Privacy Policy

Your information should stay
clear, controlled and respected.

This Privacy Policy explains how ArpA handles account information, organiser data, information you deliberately share, device permissions, subscriptions, security and Emergency Recovery.

1. Who this notice applies to

This notice applies to the adult-only Version 1 ArpA service and the related ArpA website. It covers personal information processed when you create or use an ArpA account, use organiser features, create or join Connections, use optional device permissions or recovery, manage a subscription, ask for support, or request account deletion.

Who is responsible for ArpA?

ArpA is operated by Askin Ozturk, trading as ArpA. For privacy and data-protection questions, email privacy@arpafamily.com. For general support, email support@arpafamily.com.

2. Privacy by design

ArpA is built around a local-first Personal-data model. Your Personal area is separate from information you deliberately share. Creating or joining a Connection does not give another adult automatic access to the rest of your Personal information.

Personal stays Personal

Your Personal area is not automatically visible to other ArpA users.

You choose what is shared

Shared organiser information is tied to the Connection or sharing action you deliberately select.

Permissions are contextual

Calendar, location and notification permissions are requested when the related feature needs them rather than simply on first launch.

Adult-only Version 1

ArpA Version 1 is designed for verified adult accounts. The earlier child-account commercial model is not part of Version 1.

3. Information ArpA may process

Account and profile information

Information needed to create, verify and secure your ArpA account, such as your verified email address, account/profile identifiers and information needed to maintain your account, membership and Connections.

Organiser information

Depending on what you use, ArpA may process Calendar events, Special Dates, Lists, Outgoings, Trackers, Countdowns and related organiser information. ArpA separates Personal information from information you deliberately share.

Information about other people

Organiser entries can contain information about people other than you, for example a name in a shared plan or a Special Date. Only add or share information that you are entitled to use and share.

Calendar access and import

When you choose Import from calendars on this phone, ArpA requests calendar access so you can review calendars exposed by your device, select events and copy chosen events into ArpA. ArpA does not need that permission until you choose the import action.

Location and notifications

Location access is used for weather-related functionality when needed. Notification permission is requested contextually for features that use reminders or notifications. You can manage these permissions through your device settings.

Connections and shared data

When you create or join a Connection, ArpA processes the membership information and supported organiser information needed to provide the sharing you choose. Other Connection participants receive only the information made available through that Connection or sharing action.

Subscription and entitlement information

If you subscribe through an app store, ArpA processes the store, purchase-token/order and entitlement information needed to verify and maintain access. Payment-card details are handled by the relevant app store rather than entered into ArpA.

Security, device and recovery information

ArpA processes the technical information needed to protect accounts, enforce the one-active-device model, prevent abuse, operate protected backend functions and support replacement-device recovery. If you enable Emergency Recovery, an encrypted recovery copy of supported data can be stored for restoration to a replacement phone.

Support and website information

If you contact Support, ArpA will need the contact and case information necessary to understand and respond to your request. The ArpA website is hosted on Vercel. The current site does not use ArpA advertising or behavioural profiling technologies.

Weather and location

Weather is an optional ArpA feature. ArpA requests access to your device location only when you choose an action that needs fresh location information for weather. If you allow it, the device may obtain your location locally so ArpA can request a forecast.

Before the weather request is sent to the weather provider, ArpA rounds the latitude and longitude used for the request to 3 decimal places. ArpA does not send the provider the more precise raw coordinates obtained from the device for that request.

ArpA currently uses MET Norway and its Locationforecast service as the weather-data provider. Because the app requests the forecast directly from MET Norway, MET Norway receives the internet protocol (IP) address used for the request together with the rounded coordinates requested. MET Norway states that API access logs are stored in Oslo, Norway.

Weather forecast information and the rounded location used for the forecast can be cached locally for the active ArpA account so that ArpA can respect provider caching rules and avoid unnecessary repeat requests.

Weather information is attributed as: Based on data from MET Norway - adapted by ArpA - CC BY 4.0. The applicable licence is available at Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International.

4. Where information comes from

Most information comes directly from you or from the device feature you deliberately choose to use. ArpA may also receive information from other Connection participants when they share supported organiser information with you, from the app store when a subscription or billing status is verified, and from ArpA security/backend systems when account or service operations are performed.

5. Why ArpA uses information and lawful basis

ArpA uses personal information only for defined purposes such as creating and securing accounts, providing organiser features, syncing information you choose to share, verifying subscriptions, preventing abuse, supporting recovery, responding to requests and completing account deletion.

ArpA uses different lawful bases depending on why personal information is processed. Processing needed to provide the ArpA service or an action you request generally relies on contract. Security, abuse prevention, service integrity and certain limited processing of information about other people rely on legitimate interests. Processing genuinely required by applicable UK law relies on legal obligation. ArpA does not use one blanket lawful basis for every purpose.

Providing ArpA

ArpA relies on Article 6(1)(b) UK GDPR where processing is necessary to provide the service or action you request. This includes account access and verification, your Personal organiser features, deliberate Connection and Shared organiser actions, subscription and entitlement administration, Calendar import, requested reminders and notifications, Weather when you request a forecast, Move ArpA, optional Emergency Recovery, ordinary support and requested account closure.

Legitimate interests

ArpA relies on Article 6(1)(f) UK GDPR for defined legitimate interests including account, device and service security; App Check and protected backend operations; abuse and fraud prevention; request throttling; subscription-integrity checks; privacy-safe operational logging; retry-safe service integrity; dispute handling and legal-rights protection where another law does not require the processing. It also applies to limited ordinary information about another person that an ArpA user places in organiser content where that person is not the contracting user. ArpA has assessed necessity and the effect on people's rights for these purposes.

Legal and billing records

ArpA relies on Article 6(1)(c) UK GDPR only where applicable UK law requires the processing. This can include statutory data-protection obligations, legally required tax or accounting records, court orders or binding regulatory requirements where applicable. A contractual requirement imposed by an app store or another commercial provider is not treated as a legal obligation merely because the contract requires it.

Permissions and future optional uses

ArpA does not currently rely on Article 6 consent for its core Version 1 processing. Calendar, location and notification permissions remain contextual choices controlled through your device, but granting a device permission does not by itself make consent the UK GDPR lawful basis for the underlying feature. If future marketing, analytics, advertising or other non-essential processing is introduced, its lawful basis and any required consent will be determined before it is enabled.

Special-category information

ArpA Version 1 is not designed or intended to collect, request, require, infer, classify or use special-category personal information. Do not enter special-category information into ArpA free-text organiser fields. This includes information about racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade-union membership, genetic data, biometric data used to uniquely identify a person, health, sex life or sexual orientation. This restriction applies to information about you and about other people. ArpA does not claim that its free-text fields technically prevent such information from being entered. Version 1 does not provide an Article 9 explicit-consent flow for special-category processing. If ArpA intentionally supports special-category processing in future, that feature will require a separate legal, privacy and product-design review before implementation.

6. Connections, sharing and recipients

Connections are designed for deliberate sharing with selected people. A Connection is not permission to inspect another adult's Personal area. When you share supported information, the selected Connection participants can receive and use that shared information as part of the Connection.

ArpA also uses service providers and app-store infrastructure where needed for authentication, backend functions, shared-data syncing, subscription verification, security and optional recovery. These provider categories include Google/Firebase for core app services and security, Google Play for Android subscription processing, MET Norway when Weather is requested, and Vercel for website hosting.

Information may also be disclosed where legally required, or where necessary to establish, exercise or defend legal rights.

7. International transfers

ArpA uses service providers in the United Kingdom and in other countries. ArpA's main configured Cloud Firestore database and Cloud Functions workloads are in Google's europe-west2 region in London. Firebase Authentication is processed in the United States, and some Firebase security, messaging and Google operational processing can take place internationally. Google Play may also process relevant subscription information internationally. When you request Weather, the app sends the required rounded coordinates directly to MET Norway in Norway together with the internet protocol (IP) address used for the request.

International transfer safeguards

Where personal information is transferred outside the United Kingdom, ArpA uses the applicable UK adequacy arrangements or appropriate contractual safeguards where required by UK data-protection law. Norway benefits from UK adequacy. For restricted transfers involving Google/Firebase or Google Play, applicable provider terms include contractual transfer safeguards such as Standard Contractual Clauses and UK transfer arrangements where required. Cloud Storage for Firebase is not currently provisioned as an ArpA user-data storage route. The ArpA website is hosted on Vercel. If website technologies or international transfer routes change materially, this notice will be updated where required.

8. How long information is kept

ArpA keeps personal information only for as long as it is needed for the purpose for which it is processed. Ordinary account and organiser information is kept while needed to provide the service and is then removed through ArpA's applicable deletion or cleanup process.

When information is no longer needed, it is deleted or otherwise removed from active use as appropriate. Shared Connection information can be treated differently from purely Personal information where another participant is entitled to retain the surviving shared record; the deleting account's identity and membership attribution are removed where required by ArpA's deletion design.

Confirmed retention approach

Examples of fixed technical periods include: ordinary Connection invitation records up to 60 days depending on state; Multi invitation records 90 days; terminal Multi coverage records, applied Google Play technical journals, Google Play RTDN records and completed account-deletion journals 12 calendar months; notification-device records 180 days; invalidated-device records 90 days; and subscription-verification and device-authority throttle records no later than 24 hours after update. Move ArpA QR transfer sessions are usable for 10 minutes and expired session documents are removed by scheduled cleanup. Google Cloud's _Default log bucket is retained for 30 days and the _Required audit log bucket for 400 days. Where a fixed period is not appropriate, ArpA uses the purpose of the processing and applicable legal requirements to determine retention.

9. Emergency Recovery, device security and account deletion

ArpA uses a one-active-device policy for each verified account. Where Emergency Recovery is enabled, the supported recovery data is encrypted before cloud storage. After a successful replacement-device recovery, the replacement phone becomes the designated active device and the former phone is invalidated when it reconnects.

ArpA also provides a protected account-deletion process. Before irreversible deletion, you can review the consequences and optionally export supported Calendar information. Deletion is designed to distinguish Personal data from surviving shared Connection information and to complete safely even if the destructive process needs to retry.

For the public deletion process, use the dedicated My Account page from the website navigation.

10. Security

ArpA uses technical and organisational safeguards intended to protect personal information against unauthorised access, loss, misuse or alteration. Current controls include verified accounts, protected backend operations, App Check, abuse protection for sensitive account/subscription operations, encryption for Emergency Recovery and the one-active-device model.

No online service can promise absolute security. ArpA will continue to review controls against the risks presented by the service and the information it processes.

11. Your choices and data-protection rights

You control what organiser information you add, what supported information you share, which optional device permissions you grant and whether you enable optional Emergency Recovery.

Depending on the processing and the law that applies, you may have rights including being informed about processing; access to your personal information; correction of inaccurate information; erasure in applicable circumstances; restriction of processing; data portability in applicable circumstances; objection to certain processing; and withdrawal of consent where processing relies on consent. These rights are not all absolute and can depend on the lawful basis and circumstances.

You also have the right to raise a data-protection complaint. For privacy or data-protection questions, email privacy@arpafamily.com. In the UK, you can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

12. Automated decisions, website cookies and changes

Automated decision-making and profiling

ArpA Version 1 uses automated technical rules to operate and protect the service, including subscription and access-state checks, device-security controls, abuse throttling, retention cleanup, organiser calculations and reminders. These routine technical operations are not used to build behavioural, advertising or interest profiles about users. ArpA Version 1 does not currently use personal information to make solely automated significant decisions about you that produce legal or similarly significant effects. If ArpA introduces profiling or solely automated significant decision-making in future, the feature will undergo a new legal and privacy review and any safeguards required by the applicable UK data-protection framework will be implemented before that processing is enabled.

Website cookies and analytics

The ArpA website is hosted on Vercel. The current site does not use ArpA advertising or behavioural profiling technologies. If analytics or other non-essential technologies are enabled in future, this notice and any required consent controls will be updated before they are used.

Changes to this notice

This Privacy Policy is effective from 3 September 2026. If the way ArpA handles personal information changes materially, the notice will be updated and users will be informed where required.