Privacy Policy

Effective date set at launch.

1. Who this covers

AvatarStudio lets you pick a character (a “Sidekick”), pick a dance (a “Move”), and record yourself dancing beside it to make a short composited video. This policy explains what personal information we collect when you use the AvatarStudio app and website at avatarstudio.cloud, how we use it, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and the choices you have. It applies to everyone who uses AvatarStudio. Browsing the public Sidekick and Moves libraries does not require an account; creating, saving, buying credits, and publishing do.

2. What we collect

3. Where your duet is made

On supported phones, your finished duet video is created and saved to your camera roll on your device, so the recorded footage does not need to leave your phone to produce the file. When your device cannot do this (older hardware, missing video support, or an interruption), we fall back to building the video in the cloud on Amazon Web Services so the save still works. This cloud fallback is a mandatory, budgeted part of the service, not an optional extra; when it runs, the footage and assets needed to build your video are processed on our servers and the result is returned to you. We indicate which path is in use.

Your camera turns on only while you are recording, and we stop it the moment you finish. We do not stream or upload your live camera feed.

4. How we use what we collect

5. Third-party processors

We rely on a small set of vendors to run the service. Each receives only what it needs for its purpose:

Each processor handles your data under its own terms and our agreement with it. The final list, sub-processor links, and any data-transfer mechanisms are confirmed with counsel before launch.

6. Children, minors, and biometric considerations

A character built from a photo of a real person can act as biometric personal information, so we treat any image-derived character with extra care. For people under 13 we follow children's-privacy rules (including the U.S. Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, COPPA): we require verifiable parental consent before any image-derived character is created, we limit what we collect, and we apply children's-privacy retention limits. People under 16 cannot publish to the public library at all. We collect an age range at a gate so we can apply these protections, and we keep a record of the consents obtained. If you believe a child has given us personal information without the required consent, contact us and we will act.

7. Likeness and right of publicity

You may only create or upload likenesses you have the right to use. A person's appearance is protected by right-of-publicity and similar laws, and there is no automatic safe harbor for those claims. Before custom creation and again before anything is made public, we ask you to confirm you hold the necessary rights, and we run checks on submissions headed for the public library. See the Acceptable-Use Policy for what is and is not allowed.

8. Private by default; public only after a gate

Anything you create is private by default and visible only to you. Content becomes public only if you opt in to publish it, it passes our moderation and human-review gate, and you complete the required safety acknowledgements. We never make your content public automatically. Public library entries (and any attribution shown with them) are visible to anyone browsing the libraries, which do not require an account.

9. Cookies and analytics consent

We use a small number of cookies and similar storage that are strictly necessary to run the service (for example, to keep you signed in via a session cookie). For analytics and any non-essential storage, we ask for your consent where the law requires it, and you can change your choice. We do not sell your personal information. The specific cookie list and the consent mechanism are finalized with counsel before launch.

10. Your rights and choices

You can access, export, and delete your account and the data tied to it from your account settings. Export gives you a copy of the data tied to your account; delete removes or anonymizes that data, subject to the retention limits below. Depending on where you live, you may have additional rights to your personal information (such as to correct it or object to certain processing); contact us to exercise them, and we will not discriminate against you for doing so.

11. Retention and deletion

We keep what we need to run the service and meet legal obligations, and remove the rest. When you delete your account we remove your creations from the libraries and clear the prompts and free text you typed, except where we must retain limited records — for example, billing and credits-ledger records for tax and fraud purposes (with personal details unlinked), the consent records we are required to keep, and items under a legal hold. We do not retain full card numbers. For people under 13 we apply children's-privacy retention limits. The detailed, COPPA-compliant retention and deletion schedule is finalized with counsel before launch.

12. Governing law, changes, and contact

This policy is governed by the laws of [governing-law placeholder — pending counsel]. We may update it; we will mark the new effective date and, where required, notify you. Questions about your privacy can be sent to legal@avatarstudio.cloud (placeholder pending counsel).