Oust is a mobile app published by SWADE SAS, 200 rue de la Croix Nivert, 75015 Paris, France (“we”). Contact: contact@swade.app. The publisher’s and the host’s details are in the legal notice.
This policy explains what data is processed when you use Oust, by whom, and how to exercise your rights.
1. In short
- Your photos and videos stay on your device. We do not send them to any server and we have no access to them.
- Oust has no user account, no server of our own, no analytics, no crash reporting, and does not ask for your location.
- Apart from the App Store, Google Play and this website, the only data that leaves your device goes through two third-party services: Google AdMob (ads) and RevenueCat (premium purchase).
2. Your photos and videos
Oust asks for access to your photo library to display your photos and videos and let you sort them. It only reads photos and videos and does not request permission to add photos to your library. Oust neither uses nor stores your photos’ location (on Android, it does not request permission to access it).
All processing happens on your device:
- Swiping right keeps the photo; swiping down sets it aside (“Later”).
- Swiping left puts the photo in Oust’s trash. Nothing is deleted at this point: you can undo it or take the photo back out of that trash.
- Photos are only deleted from your library when you confirm the deletion from Oust’s trash:
- on iOS, they go to the “Recently Deleted” album after you confirm in the system dialog;
- on Android 11 and later, they go to the system trash after you confirm in the system dialog;
- on Android 10 and earlier, there is no system trash: after an explicit confirmation in Oust, deletion is immediate and permanent.
Items in the system trash can be recovered for the period set by the system (usually 30 days): on iOS from “Recently Deleted” in Photos, on Android from the trash of your gallery app or of Google Photos. If your library is synced (iCloud Photos, Google Photos…), the deletion may also apply to your other devices and to the cloud copy, depending on that service’s settings.
3. Data stored on your device
To work, Oust stores the following on your device, and only there:
- the state of your sorting: identifiers of photos kept, set aside or placed in Oust’s trash, with, for displaying the trash, their local address, dimensions, size, type (photo or video) and video duration;
- your settings (language, photo/video filter), your statistics (number of photos sorted, space freed), your free quota (swipes used, swipes earned, number of ads watched) and technical flags (onboarding steps completed, permissions granted, premium status);
- in the system’s encrypted storage (iOS Keychain, Android Keystore): your premium status and, after a purchase, the RevenueCat identifier (a random identifier that contains neither your name nor your email).
Google’s SDK also stores your ad consent choice on the device.
We have no access to this data. It is erased when you uninstall the app. On iOS, these Keychain items may remain after uninstalling. After reinstalling, use “Restore Purchase” to get your premium back.
If device backup is turned on, this data may be included in your iCloud or computer backup (iOS); on Android, the Google backup excludes Oust’s data but may include the settings of the Google and RevenueCat SDKs (consent choice, RevenueCat identifier).
4. Advertising (Google AdMob)
The free version of Oust shows ads provided by Google AdMob:
- a native ad that appears from time to time in the photo stack;
- rewarded ads, which you choose to watch to earn extra swipes.
To serve and measure ads and to prevent fraud, the Google Mobile Ads SDK may collect:
- the device’s advertising identifier (IDFA on iOS, Android advertising ID) and a vendor identifier (IDFV on iOS, App Set ID on Android);
- IP address, and an approximate location inferred from the IP address;
- technical information about the device (model, operating system, language) and SDK diagnostic data (performance, errors);
- ad interaction data (impressions, clicks).
Google processes this data as an independent controller, under its own rules.
Your choices:
- Consent (EEA, United Kingdom, Switzerland, and other regions where the law requires it): the first time the app is about to load an ad (first video you choose to watch, or the first ad among your photos), a Google consent form asks whether you accept personalized ads. You can change your choice at any time in Settings → Legal → “Ad privacy options” (this row only appears in regions where this choice is offered). If you decline, Google may show non-personalized or limited ads.
- iOS (App Tracking Transparency): your iPhone asks whether Oust may track you. The IDFA is only accessible if you allow it; you can change your mind in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking.
- Android: you can reset or delete your advertising ID in the system settings.
With Oust Premium, Google’s advertising SDK is not loaded: no advertising data is processed, and no consent form or tracking prompt is shown. This holds as soon as your premium status is recognized on the device. On Android, after a reinstall, the device does not remember it: while your purchase is being restored, the consent form may appear once. If the purchase is restored before you answer it (usually automatically, at launch), the SDK is not loaded; if it is restored later (for example with “Restore Purchase”), the SDK stays loaded until the app is closed.
Google’s privacy policy: policies.google.com/privacy
How Google uses data from partner apps: policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites
5. Premium purchase (RevenueCat, App Store, Google Play)
Payment is handled entirely by Apple’s App Store or Google Play: we never see your payment details, your name or your email address.
To handle the purchase, purchase restoration and the check of your premium status, Oust uses RevenueCat, which acts on our behalf. At every launch, even if you buy nothing, the RevenueCat SDK uses a random identifier that contains neither your name nor your email, and may process: your purchase history in Oust (product, date, price, currency, store country), the purchase receipt sent by the store, and technical data (device model, OS version, IP address).
RevenueCat’s privacy policy: revenuecat.com/privacy
If you use a promo code, Oust opens the code redemption page of the App Store or Google Play, and the code is processed by the store.
6. Notifications
If you allow them, Oust schedules reminders on your device (at most three, after 3, 10 and 30 days without opening the app; they are cancelled as soon as you come back). These are local notifications: no notification token is sent to any server and we cannot send you messages remotely. You can turn them off in your device settings.
7. What we don’t do
- No account, no email requested, no Oust server.
- No analytics or audience measurement, no crash reporting tool, apart from the aggregated reports that Google (ad revenue) and RevenueCat (sales) provide to us.
- Oust does not ask for your location and does not use your photos’ location. Google may infer an approximate location (country, city) from your IP address for ads.
- We do not sell your data.
The “Rate Us” button opens Oust’s page on the App Store or Google Play, and the system may occasionally show its own rating prompt; your review is handled by the store. The links to this policy and to the terms of use open this website (section 15).
8. Legal bases
- Personalized ads, access to the advertising identifier and access to information on your device: your consent (Google’s form; on iOS, Apple’s tracking request).
- Serving non-personalized ads, measurement and fraud prevention: our legitimate interest in funding the free app, within the limits of your consent choices.
- Premium purchase: performance of the contract; checking premium status at every launch: our legitimate interest in giving you access to what you bought.
- Replying to your messages: our legitimate interest in answering you.
- Notifications: no data leaves your device.
9. Retention
- Data stored on the device: until you uninstall the app (subject to the iOS Keychain and backups, see section 3).
- Data processed by Google and RevenueCat: according to their own policies; RevenueCat keeps the purchase history as long as needed to let you restore your purchase.
- Your emails: at most 12 months after the conversation ends (section 13).
10. Transfers outside the European Union
Google (Google LLC), RevenueCat (RevenueCat, Inc.) and Cloudflare (Cloudflare, Inc.) may process data in the United States. These transfers are covered by the safeguards of their data processing agreements: the EU–US Data Privacy Framework, or the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses.
11. Children
Oust is not directed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect data about them. If you are under 15 (or the age set in your country), ask a parent before accepting personalized ads.
12. Your rights
Under the GDPR and the French Data Protection Act, you have the right to access, rectify, erase, object, restrict and port your data, and to withdraw your consent at any time.
In practice:
- Oust’s data is on your device. You can erase your sorting decisions with Settings → Data → “Reset Swipe History”, and all of Oust’s data by uninstalling the app.
- Ads: change your choice in Settings → Legal → “Ad privacy options” (this row only appears in regions where this choice is offered), in the iOS Tracking setting, or reset your advertising ID. For data held by Google, see its policy (section 4).
- Purchases: write to us at contact@swade.app; since we know neither your name nor your email, we may ask for the transaction ID shown on the store receipt to find your data at RevenueCat.
You can also lodge a complaint with the CNIL, the French data protection authority (cnil.fr), or with the authority of your country.
13. If you write to us
If you write to us, we use your email address and your message only to reply to you, and delete them at most 12 months after the conversation ends.
14. Security
Your photos do not leave the device. Your premium status is kept in the system’s encrypted storage. The Google and RevenueCat SDKs communicate with their servers over encrypted connections (HTTPS). We only share data with Google and RevenueCat, which are contractually bound to provide a level of protection at least equivalent to the one described here.
15. This website
oust.swade.app sets no cookie, measures no audience, has no form and loads nothing from another site. Our host, Cloudflare, processes your IP address, the page requested and your browser to serve the site and protect it, on the basis of our legitimate interest and its own.
16. Changes
We may change this policy, for example when the app evolves. The last-updated date is shown at the top of this page.
Contact
SWADE SAS — 200 rue de la Croix Nivert, 75015 Paris, France — contact@swade.app