--- title: "Privacy" description: "How WhiskerMatch handles browser-local consumer data, public adoption applications, other public submissions, accounts, uploads, and shelter or rescue records." canonical: https://www.whiskermatch.com/privacy markdown_url: https://www.whiskermatch.com/privacy.md generated_from: "canonical page server-rendered HTML; the HTML page is authoritative" last_modified: 2026-10-04 last_updated: 2026-10-04 publisher: "Veldarium Technology Systems LLC" --- Privacy # Privacy, stated plainly. Some consumer tools store data only in your browser; configured discovery may query an external listing provider; public forms and shelter workflows store data on the backend. This page distinguishes those paths. Effective October 4, 2026 Plain-English summary ### What this page governs This policy covers the public website, externally sourced discovery, browser-local consumer tools, organization-scoped adoption applications, Discovery Questionnaire submissions, authenticated accounts, shelter or rescue operational records, and uploaded files. Public shelter and rescue contact now happens by direct email; pilot requests previously submitted through the earlier request form are retained as historical records. ### What it does not govern Each shelter or rescue remains responsible for its own notices, permissions, retention decisions, and lawful use of information it enters into WhiskerMatch. ### Contact Veldarium Technology Systems LLC ยท [support@whiskermatch.com](mailto:support@whiskermatch.com) ### Product-stage note WhiskerMatch is a founder-led pilot product. Consumer saves, matching preferences, lost-and-found drafts, and care notes stay in unencrypted local or session browser storage in this build. Where Lost & Found reports are switched on, a posted report is stored on WhiskerMatch's database instead (see below). In RescueGroups mode, a postal-code or coordinate-radius search is made server-side and returned records remain temporary. Backend submissions and organization workflows store data only when the required database and hosting services are configured. WhiskerMatch does not provide veterinary, legal, medical, behavioral, placement, or emergency services. ## Who we are WhiskerMatch is operated by **Veldarium Technology Systems LLC**. Privacy questions and requests can be sent to [support@whiskermatch.com](mailto:support@whiskermatch.com). ## What we collect and store Category Examples Purpose - Category Browser-local consumer data Examples Saved profiles, recent views, saved searches, matching answers, lost-and-found drafts, uploaded-file names, care observations, and reminders created in the consumer experience. Purpose To make the current browser experience useful without requiring an account. These prototype surfaces do not send that content to WhiskerMatch's backend; it remains unencrypted on the device or current browser session until removed or browser storage is cleared. - Category External discovery data Examples Public animal and source-organization details, source timestamps and links, source-provided images and tracker pixels, approximate city/state location, and a postal-code or coordinate-radius search when RescueGroups mode is configured. Purpose To request and display temporary, source-attributed adoption listings without importing street addresses or source contact details into the public discovery model. Provider records expire and are not substituted with fixtures when the provider fails. - Category Lost & Found reports (only when switched on) Examples A short description, photos, the date and approximate time, size, collar and tag wording, microchip status, a search radius, and a ZIP or postal code reduced to an approximate area. An optional email for notices, the name and contact a person gives when writing to a poster, and sightings (a day, an area, a note and an optional contact). Purpose To publish a report on WhiskerMatch, relay messages and sightings, and suggest possible matches to the poster. The email, message contacts and sighting notes are never shown publicly; a sighting shows only its area and day. Photos are re-encoded so camera and location data are removed. - Category Community-cat reports Examples The day and approximate time you saw a cat, your description of where, how many cats, coat, condition, behavior, ear tip, collar, whether food was out, photos, notes, and an optional email. Purpose To deliver the report to the one organization you chose, which opted in to receive reports for that area. Nothing is published. You get a private receipt link to see whether the organization read it. - Category Member accounts Examples Your email, a password hash (never the password), an optional name and home ZIP, hashed recovery codes, your settings, the animals you save, the organizations you follow, journal entries made by things you did (lessons finished, reports sent, enquiries, event interest), and the companion look you chose. Purpose To keep these on every device you sign in on and to show you updates from organizations you follow. None of it is public. Organizations never see who follows them or who saved an animal. You can download it or delete it from Settings at any time. - Category Foster, volunteer and event enquiries Examples The name, email, optional phone and message you send to an organization from its profile; for events, that a signed-in member is interested. Purpose To deliver your enquiry to that organization, which replies and decides. For events, organizations see a count of interested people, not who. If you delete your account, enquiries you already sent stay with the organization without a link to your account. - Category Donations (only where an organization set them up) Examples The amount, the purpose you chose, the payment status and refunds. Your card and billing details are entered on Stripe and go to the organization's own Stripe account. Purpose To keep a record that a gift was made and settled. The organization is the seller of record and sends your receipt. - Category Organization billing (only when card billing is switched on) Examples Stripe customer and subscription identifiers, subscription status and renewal date, payment amounts and statuses, refunds, and links to Stripe-hosted invoices. Purpose To keep a record of what an organization paid and whether its subscription is active. Card details are entered on Stripe's own pages and never reach WhiskerMatch. - Category Public adoption applications Examples Name, email, optional phone number, and optional household notes submitted from an eligible organization's public animal listing. Purpose To create an applicant record for the shelter or rescue responsible for that listing so authorized staff can review the inquiry and contact the applicant. - Category Public questionnaire submissions Examples Contact details, organization context, workflow answers, and other information a person chooses to submit. Purpose To review needs, understand shelter and rescue workflows, generate reports, and follow up on the submission. - Category Pilot requests (historical) Examples Name, email, organization, role, and workflow description previously supplied through the retired pilot-request form. New shelter and rescue inquiries now arrive by direct email, not a stored web form. Purpose Retained to honor and follow up on requests already submitted, and to provision organizations that arose from them. No new records are collected through a public form. - Category Accounts and sessions Examples Administrator identity, email address, role, organization membership, password hash, session and security state, invitations, and password-reset records. Purpose To authenticate users, enforce permissions, support invitations and password recovery, and protect organization boundaries. - Category Shelter or rescue operational data Examples Animal records, intake details, statuses, notes, tasks, applicants, foster records, holds, public-profile drafts, review history, and audit events. Purpose To provide the operational workflows used by a provisioned shelter or rescue organization. - Category Uploads Examples Animal photos and documents intentionally uploaded by authorized organization users. Purpose To attach source material and approved assets to the organization's records. Uploads are kept in private storage and accessed through controlled links. - Category Usage counts (no identity) Examples An allowlisted event name (for example "pricing viewed", "guide opened", "My Pets returned"), the public page path without its query string, an optional short id such as a tool or guide name, and the time. Purpose To see which pages and tools people find useful and whether shelters reach pricing, the demo and contact. No IP address, cookie, visitor id, email, typed text, animal, applicant, health or location detail is stored with these counts. Signed-in, private-link and token pages are never counted by path. Counts are deleted after about 13 months. - Category Technical and security information Examples Request metadata, IP address, timestamps, response status, rate-limit state, and error information generated by the application or hosting provider. Purpose To operate, secure, troubleshoot, and prevent abuse of the service. ## How browser-local consumer tools work The consumer discovery, matching, saved, lost-and-found, and care prototypes use localStorage when available and fall back to sessionStorage when persistent storage is unavailable. That data is not encrypted, does not sync across devices, and may be visible to other people who can use the same browser profile. Removing an item in the product or clearing site data removes the active local copy. In the browser-only lost-or-found draft, a selected image is not uploaded and only its file name is stored. ## How Lost & Found reports work On deployments where reports are switched on, a report is stored on WhiskerMatch's database and is visible to anyone. It shows the text, photos, date, and an approximate area, never an address, phone number, or email. Messages go to a private page reached through a link shown once when the report is posted; the link is stored only as a one-way hash. To limit abuse we keep a monthly one-way hash of the poster's network address for up to 30 days. Reports expire after 60 days unless extended and are deleted 30 days after being closed. The poster can edit, close, or delete a report at any time with that link. Anyone can send a sighting on a lost-pet report: the public page shows only its area and day, and the note and any contact go to the poster's private page. WhiskerMatch does not notify shelters or other sites automatically. ## How community-cat reports work A community-cat report goes only to the organization you choose, and only organizations that opted in for your postal area are offered. It is never posted, listed or shown on a map. The organization's staff who manage TNR read it, including your description of where and your email if you gave one. You get a private receipt link, stored only as a one-way hash, that shows whether they read it; it never shows where a colony is. The same 30-day network-address hash limits abuse. Closed reports are deleted about six months after the organization closes them, and unread ones after a year. The field journal is a list of your receipt links kept in your own browser. ## How external discovery works When RescueGroups discovery is configured, WhiskerMatch sends a server-side search containing species, radius, and either the submitted postal code or an approximate coordinate to RescueGroups.org. WhiskerMatch displays a minimized projection of the response: public animal details, source organization, source link, freshness timestamps, source-hosted media, and an approximate location. It does not expose source street addresses, email addresses, or phone numbers. Opening source-hosted images or the required animal tracker may also send ordinary request data, such as IP address and browser headers, to RescueGroups or its media host. ## How public submissions work Organization-scoped adoption applications and the Discovery Questionnaire validate and store submitted information in the configured WhiskerMatch database before a success state is shown. Adoption applications are stored for the organization responsible for the listing. The public pilot-request form has been retired: shelter and rescue inquiries now go to support@whiskermatch.com by direct email, which the website does not receive or store. ## How authenticated workflows work Provisioned users sign in to an organization-scoped application. Account, session, animal, applicant, foster, task, note, status, upload, and audit information may be processed and stored so the requested workflow can operate. Roles and server-side organization checks are used to limit access. ## Infrastructure and service providers - **Vercel** hosts and delivers the application and may process standard request and diagnostic information. - **Supabase** provides Postgres database and private object storage when those backend services are configured for a deployment. - **RescueGroups.org** supplies temporary public adoption-listing data, source media, and required tracker images only when the deployment is placed in RescueGroups discovery mode. - **Anthropic** may receive an animal name, species, and public-safe source lines a reviewer types for one organization-owned profile draft when the optional AI key is configured. The action does not automatically load applicant, upload, document, or external provider records. - Automated transactional email is optional. Core workflows do not depend on email delivery: invitations and password resets can be completed with manually copied links. The full list, with what each provider touches, is on the [subprocessors page](https://www.whiskermatch.com/subprocessors). ## How we use information - Provide, secure, maintain, and troubleshoot WhiskerMatch. - Authenticate users and enforce organization and role boundaries. - Store and display records entered by authorized users. - Review questionnaire submissions and email inquiries and respond to them. - Improve workflows using operational feedback and non-identifying patterns. - Investigate abuse, reliability problems, and security incidents. ## What we do not do - We do not sell or rent organization, applicant, adopter, foster, or animal data. - We do not use operational data for ad targeting. - We do not guarantee adoption, foster, placement, medical, or behavioral outcomes. - We do not make veterinary, legal, emergency, or final placement decisions for organizations. - We do not claim absolute security or a certification we have not earned. ## Organization responsibility Shelters and rescues remain responsible for the records they enter, the permissions they grant, the people they invite, the decisions they make, and whether information is appropriate to collect, retain, share, or publish. WhiskerMatch supports those workflows; it does not replace organizational judgment or professional advice. ## Retention, access, correction, and deletion Browser-local prototype data remains until it is removed in the interface, the browser session ends for session-only storage, or site data is cleared. Backend retention depends on the type of record, the organization's active use of the service, operational requirements, and applicable obligations. Authorized organizations can manage many records in the application and may request export, correction, or deletion by contacting us. Public submitters may also ask what information we hold about them and request correction or deletion where appropriate. ## Children WhiskerMatch is not directed to children under 13. If you believe a child submitted personal information without appropriate authorization, contact us so we can review and address it. ## Security and limitations We use technical and organizational safeguards appropriate to the current pilot stage, including HTTPS, server-side authentication, role checks, organization-scoped access, private storage, and security testing. No internet service is perfectly secure, and we do not promise absolute security. ## Changes We may update this policy as WhiskerMatch changes. Material updates will be reflected on this page with a revised effective date. --- About WhiskerMatch: WhiskerMatch is workflow software for animal shelters and rescues that keeps one reviewed record per animal across intake, foster care, adoption review and public profiles, with people making every placement and publishing decision. ## Sitemap See the full [WhiskerMatch sitemap](https://www.whiskermatch.com/sitemap.md) for every public page, or [llms.txt](https://www.whiskermatch.com/llms.txt) for a short summary.