Privacy Policy

Last updated: 1 July 2026

This policy explains how DarkPeating ("we", "us", "our") collects, uses, shares, and protects your personal data when you use www.darkpeating.com (the "Site") — including the interview search, the community forum, and the AI chat. It also explains your rights over your data and how to exercise them.

DarkPeating is a bioenergetic-health information resource. It is not a medical service, and nothing on the Site is medical advice. The data controller responsible for your personal data is DarkPeating. For any privacy question or request, contact us at privacy@darkpeating.com.

The short version

• You can search interviews and read the forum without an account. Creating an account, posting, or subscribing means we collect more (email, profile, payment status).
• When you use the AI chat, the text you type is sent to third-party AI providers (Anthropic and OpenAI) so we can generate an answer and search the transcripts.
• We log questions and technical data to keep the service working and prevent abuse. We store a hashed — not raw — version of your IP for that logging.
• We don't sell your personal data. Payments are handled by Stripe; we never see your full card details.
• You have rights to access, correct, delete, and export your data, and to object to certain uses.

1. Information we collect

Account & profile data. If you register or post on the forum: your email address, a password (stored only as a secure hash by our authentication provider), your chosen username and display name, and optionally a location and avatar image you provide.

Content you submit. Forum threads, posts, replies, and votes (these are public). AI chat questions and the resulting conversation. For logged-in users, chat history is synced to our database so it is available across devices; for anonymous users it is kept only in your browser's local storage.

Search and usage logs. We log the questions asked to the AI chat and the queries entered into interview search, together with technical metadata (timestamps, whether a result was found, coarse counts, and a salted hash of an IP-derived identifier). This is used to understand how the tool is used and to detect and prevent abuse. Chat question logs are not linked to your account and the IP is stored only as a one-way hash, not in plain text.

Technical & device data. Like most websites, our hosting and analytics providers automatically receive your IP address, browser type, device information, referring pages, and interactions. Your IP address is also used transiently to enforce rate limits that protect the service from abuse.

Payment data. If you subscribe, payment is processed by Stripe. We receive and store your Stripe customer identifier and your subscription status, but we do not receive or store your full card number — that is handled directly by Stripe under Stripe's privacy policy.

2. Health-related information

Because DarkPeating is about health, the questions you type into the chat or search — and anything you post on the forum — may reveal information about your health. In the UK/EU this is "special category" data. We ask that you share only what you're comfortable making part of a question, and we process this information solely to provide the service you asked for (an answer, a search result, or a forum post). We do not use it to build health profiles about you, and we never sell it. The Site is an information resource, not a diagnosis or treatment service.

3. How we use your data, and our legal bases

We use the data above to:

• Provide the Site — run searches, generate chat answers, and operate the forum (legal basis: performance of a contract / your request).
• Manage your account and subscription, and process payments (legal basis: contract).
• Keep the service secure, enforce rate limits, and detect and prevent abuse, fraud, and excessive cost (legal basis: legitimate interests).
• Understand usage and improve the tool through aggregated analytics (legal basis: legitimate interests; consent where required).
• Comply with our legal obligations (legal basis: legal obligation).

4. AI processing of your questions

When you use the AI chat, the text of your question (and recent conversation context) is sent to third-party AI providers so we can generate a grounded answer: Anthropic (which generates the answer) and OpenAI (which converts your question into a search vector). Interview-search queries are likewise sent to OpenAI to power search. These providers process the text to return a result and, under their business terms, do not use it to train their models. Please do not enter information you would not want processed by these providers.

5. Who we share data with

We do not sell your personal data. We share it only with the service providers that operate the Site on our behalf ("processors"), each under a data-processing agreement:

• Supabase — database, authentication, and file storage (account, forum, chat history, logs).
• Vercel — website hosting, plus privacy-focused analytics and performance metrics.
• Anthropic & OpenAI — AI processing of chat questions and search queries (see section 4).
• Qdrant — the vector database used to search transcript passages.
• Upstash — transient storage of an IP-derived key used to enforce rate limits.
• Stripe — subscription payments.
• Google / YouTube — interviews are embedded from YouTube; when you play one, YouTube may receive data and set cookies under Google's privacy policy.

We may also disclose data if required by law, to enforce our terms, or to protect the rights, safety, and property of our users or us.

6. International transfers

Some of our providers are based in, or process data in, the United States and other countries outside the UK/EU. Where personal data is transferred outside your region, we rely on appropriate safeguards — such as the EU Standard Contractual Clauses and the UK Addendum — to protect it.

7. How long we keep it

• Account, profile, and forum content — until you delete your account or the content, subject to any legal retention needs.
• Chat history (logged-in) — kept while your account is active, subject to a per-account cap on the number of stored chats.
• Chat question logs — retained for up to 90 days, then automatically deleted.
• Payment records — retained as long as required for accounting and tax obligations.

8. Your rights

Depending on where you live, you have some or all of the following rights over your personal data: to access it, correct it, delete it, restrict or object to its processing, port it to another service, and — where we rely on consent — to withdraw that consent at any time. You can exercise these rights, or delete your account, by contacting us at privacy@darkpeating.com.

If you are in the UK or EU and believe we have handled your data improperly, you have the right to complain to your local supervisory authority — in the UK, the Information Commissioner's Office (ico.org.uk). If you are a California resident, you have rights under the CCPA/CPRA, including the right to know and delete your data and not to be discriminated against for exercising those rights.

9. Cookies and similar technologies

We use essential cookies to keep you logged in and to secure the Site; these are required for it to function. Our analytics are designed to be privacy-friendly. Embedded YouTube players may set their own cookies once you interact with a video. You can control cookies through your browser settings, though blocking essential cookies may break login.

10. Children

The Site is not directed to children, and we do not knowingly collect personal data from anyone under 16. If you believe a child has provided us data, contact us and we will delete it.

11. Security

We take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your data — including encryption in transit, hashed passwords, access controls, and IP hashing in our logs. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, however, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. When we make material changes, we will update the "Last updated" date above and, where appropriate, notify you. Your continued use of the Site after changes take effect means you accept the updated policy.

13. Contact

Questions, requests, or complaints about this policy or your data: privacy@darkpeating.com.