Privacy Policy

Introduction

CityBot ("we", "our", or "us") is committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use our mobile application CityBot (the "Service").

Please read this privacy policy carefully. If you do not agree with the terms of this privacy policy, please do not access the Service. We reserve the right to make changes to this Privacy Policy at any time and for any reason. We will alert you about any changes by updating the "Effective date" of this Privacy Policy.

Information We Collect

We may collect information about you in a variety of ways. The information we may collect via the Service includes:

• Name and email address provided during account registration
• Profile information from social media accounts (Google, Facebook, or Apple) if used for authentication
• Photos and images you upload for civic issue reports
• Location data (GPS coordinates) when submitting civic issue reports
• Device information (device type, operating system, unique device identifiers)
• Usage data (app interactions, features used, time spent)
• AI-generated descriptions and categorizations of your submitted images
• Communication data when you contact us for support

How We Collect Your Information

We collect information through the following methods:

• Directly from you when you register for an account or submit a civic issue report
• From social media platforms when you choose to authenticate using social login
• Automatically through your device when you use our Service (device information, usage data)
• Through your device's camera when you capture photos for civic issue reports
• Through your device's location services when you submit a report with geolocation
• Through third-party AI services (Google Gemini Pro Vision) when processing your submitted images
• Through analytics tools that track how you interact with our Service
• Through customer support communications

How We Use Your Information

Having accurate information about you permits us to provide you with a smooth, efficient, and customized experience. Specifically, we may use information collected about you via the Service to:

• Create and manage your account
• Process and manage civic issue reports you submit
• Use AI technology to analyze images and generate descriptions of civic issues
• Tag civic issue reports to the correct municipal departments using geolocation
• Send you notifications about the status of your reports
• Improve our Service and develop new features
• Monitor and analyze usage patterns and trends
• Communicate with you about updates, security alerts, and support
• Prevent fraudulent or false reports
• Comply with legal obligations
• Respond to your inquiries and provide customer support

We will not use your information for purposes materially different from those described in this Privacy Policy without your consent.

AI Processing and Third-Party Services

Our Service uses artificial intelligence to enhance civic issue reporting. Specifically:

1. We use Google's Gemini Pro Vision to analyze images you submit and generate descriptions of civic issues.
2. Images submitted for analysis are sent to Google's servers for processing. Please refer to Google's Privacy Policy for information about how they handle data.
3. AI-generated content (descriptions, categorizations) is stored alongside your report data.
4. We do not use your images or data to train AI models. Our use of third-party AI services is limited to generating descriptions and categorizations for your specific reports.

Social Media Integration

Our Service offers social media login options through Google, Facebook, and Apple. When you choose to authenticate using these services:

1. We receive basic profile information (name, email address, and profile picture) from the social media platform.
2. We do not access your social media contacts, posts, or other social media data.
3. We do not post on your social media accounts on your behalf.
4. Authentication tokens are stored securely on your device and our servers to maintain your login session.

You can disconnect your social media accounts at any time through the app settings. Disconnecting will not delete data already collected through the social media integration.

How We Share Your Information

We may share information we have collected about you in certain situations. Your information may be disclosed as follows:

1. Municipal Departments: Civic issue reports, including photos, descriptions, and location data, may be shared with relevant city departments and municipal authorities for the purpose of addressing reported issues.
2. AI Service Providers:Images you submit are processed by Google's Gemini Pro Vision for analysis. This processing is subject to Google's Privacy Policy.
3. Analytics Partners: We may share anonymized, aggregated data with analytics partners to help us understand usage patterns and improve our Service.
4. Legal Requirements: We may disclose your information where we are legally required to do so in order to comply with applicable law, governmental requests, a judicial proceeding, court order, or legal process.
5. Business Transfers: We may share or transfer your information in connection with, or during negotiations of, any merger, sale of company assets, financing, or acquisition of all or a portion of our business to another company.

We do not sell your personal information to third parties.

Analytics

We may use third-party analytics tools to help us measure traffic and usage trends for our Service. These tools collect information sent by your device, including the app features you use, and other information that assists us in improving the Service. We collect and use this analytics information in aggregate form such that it cannot reasonably be manipulated to identify any particular individual user.

Retention Of Your Information

We will retain your personal information only for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. We will retain and use your information to the extent necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our policies.

Civic issue reports and associated data may be retained for a longer period as they form part of the public record of civic issues reported in a municipality. AI-generated descriptions are retained alongside the reports they describe.

Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies

We may use cookies, web beacons, tracking pixels, and other tracking technologies on the Service to help customize the Service and improve your experience. For more information on how we use cookies, please refer to our Cookie Policy.

Security

We use administrative, technical, and physical security measures to help protect your personal information. While we have taken reasonable steps to secure the personal information you provide to us, please be aware that despite our efforts, no security measures are perfect or impenetrable, and no method of data transmission can be guaranteed against any interception or other type of misuse.

CCPA Privacy Rights

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), California consumers have the right to:

• Request that a business that collects a consumer's personal data disclose the categories and specific pieces of personal data that a business has collected about consumers.
• Request that a business delete any personal data about the consumer that a business has collected.
• Request that a business that sells a consumer's personal data, not sell the consumer's personal data.

If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you. If you would like to exercise any of these rights, please contact us via our Contact page.

Children's Information

Another part of our priority is adding protection for children while using the internet. We encourage parents and guardians to observe, participate in, and/or monitor and guide their online activity.

CityBot does not knowingly collect any Personal Identifiable Information from children under the age of 13. If you think that your child provided this kind of information on our Service, we strongly encourage you to contact us immediately and we will do our best efforts to promptly remove such information from our records.

Retention Of Your Information

Our Service is hosted in the United States. If you access the Service from outside the United States, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States where our servers are located and our central database is operated. By using our Service, you consent to your information being transferred to our facilities and to the facilities of those third parties with whom we share it as described in this Privacy Policy.

Grievance / Data Protection Officer

If you have any questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy or our data practices, or if you would like to exercise your privacy rights, please contact our Data Protection Officer via our Contact page.

We will respond to your inquiry within 30 days of receiving it.