Privacy Policy

Who we are

ChatBridge (chatbridge.chat) is run independently by two people, a current student and a graduate of the University of Cambridge, who together act as the data controller for the personal data described in this policy. For anything about your data, including requests, email team@chatbridge.chat. ChatBridge is not affiliated with or endorsed by the University of Cambridge.

What we collect

• Account and profile. Your CRSid, first name and college. If you choose to add them, also your degree, course, matriculation year, up to six interests, a profile photo, a different year of study from the one we work out from your matriculation year, your favourite Cambridge places (a formal, a café, a pub, a study spot and somewhere to go out), and your Instagram and LinkedIn usernames. Raven login also creates an account email in the form crsid@cam.ac.uk. It is your login identifier, and it is where we send the emails about events you sign up for, described below.
• Profile photo. Before a photo is uploaded, your browser crops it to a square and saves a fresh copy, so the location, time and camera details a phone stores inside a photo are never sent to us. We remove any that reach us anyway. The explicit content check described below looks at the photo on your device first, and a photo it stops is never uploaded. We store your photo with Supabase.
• Event signups. Which events you sign up for and when, whether you have a place or are on the waitlist, and a record of which emails about that event we have already sent you, so that we do not send the same one twice. When you sign up we email your crsid@cam.ac.uk address to confirm it, with links to add the event to your calendar. We also email you if you join a waitlist and if a place later opens up for you. These are confirmations of something you did, so there is no marketing list to leave: to stop them, give up your place on the event.
• Invite links.Every account gets a random invite code, used in links like chatbridge.chat/i/abc1234567 that you can share with friends. The code is random and contains no part of your name or CRSid, so a link you share does not tell anyone who sent it. If you join through someone else's link we record which account referred you. Nothing is awarded for this automatically; we use it to see how people are finding ChatBridge.
• Waitlist and event emails. If you join the waitlist or press Keep me posted on our home page: your email address, any profile details you choose to add, your referral code, and which referral link (if any) you signed up through. We email you once to confirm you are on the list, and again whenever a new event is scheduled. Every one of those emails has an unsubscribe link, and using it stops them straight away.
• Private events. If you join a private event using an invite link: your first name and last name, and a record that you joined that event. That is all. We do not ask for your email address, we do not verify who you are, and there is no Raven login on this route, so people at a private event are not checked as Cambridge students. Your full name is shown on screen to the people you are matched with during the event.
• Calls and matchmaking. A record of each call: who you were matched with, when it started and ended, how long you waited, and whether it failed to connect. We also record each time you join the queue.
• Friends. Your choice after each call whether to add the other person as a friend, and the list of people you are friends with. If you both choose to, you become friends, and your first name and CRSid are shown to each other on your Friends pages. When we introduced friends, anyone you had already swapped CRSids with became a friend automatically.
• Safety and moderation. Reports you file or that are filed about you (category and any written detail), records from the explicit content check (only that a detection happened and a confidence score, never an image), witness confirmations (including what the witness wrote about what they saw), moderation decisions, appeals you write, and pairs of users who must not be matched again.
• Feedback. Bug reports and feature requests you send, with the page you were on and your browser's user agent string. If we approve a feature request, the text you wrote is shown publicly on our feature board, where anyone can read it and signed-in users can vote on it. It is never published with your name, CRSid or any other detail identifying you, and the page you were on is never published. Please do not put personal information in a feature request. We also record which requests you have voted for, so your vote counts once and you can change it.
• Security logs. Our owner login page keeps a log of visits and attempts (the email typed, whether it matched, IP address, and browser user agent). Raven sign-ins keep a short-lived token that blocks replayed logins, deleted after about an hour.

What we never collect

Calls are live only. We never record or store video, audio, or in-call chat messages. The explicit content check runs entirely in your browser and never sends us an image or video frame. From a call we keep only the fact that a detection happened. The only picture of you we ever store is a profile photo you choose to add, and never the original file it came from. We run no advertising, no cross-site tracking, and we never sell data.

Cookies and device storage

• Login cookies. Essential cookies from Supabase, our login provider, that keep you signed in
• Referral cookie (cb_ref). Remembers for one hour which invite or referral link brought you here, so your friend gets the credit when you sign up
• Event link cookie (cb_event). Remembers for one hour which event invitation you opened, so that logging in brings you back to it. It holds only the code from the link
• Session flag. A browser flag that shows a short notice after a call fails to connect, gone when the tab closes
• Analytics. Vercel Analytics and Speed Insights collect aggregate, cookieless page statistics; they set no cookies and do not identify you
• Sign-up analytics. On the home page, About, Safety, Help, event invitation pages, profile setup and your ChatBridge home screen, we use PostHog to count how many people get from the front page to their first call. It records the page you were on and whether you pressed Log in, finished your profile or pressed Start, along with your browser and device type. It stores nothing on your device: instead it counts visitors with a code made from your IP address and browser that changes every day, so it cannot follow you from one day to the next. It never receives your name, CRSid, email or anything about your calls, and it does not run on the call screens

None of this is advertising or cross-site tracking, which is why you do not see a cookie banner.

What other people see

During a call the other person sees your live video and audio, your first name and your subject, shortened for the courses we list (NatSci, for example). On the screen after the call, where you can choose to become friends, they also see your photo if you have one and your course as you entered it. Your first name also stays in the call list of anyone you have had a call with. If you both picked the same interest, or interests of the same kind, or failing that share a college or course, ChatBridge may show you both a small hint about it, and only ever something you both share. That hint is the only way someone who is not your friend can learn your college. Your CRSid is shown only to people you are friends with, which happens only if you both choose it after a call. We see reports, moderation records, and call metadata when reviewing safety issues.

If you add a profile photo, your friends can see it, and so can anyone you had a call with in the last day. It is never shown to anyone you have blocked or reported, or who has blocked or reported you, and calls at a private event that only asks for names do not count. If someone reports your photo, our moderators can see it while they review the report, and may remove it.

Your friends can open your profile. It shows them your photo, first name, college, course and year of study, your interests, favourite places, Instagram and LinkedIn, your CRSid, when and at which event the two of you met, and your ChatBridge numbers: how many calls you have had, how long you have talked in total, your longest call, how many events you have been to and how many colleges the people you have talked to come from. Apart from your photo, first name and course and the hints above, none of this is shown to anyone who is not your friend.

At a private event that only asks for names this works differently. The people you are matched with see your full name, during the call and on the screen straight after it. There are no friends at an event like this, so no contact details are shared either way.

Why we can use this data

Under UK data protection law, our lawful bases are:

• Providing the service you signed up for. Your account, profile, matchmaking, calls, friends, and call history
• Legitimate interests. Keeping the platform safe (reports, moderation records, pair blocks), securing logins and preventing abuse (security logs, rate limiting), understanding aggregate usage (cookieless analytics, including the sign-up analytics above), and crediting waitlist referrals
• Consent. Joining the waitlist and receiving emails about new events (withdraw it at any time with the unsubscribe link), and adding someone as a friend, which shares your CRSid with them
• Legal obligation. Where we must respond to a lawful request

Who handles data for us, and where

Five providers process data on our behalf: Supabase (database, login, and profile photos), Daily.co (carries the live video and audio during a call, receives your display name, which is your first name and subject, or the name you gave at a private event that only asks for names, and keeps technical meeting records such as who joined and for how long), Vercel (hosting, server logs, and analytics), Resend (sends the emails we send you, so it receives your email address and the message), and PostHog (the sign-up analytics described under cookies, hosted in the EU). We do not sell data or share it for advertising.

Some of these providers process data outside the UK. Where that happens, transfers rely on the providers' UK-recognised safeguards, such as adequacy decisions or standard contractual clauses, under their data processing agreements.

How long we keep data

• Login replay tokens: about one hour, deleted automatically
• Your account and profile: until you delete your account, from the Edit profile page or by emailing us. Your profile details are removed at that point
• Private event attendees: your name and the record that you joined are kept until you ask us to remove them. There is no Edit profile page on this route, because a private event does not create a full account, so email team@chatbridge.chat and we will delete them
• Your profile photo: until you remove or replace it, or delete your account, when we delete it
• Friends: until either of you removes or blocks the other, or deletes your account
• Call, queue attendance, and friend request records: kept so other people's call histories stay intact. Once you delete your account they no longer show your CRSid or name to anyone
• After account deletion we keep a minimal record (your CRSid and any moderation or ban state), so past safety decisions, such as bans and never-rematch blocks, stay enforced if you return
• Safety and moderation records: for as long as they are needed to enforce a decision. Records behind a permanent ban are kept while the ban stands. Everything else is reviewed at least every 12 months and removed when no longer needed
• Feedback and bug reports: until resolved, then removed in our periodic review
• The owner login security log: pruned in our periodic review, kept no more than 12 months
• Waitlist entries: until you unsubscribe or ask us to remove them. After you unsubscribe we keep the entry only so we know not to email you, and remove it in our periodic review
• Sign-up analytics in PostHog: kept for up to 12 months, then deleted
• Provider infrastructure logs (Vercel, Supabase, Daily.co, Resend): short windows controlled by those providers, per their own policies

Apart from login tokens, nothing deletes itself on a schedule: deletion is a manual process we run through these reviews and your requests.

Your rights

You have the right to access your data, correct it, delete it, restrict or object to how it is used, and receive a copy in a portable form. If you signed in with Raven you can delete your account yourself from the Edit profile page. If you joined a private event by invite link there is no such page, so email us instead and we will delete your details. For anything else, email team@chatbridge.chat and we will respond within one month. We may keep some safety records where we have an overriding legitimate interest, for example the record behind a permanent ban, and we will tell you if that applies to your request.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk. We would welcome the chance to sort things out first, so please consider contacting us before them.

Security

All traffic is encrypted in transit. The database is accessible only to the people who run ChatBridge. Video calls run in private rooms that require a server-issued token to join. We hold no payment details.

Age

ChatBridge is for adults. You must be 18 or over to create a profile, and we ask you to confirm this when you set one up.

Changes and contact

We may update this policy as ChatBridge evolves. The version date at the top identifies the current policy, and material changes will be flagged in the app. Anything unclear, or any request about your data: team@chatbridge.chat.