Privacy notice
Last updated: 8 November 2026
The short version. We collect your email address so you can sign in, and we store the research you put on your boards so you can use it. We don’t sell your information, show adverts or use tracking cookies. You can ask us to delete your account and everything in it at any time.
Who we are
Happy Citing (happyciting.com and app.happyciting.com) is run by Claire Phipps, trading as Happy Citing. Claire is the “controller” of the personal information described here, which means she decides how it is used and is responsible for looking after it under UK data protection law (the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018).
If you have any questions, or want to use any of your rights, email hello@happyciting.com.
What we collect and why
| Information | Why we use it | Lawful basis |
|---|---|---|
| Your email address | To create your account and send you sign-in links. If someone shares a board with you, we hold the email address they entered so you can get access when you sign in. | Contract: we need it to provide the service you signed up for. |
| What you put on your boards | Cards, notes, quotes, references, links, labels, sections and the photos, screenshots and video clips you upload. We store this so you, and anyone you share a board with, can use it. | Contract. |
| Who a board is shared with | The email addresses and access level (can edit or can view) of people on a board, so the board owner can manage access. | Contract. |
| Links you add to cards | When you add a web link, our server visits that page to fetch its title, author, date and preview image for your card. We don’t keep a separate record of the links beyond what is saved on your board. | Contract. |
| Technical information | Our hosting and database providers automatically record things like IP addresses, browser type and the time of requests, to keep the service secure, prevent abuse and fix problems. | Legitimate interests: running a secure and reliable service. |
| Support payments | If you choose to pay to support Happy Citing, Stripe takes the payment. We receive your name, email address, the amount and the date. We never see your full card details. | Contract, and our legal duty to keep financial records. |
| Emails you send us | To reply to you. | Legitimate interests: answering your questions. |
Please don’t put sensitive personal information about yourself or other people on your boards unless you need to. The research you collect may include other people’s work and images; you are responsible for using it in line with copyright and your institution’s rules.
Cookies and storage on your device
We don’t use advertising or analytics cookies, and we don’t track you across other websites. The app stores a small amount of information in your browser so it can work:
- Your sign-in session, so you stay signed in until you sign out.
- Temporary image links, so photos on your boards load faster and don’t download again on every visit. These expire after a few days.
- Your preferences, such as PDF export settings.
These are strictly necessary for the service you’ve asked for, so we don’t ask for consent to use them. You can clear them at any time in your browser settings, which will sign you out.
Who else handles your information
We use a small number of trusted companies to run Happy Citing. They process information on our instructions and are bound by data processing agreements.
| Provider | What they do | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Supabase | Stores your account, boards and uploaded files, and sends sign-in emails. | Ireland (EU) |
| Vercel | Hosts the website and app, and runs the link-preview helper. | Global network, with servers in the US and elsewhere |
| Cloudflare | Manages our domain and forwards emails sent to hello@happyciting.com. | Global network |
| Stripe | Processes support payments and holds the payment details you give it, under its own privacy policy. | Ireland and the US |
| Receives and stores emails sent to hello@happyciting.com, and supplies the fonts used on our pages (your browser requests them directly from Google). | US and elsewhere |
Your boards and files are stored in Ireland, which the UK recognises as giving equivalent protection. Where information is transferred to other countries, such as the US, we rely on the protections the law requires, such as the UK’s adequacy regulations (including the UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework) or the UK International Data Transfer Addendum to standard contractual clauses.
We never sell your information. We would only share it with others if the law required us to, or to protect the rights and safety of our users or the public.
How long we keep it
- Your account and boards: for as long as you have an account. If you delete a card, photo or board, it is removed straight away, apart from our database provider’s backups, which are deleted within 7 days.
- If you ask us to close your account: we delete your account and the boards you own within 30 days. Boards other people own, and that you were invited to, stay with their owners.
- Pending invitations: if someone invites your email address and you never sign in, the invitation stays until the board owner removes it or deletes the board.
- Technical logs: kept by our providers for their standard periods, usually no more than a few weeks.
- Support payment records: kept for 6 years, as HMRC requires for business records.
- Emails to us: kept for as long as needed to deal with your question, and no longer than 2 years.
Your rights
Under UK data protection law you have the right to:
- ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you;
- ask us to correct anything that is wrong;
- ask us to delete your information;
- ask us to limit how we use it, or object to us using it;
- receive your information in a format you can take elsewhere. You can already export any board yourself as a backup file or PDF.
To use any of these rights, email hello@happyciting.com from the address you sign in with. We’ll reply within one month. There is no charge.
If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your information, please tell us first so we can put it right. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint or on 0303 123 1113.
Age
Happy Citing is designed for students in further and higher education and their lecturers. You must be 16 or over to create an account.
Keeping your information safe
Boards and uploaded files are private by default and can only be seen by people the board owner has invited. Photos and videos are stored privately and shown through links that expire. All connections to Happy Citing are encrypted. No system is perfectly secure, but if something went wrong that put your information at risk, we would tell you and the ICO where the law requires.
Changes to this notice
If we change how we use your information, we’ll update this page and the date at the top. If the change is significant, we’ll also tell you by email.