Privacy policy

The data controller responsible for your personal data is:

Company

Kern IT

Company number

BE0845906217

Address

Rue Belliard 2A, 1040 Brussels, Belgium

Email

privacy@kernit.be

We process your personal data on the following legal bases under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR):

• Contract performance: processing necessary to provide our services and fulfil our contractual obligations to you.
• Legitimate interest: processing necessary for our legitimate business interests, such as improving our services, security and fraud prevention.
• Legal obligation: processing necessary to comply with legal obligations, including accounting and tax requirements.
• Consent: for marketing communications and optional features, we process data based on your explicit consent.

We collect and process the following categories of personal data:

• Account information: email address, username, first name, last name, profile picture, language preferences and account settings.
• Location information: geographic position when you use location-based features, join a place or take part in its rooms.
• Usage data: login history, last activity, features used, IP addresses, browser type, device information and access times.
• Communications: messages sent in rooms, support requests and other communications with us or through the platform.
• Technical data: cookies, log files, session data and technical identifiers needed for security and platform functionality.

We use your personal data to:

• Provide and maintain our location-based chat platform
• Process your registration and manage your account
• Authenticate you through passwordless magic links
• Enable location-based features and real-time messaging
• Provide customer support and answer your requests
• Improve and optimise our services
• Keep the platform secure and prevent fraud
• Comply with legal obligations and enforce our terms
• Send service notifications (magic links, account updates)
• Send marketing communications (only with your consent)

We do not sell your personal data. We may share your data with:

• Service providers who help us with hosting, email delivery and analytics. They are contractually bound to protect your data.
• Legal authorities, when required by law, court order, or to protect our rights, property or safety.
• An acquiring entity, in the event of a merger, acquisition or sale of assets.

We keep your personal data only as long as needed for the purposes described in this policy:

• Active accounts: account data is kept while your account is active and for a reasonable period afterwards.
• Legal obligations: financial and transaction data is kept for 7 years, as required by Belgian accounting and tax law.
• Deleted accounts: when you delete your account, personal data is anonymised or deleted within 90 days, unless the law requires us to keep it.

Under the GDPR and Belgian data protection law, you have the right to:

• Access: request a copy of the personal data we hold about you
• Rectification: request the correction of inaccurate or incomplete data
• Erasure ('right to be forgotten'): request the deletion of your personal data
• Restriction: ask us to limit how we use your data
• Portability: receive your data in a machine-readable format
• Objection: object to processing based on legitimate interests or for direct marketing
• Withdrawal of consent: withdraw your consent at any time where processing relies on it
• Complaint: lodge a complaint with the Belgian Data Protection Authority

To exercise your rights, write to privacy@kernit.be. We answer within 30 days.

We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal data:

• Encryption of data in transit (TLS) and at rest
• Passwordless authentication through secure magic links
• Regular security audits and vulnerability assessments
• Access controls and authentication mechanisms
• Regular backups and disaster recovery procedures

No method of transmission over the Internet is fully secure. We do our best to protect your data, but we cannot guarantee absolute security.

We use essential cookies and similar technologies to:

• Keep your session and authentication
• Remember your preferences (language)
• Keep the platform secure and prevent fraud
• Analyse platform performance (with your consent)

You can control cookies in your browser settings. Disabling essential cookies may affect how the platform works.

Audience measurement uses Plausible Analytics, a tool that sets no cookie and stores no personal data: page views are counted without identifying visitors, and no consent banner is needed. Usage statistics shown to venue managers (arrivals, messages per day) are computed from your actions on the platform and never include the content of messages or your position.

If you have concerns about how we handle your personal data, you can lodge a complaint with the Belgian Data Protection Authority:

Authority

Autorité de protection des données (APD) / Gegevensbeschermingsautoriteit (GBA)

Address

Rue de la Presse 35, 1000 Brussels, Belgium

Phone

+32 2 274 48 00

Email

contact@apd-gba.be

Website

www.dataprotectionauthority.be

For any question about this policy or our data practices:

Email

privacy@kernit.be

Mail

Kern IT, Rue Belliard 2A, 1040 Brussels, Belgium