Publisher: Univers Media Group (“we,” “us,” “our”). Contact: support@milkyways.app.
This Privacy Policy explains what information the MilkyWays app (the “Service”) collects, how we use and share it, and the choices and rights you have. It is incorporated into our Terms of Service. By using MilkyWays you agree to this Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.
1. Information you provide
Account: email, password (stored hashed by our auth provider), and, if you use Sign in with Apple or Google, the identifier and email those providers return.
Profile: display name, username, photo, bio, and any details you add.
Your Content: posts, Flashes, comments, live streams and recaps, messages, event listings, and beauty-camera/AR creations you make or upload.
Payments & payouts: purchases are handled by Apple and RevenueCat; creator payouts are handled by Stripe. We never receive or store your full card number. For payouts you provide Stripe with identity and tax information directly.
Support: anything you send us at support@milkyways.app.
AI features — only with your permission. The app asks before the first one is used, and you can change your answer anytime in Settings → Privacy & Data. AI writing help sends the text you are working on — plus a small amount of surrounding context, such as the last few messages in that conversation — to Anthropic. Sorting your posts, events and Flashes into categories (so people who like that kind of thing can find them) sends their words and up to three of their photos or video frames to Anthropic. Translating a caption, comment, bio or message sends that text to OpenAI. Generating a flyer image sends your prompt and the event’s details to OpenAI or Stability AI, plus a reference photo if you choose one; cutting out a photo sends that photo to Stability AI. These providers use what they receive only to answer the request. Separately, for everyone’s safety, when you post a voice comment the audio is sent to OpenAI for transcription and moderation. AI output can be wrong or misleading; you are responsible for what you post or send.
2. Information collected automatically
Usage & behavior: the content you view, tap, like, follow, search, and engage with, used to power your “For You” recommendations. You can turn this off (Section 6).
Search history: the searches you run in the app, used for recent searches and better recommendations. You can turn this off and clear it (Section 6).
Device & technical: device model, OS version, app version, language, and a device/advertising identifier.
Diagnostics: crash reports, errors, and performance data collected through Sentry to help us fix problems. You can turn this off (Section 6).
Approximate/precise location: used to show nearby events and maps, only while you use the app and only with your permission.
3. Camera, microphone, photos, and face data
Camera and microphone are used for live streaming, calls, Flashes, and the beauty/AR camera, only with your permission.
Photos are accessed only to let you pick or save media, with your permission.
Face and AR-camera data used by the beauty-camera features is processed on your device to render effects. It is used ONLY to provide those features and is NOT used for advertising, profiling, or data mining, and is not sold.
4. Contacts (optional, off by default)
Find Friends is optional and off unless you enable it. If you use it, contact emails and phone numbers are hashed on your device (using a one-way SHA-256 hash) before anything leaves your phone — we never receive your contacts in the clear. We compare those hashes only to find people you may already know on MilkyWays. If you turn on “Discoverable by contacts,” others who have your number or email can find your profile; you can turn this off anytime (Section 6).
5. How we use information
To provide, operate, secure, and improve the Service.
To personalize your feed and recommendations (unless you opt out).
To process purchases, subscriptions, tickets, gifts, and creator payouts.
To send notifications you’ve enabled and important service messages.
To show advertising (see Section 7) and to measure and improve it.
To keep MilkyWays safe: detect fraud, enforce our Terms, moderate content, and respond to reports and legal requests.
6. Your choices and controls
In Settings → Privacy & Data you can:
Turn personalized recommendations on or off. Off means generic, popularity-based ranking.
Turn search history on or off, and clear your saved searches.
Turn diagnostics sharing on or off.
Turn “Discoverable by contacts” on or off.
Turning a category off degrades the connected feature rather than breaking it. You can also change the app’s Location, Camera, Microphone, Photos, Contacts, and Notifications permissions, and the App Tracking (personalized ads) permission, at any time in your device’s iOS Settings.
7. Advertising and tracking (ATT)
MilkyWays shows ads through Google AdMob. When you first open the app, iOS asks whether you allow tracking (the App Tracking Transparency prompt). If you do NOT allow tracking, ads are non-personalized and we do not use your advertising identifier for cross-app tracking. If you allow it, ads may be personalized. You can change this anytime in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking. MilkyWays Pro removes ads.
8. How we share information
We do not sell your personal information. We share it only:
With service providers who process it for us under contract: Apple and RevenueCat (purchases), Stripe (payouts), Agora (live video/voice), Google Maps (maps/location), Google AdMob (advertising), our licensed music catalog and Audius (music), Giphy (GIF search), Anthropic (AI writing assistance and sorting content into categories, with your permission), OpenAI (content moderation, voice transcription, event classification, and — with your permission — translation and image generation), Stability AI (image generation and photo cutouts, with your permission), Expo (delivering push notifications), OpenStreetMap services (address search), Open-Meteo (weather), Sentry (diagnostics), and Supabase (hosting and database).
With other users, for content and profile information you choose to make visible.
For legal, safety, and fraud-prevention reasons, or in a business transfer.
Some of these providers act as independent controllers under their own privacy policies.
9. Data retention and deletion
We keep information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide the Service and meet legal obligations. You can delete your account anytime in Settings → Account → Delete account; this permanently removes your profile, content, and associated data (some records may be retained where required by law, for fraud prevention, or in backups for a limited period). You may also email support@milkyways.app to exercise your rights.
10. Your privacy rights
Depending on where you live (including California/CCPA and the EEA/UK GDPR), you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or port your information, to opt out of certain processing, and to withdraw consent. We do not sell or “share” personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising in the CCPA sense beyond the ATT-gated advertising described in Section 7. To exercise any right, use the in-app controls (Section 6 and account deletion) or email support@milkyways.app. We will not discriminate against you for exercising your rights.
11. Children
MilkyWays is not for anyone under 13, and we do not knowingly collect information from children under 13. If you believe a child under 13 has given us information, contact support@milkyways.app and we will delete it.
12. Security
We use industry-standard safeguards to protect information, including encryption in transit and access controls. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, so we cannot guarantee absolute security.
13. International users
We operate the Service from the United States. If you use MilkyWays from outside the U.S., you understand your information is processed in the U.S. and other countries where our providers operate, which may have different data-protection laws.
14. Changes to this Policy
We may update this Policy; we will post the new version with a new effective date and, for material changes, notify you in the app. Continued use after the effective date means you accept the updated Policy.
15. Contact us
Questions or requests: Univers Media Group, 1700 Center Point Parkway, Birmingham, AL 35215, support@milkyways.app, +1 (678) 855-9097.