Privacy policy

1. Who is responsible

The controller of your data is the Media News team, reachable at [email protected] (website: medianews.app).

2. What we process

When you just read, with no account:

• A random anonymous code that the app creates on first launch (not derived from your phone, your name or any advertising ID).
• Your phone’s platform (Android) and the app version.
• Which days you opened the app and how many times.
• Which headlines you opened, read on the publisher’s site or shared, and how long you kept an article open in the in-app browser.

When you create an account, in addition:

• Your chosen username (it is shown next to your comments) and your password, which we store only as a one-way hash and can never read.
• Your comments, upvotes, reports and the articles you saved.
• The time of your sign-ins, and the link between your account and your phone’s anonymous code.

Technical data: like every online service, our servers handle your IP address and request details (time, page requested) to deliver the service, block abuse and limit excessive requests. These are kept in security logs for a limited time.

What we do not collect: your name, email address, phone number, location, contacts, photos, advertising ID or hardware identifiers.

3. Why, and on what legal basis

• To provide the app and your account, comments and saved articles (performance of a contract, Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR).
• To understand how the app is used and to improve it, using anonymous statistics (our legitimate interest, Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR). You can object at any time with the switch described below.
• To keep the service secure, stop abuse and enforce our community rules (legitimate interest, Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR).
• To comply with legal obligations when required.

We do not sell your data, we do not show advertising and we do not build advertising profiles.

4. Your control: the statistics switch

In the app, open Settings and use “Anonymous usage statistics”. It is on by default. When you switch it off, the app stops sending its anonymous code, asks our server to delete what was collected about your phone, and forgets the code. Switching it on again creates a new, unrelated code. If your phone is offline at that moment, the deletion is retried at the next launch.

Activity you did while signed in (comments, saved articles) belongs to your account and stays until you delete the account (see section 9).

5. Who receives data

• Hosting and network providers that run our server and protect it from attacks (including Cloudflare, which relays traffic to our server). They process data only on our behalf.
• Publishers: when you open an article, its page and images are loaded from the publisher’s servers, which then see your IP address and apply their own policies and cookies (see section 6).
• Authorities, if the law requires it.

Some providers may process data outside the European Economic Area; where this happens we rely on appropriate safeguards such as standard contractual clauses. We do not share data with advertisers or data brokers.

6. Publishers’ websites

“Open Article” shows the publisher’s own web page inside the app. That page is operated by the publisher, not by us, and may set its own cookies or load its own trackers. Please read the publisher’s privacy policy. We do not control or receive that data.

7. How long we keep data

• Anonymous usage data: while you use the app, or until you switch statistics off (then it is deleted).
• Account data, comments and saved articles: until you delete your account.
• News headlines in our database: about 14 days.
• Security logs: a limited time needed to keep the service safe.

8. Security

Traffic between the app and our server is encrypted (HTTPS). Passwords are stored only as salted bcrypt hashes. The administration area is protected by a separate sign-in, short-lived sessions and request limits, and is reachable only by authorised staff. No system is perfectly secure, but we take reasonable measures to protect your data.

9. Your rights, including deleting your account

Under the GDPR and similar laws you have the right to access your data, correct it, have it erased, restrict or object to its processing, and receive a copy in a portable format. To exercise these rights, or to delete your account and its data, follow the steps on our account deletion page or write to [email protected]. You also have the right to complain to your data protection authority (for example the Belgian Data Protection Authority, the French CNIL, the German state authorities, the Spanish AEPD or the Swiss FDPIC).

10. Children

Media News is not directed at children under 13 (or the higher age set by the law where you live), and we do not knowingly collect their data. If you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.

11. Changes and contact

We may update this policy when the app changes; the date at the top shows the latest version, and we will highlight significant changes in the app. Questions? Write to [email protected].