Privacy Policy

1. Introduction

Sous-Sjef ("we", "us", "our") respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy policy explains how we collect, use, store, and share your personal data when you use our website or mobile app.

2. Data we collect

When you use our platform, we may collect the following categories of data:

• Identification data: first name, last name, email address, and profile photo.
• Third-party sign-in data: if you log in via Google or Apple, we receive your name, email address, and a unique account identifier from these providers (see section 5).
• Culinary data: your own and scanned recipes, favorites, cooking times, and cooking history.
• Camera and photo data: photos you take or select for scanning or as a profile picture (see section 4).
• Technical data: IP address, browser type, device information, and usage statistics.
• Subscription and purchase data: your subscription status, Sjef Coin balance, and purchase history (see section 6).

3. Special categories of personal data (diet and allergies)

The Sous-Sjef platform processes sensitive information that you voluntarily provide to optimize your cooking experience:

• The dietary profiles (such as vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free) and specific allergy exclusions or ingredient restrictions you configure in 'My Profile' are considered special categories of personal data.
• We process this data exclusively to tailor the AI cooking assistant (Sjef's Lab) and the recipe scanner to your personal profile.
• This data is stored with the utmost security and is never shared with third parties, except in fully anonymized form with our Vision LLM and AI infrastructure providers for the purpose of recipe processing.

4. Camera, photos, and device permissions

The app requests camera and photo access at specific moments:

• Camera: used to photograph a cookbook page, menu, or dish so it can be converted into a recipe using AI.
• Photo library: used to select an existing photo for the same recipe scan, or to set a profile picture.
• Scanned photos are processed by our Vision LLM provider to recognize ingredients and preparation steps; they are not used for any purpose other than generating your recipe and, where applicable, storing the resulting recipe image.
• You can revoke camera and photo access at any time in your device's settings. Without this permission you cannot scan recipes or upload a profile picture.

5. Signing in with Google or Apple

In addition to an email address and password, you can sign in via Google Sign-In or "Sign in with Apple". The following applies:

• We only receive your name, email address, and a unique, provider-specific account identifier from these providers to create or recognize your Sous-Sjef account.
• We never receive or store your Google or Apple password.
• If you choose to hide your email address via Apple ("Hide My Email"), we use the relay address generated by Apple for account communication.
• Google's and Apple's own privacy policies apply to their processing of your data.

6. Financial data, subscriptions, and payments

To process our paid subscription (Sjef de Cuisine), we rely on the following third parties, depending on how you subscribed:

• Stripe acts as our external data processor for web subscriptions, billing, and payment management.
• RevenueCat and the Apple App Store process subscriptions purchased from the iOS app; through RevenueCat we receive your subscription status, purchase history, and a linked user identifier, but no payment details.
• Your payment details (such as credit card numbers and billing information) are collected and processed directly by Stripe or Apple respectively, under their own privacy policies.
• Sous-Sjef does not store credit card details or sensitive banking information on its own servers; we only store the status of your subscription and your Sjef Coin balance.

7. Sharing data with third parties

We never sell your personal data. To deliver our service, we share data only with the following categories of processors, each limited to what is necessary:

• Supabase — account authentication and database hosting.
• Stripe and RevenueCat — payment and subscription processing (see section 6).
• Cloudflare — storage and delivery of recipe images and profile photos.
• Our Vision LLM and AI infrastructure providers — recipe recognition and generation, exclusively in anonymized or pseudonymized form.
• Google and Apple — only if you sign in via their service (see section 5).

We do not share data with third parties for marketing purposes without your explicit consent.

8. Content you share (Community)

Recipes you share with the community, including any photos, are visible to other users and remain so until you change their visibility or delete your account. Other users can report shared content; reported content is reviewed according to the moderation policy described in our Terms of Service. You can block other users, after which their content is no longer visible to you.

9. Data retention

We do not retain your personal data for longer than necessary for the purposes for which it was collected. If you delete your account, all your personal data, cookbooks, and dietary profiles will be permanently erased from our active systems, as described on our account deletion page.

10. Your legal rights

Under the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you have various rights regarding your personal data:

• The right to access your stored data.
• The right to rectification or completion of inaccurate data.
• The right to erasure ("the right to be forgotten").
• The right to restrict and object to processing.
• The right to data portability.

You can exercise these rights via your profile settings or by contacting our support email address.

11. Children

Sous-Sjef is not directed at individuals under the age of 16 and does not knowingly collect personal data from children under this age. If you believe we have unintentionally collected data from a child, please contact us so we can remove it.

12. Changes to this privacy policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time. The most current version will always be available on this page along with its revision date.

13. Contact

For questions about this privacy policy or to exercise your rights, please contact us via the email address on our company information page.