Privacy Policy

1. Scope

This Privacy Policy explains how Snowbear Ventures LLC, a Massachusetts limited liability company ("Snowbear", "we", "us"), collects, uses, and shares information about people who use Dossier Audio at dossier.audio (the "Service") during the beta.

2. Information We Collect

2.1 Information you provide

• Account data: your email address, name, and profile photo link from Google Sign-In (see 2.4). We do not create or store passwords.
• Application data: responses to waitlist application questions (problem statement, podcast list, current alternatives)
• Survey data: responses to onboarding, post-dossier feedback, and pricing/WTP surveys
• Submissions: podcast URLs you submit for dossier generation
• Feedback: ratings, comments, and unstructured feedback you provide in-product

2.2 Information collected automatically

• Usage data: pages viewed, features used, interaction events (click, share, submit)
• Device/browser: user agent, IP address, general geolocation derived from IP
• Cookies: cookies that keep you signed in and protect sign-in; first-party cookies holding a random ID (kept up to 180 days) so a share, rating or survey answer is counted once; and a cookie that keeps a shared dossier open for the person it was shared with. We do not use advertising cookies, and we do not use third-party analytics on our website.
• Our emails: we record whether the emails we send you were delivered and opened, through our email provider, Resend, and which of our own links in them you clicked, to improve the Service. An open is recorded when your email app loads a small image in the email, and some email apps load it on their own, so it is only a rough signal. We never sell this information, and we do not use it for advertising.
• Episode playback: when you play an episode, your browser streams it directly from the podcast's host. That host, and any measurement services the podcast uses, receive your IP address and device information under the podcast's own policies.

2.3 Information from third parties

• OAuth providers (e.g., Google): email address and basic profile information you authorize
• Podcast feeds: publicly available episode metadata and audio files for transcription

2.4 Google Sign-In data

When you sign in with Google, we request only the basic "openid", "email", and "profile" permissions. From Google we receive your Google account identifier, your email address and whether Google has verified it, your name, and a link to your profile photo.

• How we use it: to create and secure your account, sign you in, recognize you across visits, review your access request, and send you service emails (such as access approval and "your dossier is ready").
• How we store it: in our account database, hosted by our database provider in the United States. We use Google's sign-in response only to confirm your identity. We do not store Google access tokens or refresh tokens, and we cannot access your Gmail, Google Drive, Contacts, Calendar, or any other Google data.
• How we share it: only with service providers that host and operate the Service for us (hosting, database, email delivery, and the other service providers listed in Section 4), when required by law, or as part of a disclosed business transfer. We do not sell Google user data, do not use it for advertising, do not transfer it to data brokers, and do not use it to train AI models.
• How to remove it: you can delete your account at any time from the Account menu, which deletes your Google account information from our active systems. You can also revoke Dossier Audio's access in your Google Account settings at myaccount.google.com/permissions.

Our use of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy.

3. How We Use Information

• Provide, operate, and maintain the Service
• Generate dossiers from podcast content you submit
• Improve the Service, such as fixing errors and refining our prompts and quality checks
• Communicate with you (account updates, dossier completion notices, beta announcements)
• Enforce Terms, investigate violations, and prevent abuse (including scraping detection)
• Conduct internal research and product development
• Comply with legal obligations

No AI training on your content. We do not use your content to train AI models. That includes your account data, the podcasts you submit, and the transcripts and dossiers made from them. Our AI providers process this content to return results to us, and some keep it for a limited period to monitor abuse, under terms or account settings that do not allow them to train their models on it.

4. How We Share Information

We share information only as necessary:

• Service providers: categories of sub-processors that process data on our behalf, including AI inference and transcription providers, podcast and academic search services, email delivery, form and survey hosting, AI request logging (which can include short excerpts of transcripts and AI output), payment processing, and cloud infrastructure and database hosting (including the error logs our hosting providers keep). Processing occurs under their respective terms. Current sub-processor list available on request.
• Legal compliance: if required by law, subpoena, or government request
• Safety: to prevent harm, abuse, or illegal activity
• Business transfers: in the event of a merger, acquisition, or asset sale (with notice to users)

We will never sell your personal data to target ads. We do not sell your personal information to anyone, and we do not use it to target ads to you.

5. Data Retention

• Your account and activity: your account data, the podcast links you submitted, your credits, starred passages and notes, play positions, shares, invites, survey answers, and any projects and the files you add to them are kept while your account is open. When you delete your account from the Account menu, we delete them from our database right away. Feedback you sent through the feedback box, and error and audit records, stay in our database with your email removed. Feedback is also emailed to our team, and that email is kept in our inbox.
• Dossiers and transcripts: a dossier and its transcript are made from the podcast episode, not from your account. We keep them with no set end date, including after you delete your account, so the episode does not have to be processed again; once your account is deleted, nothing links them to you. Only people who requested the episode, and our administrators, can read its full transcript.
• Podcast audio: we fetch the episode audio to transcribe it and do not store the audio file.
• Copies held by service providers: the AI providers that process episodes keep content only long enough to return a result, or for a limited abuse-monitoring period where their terms require it. Email delivery records are kept for 30 days, and database backups roll off within 6 hours. Our AI request log (short excerpts, see Section 4) is kept until we delete it. Current details for each provider are available on request.

You may request deletion of any of your information at any time (see Section 7).

6. Security

We implement reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect your information, including encryption in transit, access controls, and secure authentication. No system is perfectly secure; you use the Service at your own risk during the beta.

7. Your Rights

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have the right to:

• Access the information we have about you
• Correct inaccurate information
• Delete your account and associated data
• Export your data
• Object to or restrict certain processing

To exercise these rights, contact us at legal@dossier.audio.

8. Children's Privacy

The Service is not intended for users under 18. We do not knowingly collect information from children.

9. International Users

The Service is operated from the United States. If you access the Service from outside the US, you consent to the transfer and processing of your information in the US.

10. Changes to this Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Material changes will be communicated by email or in-product notice.

11. Contact

Snowbear Ventures LLC, operator of Dossier Audio. Email: legal@dossier.audio.