expires. Where the law requires us to keep a record, we keep that record and nothing more.

Automated Content and Automated Decisions

Book descriptions, genres, moods, characters and FAQ answers are drafted automatically from public information about the book, and can be wrong. Recommendations, statistics and reading estimates are calculated from what you have logged. None of this makes a decision with a legal effect on you, or anything comparable. If something about you looks wrong, ask us and a person will look at it.

Children's Privacy

You must be at least 13 to create an account, and Seekquel is not directed at younger children. If the law where you live sets a higher age for consenting to online services on your own, which is 16 in some EU countries, you must meet that age instead. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children below the applicable age. If you believe a child has given us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.

Your Rights

You can see and change your account information at any time in the app. You can export everything you have put into Seekquel, in 18 categories, as a single archive you are free to take elsewhere. You can correct anything that is wrong, restrict what is shared, withdraw your analytics consent, object to the processing that rests on our legitimate interests, and delete your account. Withdrawing a consent does not undo what was done while it was given. We will never treat you differently for exercising any of this. If you are in the EU or the UK you can also complain to your local data protection authority. If you are in California, you have the right to know, delete and correct what we hold, and we neither sell nor share personal information as that law defines it. Contact us and we will help.

Deleting Your Account

Deletion is in Settings, under Danger Zone. It takes effect immediately and cannot be undone. Your name, username, email address, avatar, cover image and bio are erased at once, every session and linked account is cut, your push tokens are removed, and any subscription record is closed out with our payments provider. Your reading history and the content you wrote are detached from your identity rather than kept under your name. Contributions to the shared catalog remain, as described above. Export your data first if you want a copy. If you cannot get into the app, email us from the address registered to the account and we will do it for you.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy. We will tell you about significant changes in the app or by email, before they take effect where the law requires it. Continuing to use Seekquel after a change means you accept the updated policy.

Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, or want to exercise any of the rights above, reach us through the Feedback page in the app or at [email protected].