Privacy Policy

What this app stores

Kan keeps what you make while learning: the words you save, your review schedule, your streak and study history, the words you have recently looked up, and your settings — including the display name and profile picture you choose, if you choose one. If you sign in, that same data is stored on our server so it survives losing your phone. If you choose “Use this device only”, it never leaves the phone. (The anonymous usage statistics below are separate, and you can turn them off.)

We do not ask for your real name, and we do not collect your contacts, your location, or the other apps on your device. There is no AI chat, no photo recognition and no camera in the app.

Your account

An account made with a username keeps the username and your password, scrambled with a one-way hash — we cannot read it back. An account made with Google keeps Google’s id for you and your email address; Google also tells us your name, which is used once to suggest a username and not kept. We use these only to sign you in and to keep your data under your account.

Your profile picture

If you pick a photo for your profile, it is cut to a small square on your phone and kept with your settings. If you are signed in it is stored on our server with the rest of your data. Other people using the app never see it, and it is not sent anywhere but our server. The drawn avatars need no photo at all.

Usage statistics

The app counts which of its parts get used, so that we can see what helps people learn and decide what to improve first. It is on unless you turn it off, and it works the same whether or not you are signed in.

What is recorded: a random id made by the app when it is installed (it is not your phone’s id or an advertising id); the app version, whether it is the phone app or the website, and the language the app is set to; and a short list of things that happened, with ids and numbers about them — the app was opened, a tab was opened, a video clip was watched (which clip, roughly how many seconds, whether to the end), a word was saved (from a clip, a lesson, a word book, the dictionary or grammar — not which word), a study round, review, lesson, grammar practice or level check was finished (with its count or score), the word book being studied was changed, something was shared, the “What’s new” notes were seen. Our server adds the time it arrived and, if you are signed in, your account id. It never records the words you save or look up, anything you type, your name or email, or your internet address.

How long: the individual events are kept for 12 months and then deleted. We only look at them as totals — how many people used the app on a day, how many came back, how often clips are watched to the end.

Turning it off: Me → Privacy → Share usage statistics. When it is off nothing is recorded or sent, and anything waiting to be sent is thrown away.

Deleting it: deleting your account also deletes the usage statistics recorded under it and from any phone that was signed into it, and the app starts again with a new random id.

No analytics company is involved: the statistics go only to our own server.

The microphone

The microphone is used only if you tap it in the dictionary’s search box, and only where your browser or phone offers speech recognition. The recognition is done by your browser or phone (and whichever service its maker uses for it); we never receive the audio. Only the words it heard go into the search box.

What else reaches our server

• Words you open in the dictionary, while signed in: the word, its reading and meaning, with your account id and username. We use this list to see which words need better recordings. It is deleted with your account, and the oldest entries are dropped as the list grows.
• A forgotten-password request, if you send one: the username and the contact you type in, so that a person here can reply and set a new password.

Like any website, our server sees the internet address of each request. It keeps addresses only in memory, to limit repeated sign-in attempts and repeated requests, and never writes them to disk.

Where it is kept, and who else is involved

• Our server, hosted by Railway, stores your account, the data listed above and the usage statistics.
• Google, only if you sign in with Google: you sign in on Google’s own page or with Google on your phone, and our server asks Google to confirm it was you.
• Cloudflare stores the app’s videos and pictures, and your phone downloads them from there. Nothing of yours is stored there.

We send nothing of yours to any AI or speech provider: the spoken audio in the app is made in advance and played back, and nothing you type or say is sent anywhere to generate it.

We do not sell your data, and we do not share it for advertising. There are no ads and no advertising identifiers in this app.

How long we keep it, and deleting it

Your account and its data stay until you delete the account. Usage statistics are kept for 12 months, or until the account they were recorded under is deleted, whichever comes first.

In the app: Me → Privacy → Download my data gives you a copy, and Delete account removes your account, everything stored under it, the list of words you opened and the usage statistics recorded under it, straight away. You can also delete it on the web at /delete-account.

A forgotten-password request is kept until we remove it; it is not removed automatically when an account is deleted, so ask and we will.

Without the app, email [email protected] from the address on the account, or with the username, and we will delete it within 30 days. You do not need to reinstall the app to ask.

Children

Kan is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect data from them. If you believe a child has an account, write to the address above and we will remove it.

Changes

If this policy changes in a way that affects what we collect or who we send it to, the date at the top changes and the app will say so before the change takes effect.