Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how iRate Cars, operated by Israel Montano ("iRate Cars," "we," "us," or "our"), collects, uses, discloses, and protects information when you use the iRate Cars mobile application and this website.

iRate Cars is designed to rate observed vehicle behavior and appearance. It does not identify registered vehicle owners and does not provide vehicle location histories.

1. Information we collect

Account information

When you create an account, we collect your email address, authentication identifiers, pseudonymous public handle, account status, and account creation and update timestamps. We may also collect your home state to provide relevant defaults. Private account identifiers are kept separate from your public-facing profile.

Ratings and vehicle information

We collect information you submit about a vehicle, including country or state, license plate characters, vehicle type, make, model, color, star rating, category, structured behavior or appearance tags, optional comments, and submission timestamps. A plate may identify a vehicle even when it does not directly identify a person.

Voice and speech information

If you use voice entry, the app accesses your microphone with permission and uses Apple speech-recognition services to create a transcript. The transcript may be sent through our backend to Google Gemini to organize it into rating fields for your review. Do not include names, addresses, precise locations, contact details, or other personal information in a voice report.

Photos

If photo submission is available and you choose to upload a photo, we collect the image and related vehicle and rating references. We design photo handling to remove source metadata before upload and keep original images private while moderation is pending. Do not photograph people, private documents, precise locations, or anything you cannot lawfully capture.

Safety, moderation, analytics, and operational information

We collect reports, blocks, moderation status, risk and audit events, request identifiers, a limited allowlist of product events, app diagnostics, and security information used to prevent abuse, enforce rules, investigate problems, measure whether core features work, and protect the service. Product analytics and error events are designed to exclude license plates, transcripts, comments, email addresses, precise location, photos, authentication tokens, and passwords.

Advertising information

The free version may use Google AdMob. Google and participating advertising partners may process device identifiers, IP address, approximate location derived from IP, ad interactions, diagnostics, and consent signals to deliver and measure ads, prevent fraud, and comply with law. Depending on your region and choices, ads may be personalized, contextual, or subject to restricted data processing.

Purchases

If you purchase iRate Plus, Apple processes the payment. We receive transaction and subscription-status information needed to provide ad removal and subscription benefits, but we do not receive your complete payment-card details.

2. How we use information

• Operate authentication, ratings, vehicle reputation, claimed-vehicle monitoring, profiles, progression, and support.
• Organize voice transcripts into fields you can review before submitting.
• Aggregate eligible ratings and reduce manipulation or duplicate influence.
• Moderate content, investigate reports, prevent fraud, secure accounts, and enforce our rules.
• Display and measure advertising for non-subscribers and confirm subscription access for iRate Plus members.
• Debug, maintain, analyze, and improve performance and accessibility.
• Comply with legal obligations and protect users, the public, and our rights.

3. How information is shared

We disclose information only as needed for the service, including to:

• Supabase, for authentication, database, storage, server functions, and related infrastructure.
• Apple, for speech recognition, app distribution, purchases, and platform services.
• Google, for Gemini-assisted transcript organization and AdMob advertising and consent management.
• Professional advisers, authorities, or other parties when reasonably necessary to comply with law, address abuse, protect safety, or establish and defend legal claims.
• A successor in connection with a merger, financing, acquisition, reorganization, or sale of assets, subject to applicable privacy obligations.

We do not sell license plate reports, private account details, or vehicle reputation data to insurers, data brokers, vehicle owners, or advertisers. Advertising is not targeted using a specific plate, claimed vehicle, individual rating, or vehicle reputation score.

4. Public and private information

Public or community-facing features may display a pseudonymous handle, profile customization, eligible ratings, tags, comments, badges, and aggregate reputation. Authentication identifiers, email addresses, private home-state metadata, original photos, reports, blocks, and internal moderation or risk records are not intended for public display. Access to vehicle reputation may be limited by product rules.

5. Advertising and privacy choices

Where required, the app presents choices concerning personalized advertising and the sale or sharing of personal information as those terms are defined by applicable law. You may revisit available choices through Settings → Ad Privacy Choices. Choosing not to consent does not prevent use of the core app, although contextual ads may still appear. iRate Plus subscribers do not receive in-app advertising requests while their entitlement is active.

6. Retention and deletion

We retain information for as long as reasonably necessary to provide the service, maintain rating integrity, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, prevent fraud, and meet legal obligations. Retention periods vary by data type. In-app account deletion removes the authentication account, private and public profile, vehicle claims, badges, blocks, reports submitted by the account, ratings, and associated private photo records. Vehicle reputation totals are recalculated. Limited moderation, security, diagnostic, product, transaction, or fraud-prevention records may be retained only after being disconnected from the deleted account when legally permitted or required. See our Data & Content Removal policy.

7. Security

We use safeguards such as encrypted network connections, access controls, database row-level security, private storage, and separation of authentication and public identifiers. No system is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

8. Your choices and rights

Depending on your location, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or receive information, or to object to or restrict certain processing. You may also opt out of certain sale, sharing, targeted advertising, or personalized advertising. Contact irate.cars.app@gmail.com. We may need to verify your identity.

9. Children

iRate Cars is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided personal information, contact us so we can investigate and take appropriate action.

10. International processing

Service providers may process information in the United States and other countries. Where required, appropriate safeguards are used for international transfers.

11. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as the service changes. We will update the effective date and provide additional notice when required.

12. Contact

Operator: Israel Montano
Email: irate.cars.app@gmail.com