Privacy Policy
Last updated: 12 October 2026Anchor helps you build good habits and break bad ones. To do that, it handles information about your daily life — and some of it, like a habit to stop drinking or a note about a hard evening, is health data. This policy explains, in plain language, what we collect, why, who helps us process it and what you can do about it.
01The short version
- We collect what Anchor needs to work: your account, your habits and check-ins, and what you choose to write in the app.
- Because some of it is health data, we ask for your explicit consent before processing it (GDPR art. 9(2)(a)). You can withdraw it at any time.
- Confessions are encrypted at rest and are never shown to our staff or to anyone else.
- Anchor AI is powered by OpenAI. Your reflections and coach chats are sent to it only to generate replies and are never used to train AI models.
- Health and Screen Time data stay on your phone. Only the resulting check-in (for example “Move 30 minutes — done”) is sent to us.
- Our database is in the United States, in a data centre run by our hosting provider Contabo GmbH (Germany). We do not sell your data and we do not show ads.
- You can export everything or delete your account from inside the app, at any time.
02Who is responsible for your data
The data controller is Adrian Petre, based in Romania, who publishes Anchor (“Anchor”, “we”, “us”).
Contact us about privacy at privacy@getanchor.help. We have not appointed a data protection officer; this address handles every privacy request.
03Health data and your consent
Habits about drinking, smoking or vaping, drugs, gambling, pornography, eating, or medication and mental-health treatment, and what you log about them (cravings, slips, confessions), reveal information about your health. Under the GDPR this is a special category of data (art. 9).
We process it only with your explicit consent, which you give in the app before you add a habit that concerns your health. Without it, that habit is not saved. If you add a health habit we don’t recognise, you can mark it yourself with This habit is about my health, and it is then treated the same way. What you write in reflections, coach chats, evening check-ins, confessions, playbook entries, and the thought and answer you write during an urge can reveal health information, so it is always treated as health data and saved only with this consent. Without it, those features stay off. Like the rest of your data, it is stored on our servers in the United States (see Where your data is stored). You can withdraw your consent at any time in the app. Joining Harbor with a sensitive habit (for example alcohol or gambling) asks for a separate consent, because other members will see that you are in that crew — under an alias, never your name.
You can withdraw consent at any time in Profile → Data & account. Withdrawing does not affect processing that already happened. Because Anchor cannot track habits without this data, withdrawing consent deletes your health habits and everything logged against them (check-ins, cravings, slips, near misses), all your reflections, confessions and playbook entries, the thoughts and answers you wrote during urges, your coach chat and plans, your evening check-ins, the record of support resources and safety notices you were shown, the “why” you wrote during sign-up, and the Harbor posts and tips you wrote in those habits’ crews (posts are emptied and unlinked from you, as when you leave Harbor). Before you confirm, the app lists each habit and how many items of each kind will be deleted. You can also delete your whole account instead.
04What we collect and why
| Data | What it is | Why we use it | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Account | Email address, optional display name, sign-in identifier from Apple or Google, time zone, language. Sign-in is handled by Clerk. | To create your account, sign you in and keep it secure. | Contract (art. 6(1)(b)) |
| Habits and progress | Habits you add, reminders, check-ins, streaks, XP, levels, shields, your “why”, older days you log or fix. | To run the habit tracker and its rewards. | Contract; explicit consent where the habit concerns health (art. 9(2)(a)) |
| Urge moments | Urge strength before and after, the need you named, the thought you spotted and your answer, redirects you chose, whether you waited or used the timer. | To help you through an urge and show your own best answers next time. | Contract; explicit consent where the habit concerns health (art. 9(2)(a)). The thought and answer you write are always saved only with your consent. |
| “What works for me” | Near-miss reflections, helpers and saved redirects. | To build your personal playbook, which Anchor AI uses first. | Explicit consent |
| Evening check-in and confessions | How the day went (easy, close call, slip) and anything you choose to write or say. Dictation is turned into text on your phone; the audio never leaves it. Confession text is encrypted at rest with a separate key. | To close the day and to prepare your weekly follow-up. | Explicit consent |
| Reflections and coach chats | Your answers to reflection questions, messages to Anchor AI and its replies, plans you accept. | To coach you. Processed by OpenAI to generate replies. | Explicit consent |
| Harbor | Alias, colour, crews you join, posts, reactions, tips, reports and blocks, your age confirmation. | To run crews and tips, and to keep the community safe. | Explicit consent; legitimate interest in moderation and safety (art. 6(1)(f)) |
| Purchases | Plan, product, trial and renewal dates, store transaction identifiers. We never see your card details — payment is handled by Apple or Google. | To give you Pro and handle support requests. | Contract; legal obligation for accounting records (art. 6(1)(c)) |
| Referrals and buddy | Your invite code, who joined through it, your buddy pairing. A buddy only sees totals (habits done today, streak, level) — never habit names, reflections or chats. | To credit Pro days and run the buddy feature. | Contract |
| Notifications | Push token and device platform, your notification and quiet-hour settings. | To send reminders, the evening check-in and weekly follow-up. | Contract; your device permission |
| Health and Screen Time (optional, Pro) | Read on your device only. We receive the derived check-in (for example “Move 30 minutes — done”), never step counts, sleep data or app usage. | To tick habits off automatically. | Explicit consent |
| Diagnostics (optional) | Crash reports (device model, OS and app version, error trace) via Sentry and product usage events (screens opened, features used) via PostHog. Never habit names, confessions, reflections or chat text. | To fix bugs and improve the app. | Consent, which you can change in the app |
| Support | Emails you send us and our replies. | To help you. | Contract; legitimate interest |
We do not use your data for advertising, we do not sell it and we do not build profiles for anyone else.
05Anchor AI and automated suggestions
Anchor AI summarises your reflections, finds patterns (for example “workdays around 18:00, when tired”) and suggests small changes. When you ask it something, the relevant context — your habits, recent check-ins, reflections and playbook — is sent to our AI provider, OpenAI, to generate the reply. Anchor AI is available only with your health consent, because what you write to it can reveal health information. The text of your confessions is never sent.
OpenAI processes this data on our behalf, does not use it to train its models and keeps it for at most 30 days, only to detect abuse, unless the law requires longer. For users in the EEA and Switzerland our processor is OpenAI Ireland Limited; the processing itself may take place in the United States.
Suggestions are only suggestions. Anchor makes no decisions that have legal or similarly significant effects on you (GDPR art. 22). If something you write suggests you may be in crisis, the app shows support resources straight away; if you have given your health consent we record only that resources were shown, not what you wrote, and we delete that record if you withdraw consent.
06Who processes data for us
We use a small number of service providers (processors) bound by data processing agreements. They may use the data only to provide their service to us.
| Provider | What for | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Contabo GmbH (Munich, Germany) | Servers and the main database | United States (St. Louis data centre) |
| Clerk, Inc. | Sign-in and account security | United States |
| OpenAI Ireland Limited (OpenAI) | Anchor AI replies, summaries and weekly plans | United States |
| RevenueCat, Inc. | Managing subscriptions bought through Apple and Google | United States |
| Expo (650 Industries, Inc.) | Delivering push notifications | United States |
| Functional Software, Inc. (Sentry) — optional | Crash reports | European Union (Germany) |
| PostHog, Inc. — optional | Product usage analytics without content | European Union (Germany) |
| Namecheap, Inc. | Support and privacy email | United States |
Apple and Google act as independent controllers for purchases made in their stores and for delivering notifications to your device; their own privacy policies apply.
07Where your data is stored
Our database and servers are in a data centre in St. Louis, United States. Our hosting provider Contabo GmbH, a German company, has it run by its subcontractor Contabo Inc. (St. Louis); this transfer is covered by the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses (processor-to-processor module) in our data processing agreement with Contabo. Several providers above are also based in the United States. Where data leaves the European Economic Area, we rely on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework for certified providers or on the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses, with additional safeguards such as encryption in transit.
08How we protect it
- All traffic between the app and our servers is encrypted (TLS).
- Confession text is additionally encrypted in our database (AES-256-GCM) with a separate key.
- Our admin tools never show confessions, reflections or coach chat text, and every admin action is logged.
- Access is limited to the few people who need it to run Anchor.
- Backups are encrypted and kept in the EU.
09How long we keep it
- While your account exists, we keep your account and habit data so the app works.
- Confessions, reflections and coach chats can be deleted by you at any time, individually or all at once.
- When you delete your account, we delete your data from our live systems straight away and from backups within 35 days, as old backups expire. If we ever restore a backup, we delete your data again before it is used.
- Harbor posts: when you leave Harbor or delete your account, the text of your posts and replies is deleted and shown as removed, and your tips are deleted. Replies from other members stay.
- Activity history: urge logs are kept for 24 months and coach chat messages for 12 months, then deleted automatically.
- Inactive accounts are deleted after 24 months without sign-in, after we warn you by email.
- Purchase records are kept as long as accounting and tax law requires.
- Moderation records (reports, actions, safety events without message text) are kept for 12 months.
- Diagnostics: crash reports for [e.g. 90 days], usage analytics for [e.g. 12 months].
10Your rights
You have the right to access, correct, delete, restrict and port your data, to object to processing based on legitimate interest, and to withdraw consent at any time. Most of this you can do yourself:
- Export: Profile → Data & account → Export my data gives you a copy of everything in a machine-readable file.
- Delete: Profile → Data & account → Delete my account removes your account and all associated data. You can also delete your account by email, and see exactly what is deleted and kept.
- Delete specific things: confessions, coach data and individual habits can be deleted where they appear.
For anything else, write to privacy@getanchor.help. We reply within one month. You can also complain to the Romanian data protection authority, ANSPDCP (Autoritatea Națională de Supraveghere a Prelucrării Datelor cu Caracter Personal, dataprotection.ro), or to the authority in the EU country where you live.
11Age
Anchor is for people aged 16 and over. Harbor is for adults only (18+). We do not knowingly collect data from children; if you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.
12This website
This website uses no cookies, no analytics and no third-party trackers; fonts are served from our own domain. If you switch language, your choice is stored in your browser’s local storage, on your device only. Our hosting provider keeps short-lived server logs (IP address, time, page requested) to keep the site secure, based on our legitimate interest.
13Changes to this policy
If we change this policy in a way that matters, we will tell you in the app before the change takes effect. If a change needs your consent, we will ask for it.
14Contact
Adrian Petre · privacy@getanchor.help