HEARDSupportDownload now

Heard public documents

Heard Privacy Policy

Document key: heard-privacy
Version: 1.14.0
Last updated: November 2, 2026
Effective date: November 2, 2026
Canonical URL: https://discoverheard.com/privacy

Heard is an audio social service for adults age 18 and older in the United States. This policy explains what personal information we handle, why we use it, who can see it, and the choices you have.

Justin Lauinger operates Heard as an individual publisher. In this policy, “Heard,” “we,” “us,” and “our” refer to that publisher. This policy covers the Heard app, websites, application programming interfaces (APIs), public audio delivery, account-deletion pages, and related support and safety channels. Descriptions of optional or unavailable features apply when those features are available and used; this policy does not activate them.

1 The main things to know

  • Published audio is public on the internet, together with its post details and public creator identity. Others may copy or share it.
  • Creator uploads stay private during processing and review. Each submission requires explicit permission before we send its audio and resulting transcript to OpenAI for safety review.
  • We do not currently sell personal information, use it for targeted advertising across other companies’ websites or apps, identify people by their voices, create voiceprints, clone voices, or train a generative AI model on creator content.
  • You can manage supported account information, request a copy of your data, and delete your account. Some records may remain for the limited reasons and periods explained below.

2 Your account and profile

Signing in and keeping your account secure

Heard supports email and password, Sign in with Apple, and Google sign-in on supported devices. Supabase provides our account authentication and database services. Depending on how you sign in, we and the relevant provider process your email or Apple private-relay address, account and provider identifiers, linked-account information, sign-in status, timestamps, and the credentials needed to verify you and keep you signed in. Those credentials can include passwords, identity tokens, authorization codes, one-time security values, and session tokens. Google sign-in can return basic account information under its identity, email, and profile permissions.

Your password goes directly to Supabase or your chosen sign-in provider. Heard’s application API receives the session credential and account information needed to authorize requests, but does not receive your raw Heard, Apple, or Google password.

To delete an Apple-connected account, the app obtains fresh Apple verification. Our API uses the authorization code, one-time security value, and tokens returned by Apple to verify and revoke the connection. These values are processed in memory and are not deliberately saved or logged.

Your public identity

We keep your profile identifier, handle, display name, optional biography, account and setup status, and related timestamps. We may also keep former handles, records used to compare or protect handles, ownership claims, and limited change or administration history to prevent impersonation, preserve redirects, and resolve disputes.

For new Apple accounts, the app assigns a random public handle. It uses a name shared by Apple as the initial public display name when available; otherwise, it generates a display name. You see that name during setup and can later change your name and handle in Profile. The handle does not use your name, email, or account identifier. Existing profiles are not renamed. Heard does not use a Google name or photo as your public identity.

When linking Apple or verifying deletion, the app requests email without importing a name. Unfinished setup can save your selected name and handle in an account-specific draft on your device; its retention is explained in Section 8.

Eligibility and age checks

For account features that require eligibility confirmation, we record that you confirmed you are at least 18, are in the United States, can use the English-language release, accepted the Terms and Community Guidelines, and acknowledged this policy. This record is designed not to include a birth date, raw IP address, device identifier, or password.

On supported iPhones and iPads, Heard uses Apple’s Declared Age Range service. Apple can share an age range declared by you or a parent or guardian, or a regional age category. The app uses that information on your device to decide whether access meets Heard’s 18-and-older rule. It does not send the age range, declaration method, date of birth, or identity document to Heard’s servers, place them in your profile, or retain an age-range record.

Where sharing is optional, declining leaves the existing adult-eligibility confirmation in place. Where sharing is required, access stays restricted until eligibility is confirmed. Older operating systems use the existing confirmation. Account deletion remains available if an age check restricts access.

3 Listening and using social features

Topics and relationships

We use your selected topics, preference versions, setup status, follows, blocks, and mutes to provide your feed and supported social and safety features. Topics such as Health & Wellness or Culture/Religion can suggest sensitive interests. We use them to provide the feed you request, not to infer a diagnosis, religion, or other sensitive trait or for advertising. Before any covered sensitive-data use begins, we will provide the separate notice, consent, or rights process required by law.

Blocking affects supported signed-in Heard features and removes supported follow relationships. It cannot prevent someone from accessing public information while signed out or erase copies they already made. Section 6 explains which profile and relationship information other people can see.

Listening records and post totals

When listening measurement is available, we record a “qualified listen” after a signed-in listener plays ten accumulated seconds of eligible public audio in one playback attempt. Only actual forward playback counts; manual seek jumps do not add listening time. If that attempt then reaches the audio’s natural end, we record a separate completed listen. An attempt below ten seconds creates neither record.

The record links to your private profile and includes identifiers for the event, playback attempt, and post; the event type; whole seconds listened; whether playback came from the feed or a direct selection; and when it occurred, arrived, and expires. The app also records a limited label identifying the feed algorithm used. Records exclude your email and handle, the post title, audio, playback address, sign-in credentials, device or advertising identifiers, raw network address, and free text. Creator self-listens and plays of unavailable or ineligible content do not enter these records or public totals. Retry identifiers prevent duplicate counting.

Each qualified listen adds to the post’s lifetime listen total. That total contains no listener identities and may be public. We do not publish listener identities or completed-listen totals in public content responses.

How listening can affect your feed

When listening-based ranking is enabled, we count at most one qualified listen per listener, post, and day, using UTC days and a rolling 30-day period. Only eligible events received on or after the cutoff established when this ranking feature was introduced can contribute. Completed listens and the public lifetime total do not determine ranking.

We save fixed snapshots for individual posts, containing the post identifier, combined count of qualifying listener-days, and a limited popularity weight. These summaries contain no listener or profile identifier or individual listening record. They can affect order within the feed’s topic preferences and discovery selections, while preserving opportunities to discover less-listened-to posts. We do not display them as public scores or use them for advertising, payments, creator eligibility, moderation, or publication decisions.

Optional follower notifications

Where available on iPhone, New followers alerts require both your choice in Heard’s Settings and permission from your device. We request system permission only after you enable the feature. You can keep using Heard without it.

To deliver alerts, we keep the device’s push token, a random app-installation identifier, account and sign-in-session references, platform, and registration time. We also keep follower and recipient references, event times, and limited delivery and retry status to prevent duplicate or repeated alerts. Your choice applies to that account on that device. These records are private and do not affect feed ranking or public follower counts.

Expo and Apple process the delivery token, generic message, opaque notification references, and limited technical information. The message contains no profile names, handles, audio, email addresses, or sign-in credentials. Tapping an alert opens a follower’s profile only if the signed-in recipient and current relationship remain eligible. Delivery is not guaranteed, and providers and your operating system may retain their own records.

You can turn off New followers in Heard or change system permission in device settings. Registration and notification cleanup is explained in Section 8.

4 Creating and submitting audio

Recording and importing

Heard requests microphone access only when you choose to record. You can select audio or video through Files, or a video through the system Photos picker. We extract a selected video’s audio on your device and upload only the audio after you submit and grant the required permission. The app is designed to delete the temporary video copy after processing, without deleting your original. We do not browse your full photo library.

The current app does not request permission for precise location, contacts, camera, broad shared storage, health-platform data, or advertising identifiers.

For a submission, we process the audio, its generated storage name, title, categories, duration, file type and size, integrity checks, and identifiers needed to manage the post, file, upload, and retries. We also record your recording method; Human, AI-generated, or AI-assisted source choice; your confirmation that the choice is accurate and you own or have permission to use the audio and any identifiable person’s voice; and processing, review, visibility, storage, and deletion status and times. The form does not require an AI provider or model or collect a voiceprint or copy of a voice-consent document.

Audio may reveal sensitive information about you or others. Obtain every permission and lawful basis required before recording or submitting someone else’s private or sensitive information.

Your permission for OpenAI processing

Before each submission, Heard asks your permission to send your audio, including voices and everything said, to OpenAI for transcription. We then send the resulting text to OpenAI to check for violations of our safety rules. Heard identifies the information, recipient and purpose before you choose whether to give permission. Permission requires an affirmative choice for that submission; it is not granted by opening the creator screen, recording, importing audio, or accepting Terms for an earlier upload.

You can decline, keep your local recording or draft, and continue listening without submitting. Your local recording or draft remains subject to the seven-day draft rules. Permission covers that submission and retries of its processing, not future recordings. A restored or changed draft requires a new permission choice before a new submission.

We keep a private permission record containing your account and creator references, upload reference, permission version, and server-recorded acceptance time. It contains no IP address, device fingerprint, audio, or transcript. It is included in your account export and kept until the submission record or your account is deleted.

You can cancel an upload while it is in progress. Once cancellation reaches the server, it prevents later processing. It cannot recall audio or text already sent to OpenAI or stop a request already being sent. Post and account deletion remain subject to the retention and preservation rules below.

Processing and review

Uploads go to private Cloudflare storage for processing and review. We inspect file properties and may create a private copy adjusted for consistent playback. Technical records can include format, codec, size, integrity checks, duration, channels, sample rate, bitrate, processing version, duplicate references, status, limited diagnostic codes, and timestamps.

We keep limited moderation results and evidence that helps verify processing. Heard does not intentionally retain or display the raw moderation transcript after the request. OpenAI may retain or review request data under the configuration and terms governing Heard’s API use.

Automated checks can make mistakes. Technical processing and moderation do not themselves publish a post. Uncertain, flagged, unsupported, or failed results stay private for human review. Audio becomes public only after the applicable review and publication controls are satisfied.

5 Other information needed to run Heard

Information on your device

The app may keep sign-in state, incomplete setup, notification choices, app appearance and playback preferences, account and preference references, feed position, limited error timing, and public track details and playback addresses on your device. It may also keep creator drafts, upload recovery information, pending listening records, and a temporary account-export file while the system sharing screen is open.

The iPhone app stores saved sessions and sign-in verification secrets in the protected Keychain. They remain available for background playback after the device’s first unlock and are configured not to migrate to another device. Android uses protected encrypted storage. If a saved session exists in ordinary storage, the app moves it after verifying the protected copy. It does not fall back to ordinary storage if protected storage is unavailable. Sign-out and successful in-app deletion cleanup remove saved credentials.

Pending listening records use storage excluded from operating-system backups and a separate scope for each account. The journal keeps at most the 1,000 newest event files. It may survive sign-out for the same account to retry delivery, removes a different account’s pending records when an account becomes active, clears on account deletion, and discards records older than 90 days before upload. Collection or delivery failures do not block playback. Clearing app data or uninstalling may remove local information, including records we have not received. Other local retention periods appear in Section 8.

Network information and searches

Cloudflare, Supabase, app stores, operating systems, and network providers may process IP addresses, request times, requested URLs, response status, device or browser characteristics, and security signals. Search terms can appear in requested URLs, which Cloudflare request logs can retain. We use search terms to return results and logs to operate, secure, and troubleshoot Heard.

Our application rate controls use short-lived coded identifiers and limited counters rather than deliberately writing raw IP addresses or sign-in credentials to application logs. Providers may retain their own service and security logs.

Google Cast

Heard does not currently include third-party advertising, cross-app tracking, payment, general-purpose behavioral analytics, or third-party crash-reporting software. Its audio dependency does include Google Cast.

In the current public iPhone app, Cast does not initialize during ordinary startup or playback, and its diagnostic analytics and automatic discovery are disabled. Heard exposes no Cast controls. Google identifies diagnostic, device, coarse-location, performance, and interaction data among the information its Cast software can process for analytics and app functionality, without cross-app tracking.

Requests and support

For reports, appeals, copyright notices or counter-notices, privacy or accessibility requests, and support messages, we process the contact details, account or post references, message, evidence, legal statements, correspondence, status, and outcome needed to respond. Copyright procedures may require sharing notices and counter-notices with the affected party, as explained in the Copyright Policy.

Do not send passwords, sign-in codes or tokens, suspected child sexual abuse material, or unrelated sensitive information through these channels.

TestFlight beta testing

If you join a TestFlight beta, Apple and Heard may process your invitation email, available tester name, invitation and installation status, app version and build, device model, operating system, sessions, crashes, and feedback. Apple may provide screenshots, written or crash-report comments, app uptime, battery state, carrier, time zone, processor architecture, connection type, paired-watch details, free disk space, and screen resolution.

We use this information to run the beta, communicate with testers, investigate defects, protect security, and assess release readiness. Keep credentials, private audio, and unrelated sensitive information out of feedback and screenshots.

Other service purposes

Alongside the purposes described above, we use information to recover and delete accounts; create and deliver requested exports; label supported AI-generated or AI-assisted content; manage active support, reporting, appeals, safety, and rights processes; prevent abuse; investigate incidents; enforce policies; meet legal and preservation duties; and communicate about accounts, security, requests, policies, and the service.

6 Who can receive your information

Other people

Published audio, post details, and the associated public profile identifier, handle, and display name are internet-public. A post may show its lifetime listen total. Signed-in profile and search features may also show your biography and aggregate follower and following counts.

Follower and following list identities are available only through the supported account-owner view. We do not intentionally make your email, authentication identifier, password, private preferences, or block and mute relationships public. Listener identities and completed-listen totals are not public. Public material can be recorded, cached, or redistributed by others; Heard cannot erase those independent copies.

Companies that help provide Heard

  • Supabase provides authentication, linked-account and session records, database storage, and account administration.
  • Cloudflare provides API and audio delivery, private and public storage, restricted computing, technical processing, maintenance, and content caching and delivery.
  • OpenAI transcribes eligible private submissions and reviews the resulting text for safety with the submission-specific permission described in Section 4.
  • Apple provides Apple sign-in and private-relay email, identity verification, on-device age-range responses, app signing and distribution, TestFlight, and iPhone push delivery. Expo also processes optional follower-alert delivery.
  • Google provides Google sign-in and its associated identity and authorization information, and the Cast software described in Section 5.
  • Resend delivers operational safety alerts using limited identifiers and delivers copyright and other rights notices. Rights notices may include email addresses, names, post and case references, statements about reported material, and required contact or signature details.
  • Namecheap Private Email provides our support mailbox and authentication email delivery configured through Supabase.

Providers working on our behalf process information under applicable agreements, instructions, and data-protection terms. Apple, Google, and other providers may also act independently for authentication, operating-system, distribution, security, or service-administration purposes under their own notices and settings. They may use other service providers and permitted processing locations.

Heard requires providers, integrated software providers, and other business partners receiving user data through Heard to provide the same or equal protection described in this policy, including where they have an independent role. Heard remains responsible for the provider selection, safeguards, instructions, and disclosures required of us by law. Provider terms do not authorize us to sell information, train generative AI on creator content, or make a materially different use contrary to this policy. This does not mean every provider acts solely on our instructions or has the same retention period.

Legal obligations and other disclosures

We may preserve or disclose information when reasonably necessary to comply with law or valid legal process, make a required child-safety report, investigate fraud, abuse, infringement, or a security incident, enforce our policies, or protect the rights, property, or safety of users, Heard, providers, or the public.

Information may transfer to a verified successor if Heard or its assets are transferred through business formation, reorganization, financing, merger, acquisition, or sale, subject to applicable notice, purpose, and privacy requirements. Heard currently operates through an individual publisher, not an identified limited-liability company.

We may also disclose information at your direction or with legally sufficient consent for that disclosure.

7 Advertising and tracking choices

Heard does not currently sell personal information, track people across unaffiliated websites or apps for targeted advertising, or allow third parties to collect information through Heard for their own advertising of that kind. A browser Do Not Track signal therefore does not change current behavior. We will honor Global Privacy Control and other universal opt-out signals where law requires them for a covered sale, sharing, or targeted-advertising activity. Heard currently has no such activity to opt out of.

Any materially different use, including voice identification, voiceprints, voice cloning, or generative AI training on creator content, requires a new product decision, updated privacy review, and applicable notice and consent before it begins.

8 How long information stays

We retain information only as reasonably needed for its disclosed purpose, security, disputes, enforcement, or legal obligations. “Eligible for cleanup” means a scheduled process can remove a record; it does not promise deletion from every system at that exact moment.

Accounts and information on your device

  • Account and profile information stays while the account is active. Deletion removes the authentication account and identifying fields, with the limited exceptions in Section 9.
  • The introduction draft before signup is checked for seven-day expiry when loaded. It also clears on existing-account sign-in or explicit sign-out. A separate account-specific setup draft has no automatic expiry, may survive sign-out, and clears on setup completion, account deletion, or app-data removal.
  • Creator drafts expire seven days after their last update and are removed at the next app cleanup. They are also removed on submission, discard, account change, successful sign-out, or deletion.

Listening and notifications

  • Raw listening records expire 90 days after the listening event and are removed sooner when the listener deletes their account. Lifetime post totals and already-created summaries containing no listener identifiers remain unchanged. Future ranking summaries cannot use deleted raw records.
  • Ranking summaries use the 30-day window and original ranking cutoff in Section 3. Summaries no longer reserved for use become eligible for cleanup 45 days after their date. The initial summary chosen when ranking starts may remain reserved until replaced or ranking is turned off. Feed continuation markers expire after 30 days and keep the summary used by that session available. Once a reserved summary is released, the ordinary cleanup rule applies.
  • Notification registrations are removed when New followers is turned off, the relevant session is signed out or deleted, the account is deleted, or supported account deactivation occurs. They become eligible for cleanup after 30 days without renewal. Event and delivery records become eligible after seven days, or are removed sooner on account deletion. Cleanup runs in batches. Removing a registration removes its queued deliveries. The local choice and installation identifier clear on successful mobile account deletion or app-data removal. Already-delivered alerts remain subject to device and provider controls.

Audio and review records

  • Private uploads stay while upload, processing, or review is active. We do not currently set a fixed maximum for every inactive or pending-review upload. We must pause new publication if required cleanup or monitoring cannot be safely maintained.
  • Private audio waiting for deletion remains inaccessible and becomes eligible for scheduled deletion at the applicable retention cutoff, ordinarily 30 days. A valid restricted legal or safety hold may delay deletion.
  • OpenAI permission records stay until the associated submission record or account is deleted. Heard does not intentionally retain raw moderation transcripts after the request; OpenAI’s retention and review depend on the terms and configuration governing our API use.
  • Removed public audio leaves current Heard feeds and is queued for deletion from our storage and delivery network. Our internal target is to deny ordinary playback and requests for portions of a file within five minutes after authorized removal. This is an internal target, not a guaranteed completion time, and it does not extend any legally required removal deadline. Heard cannot erase copies held independently by other people.

Exports and other retained information

  • A requested account-export snapshot and its direct authentication-account link clear after 24 hours, or immediately on account deletion. Limited remaining records, including one-way account and retry-key hashes, request status, version, and timestamps, are deleted 90 days after the snapshot is cleared. Private audio download links expire after 15 minutes. The app deletes its temporary export file when the system sharing screen closes; copies you save or share are outside our control.
  • TestFlight records stay as reasonably needed for beta operations, troubleshooting, security, and release decisions, subject to Apple’s controls. We remove testers when participation ends and delete downloaded feedback when no longer needed, unless security, legal, or preservation needs require restricted retention.
  • Limited operational, moderation, safety, rights, and deletion records may remain with identifying detail reduced or replaced by coded references while reasonably needed for integrity, security, enforcement, law, disputes, or proof. Some classes have no fixed destruction period. Coded records are not necessarily anonymous.
  • Provider logs, copies, caches, and backups follow provider configurations and terms. Security, continuity, legal duties, and backup cycles may retain information after removal from Heard’s active systems.

Legal, safety, litigation, fraud-prevention, or preservation obligations may require longer restricted retention. Material included in a completed CyberTipline report must be preserved for the period required by applicable law. Access is limited to what the preservation purpose requires.

9 Deleting your account or content

To permanently delete your account, use Settings > Account Actions > Delete account. Password accounts without an Apple connection can also use Heard’s account-deletion page or the API-hosted deletion form. Apple-connected accounts use the current iPhone app to verify and revoke Apple’s connection first. The deletion page explains verification and support options if you cannot access the account or app.

After a valid request, Heard is designed to remove the account and identifying profile fields, category preferences, supported relationships, and personal report details; remove posts from current feeds and profile responses and end their playback eligibility; stop active uploads and processing; remove notification records and queued deliveries; delete raw listening records; and immediately clear active account-export snapshots. It queues public audio for removal and makes private audio eligible for deletion under Section 8. Successful mobile completion also clears Heard sessions, playback queues, local storage, caches, and document files on that device. If final authentication-account deletion is interrupted, a limited account link may remain temporarily so you can sign in again and resume the same deletion request.

Limited identifiers, one-way hashes, status records, and reduced or coded operational, security, moderation, rights, safety, preservation, or deletion evidence may remain. Some can still be linked to previously public information and are not anonymous. Already-created listen totals and ranking summaries without listener links are not recalculated. Independent copies of previously public content cannot be erased by Heard.

You can also edit, remove, or unpublish posts where supported. Deleting a post, signing out, or uninstalling the app does not delete your account. Timing, provider copies and backups, and lawful exceptions vary by record type as described in Section 8 and the account-deletion page.

10 Your controls and privacy requests

Available controls let you edit supported profile fields and topics, manage follows, blocks and mutes, change microphone and notification permissions, turn follower alerts on or off, discard local drafts, edit or remove supported posts, sign out, export account data, and delete your account.

Getting a copy of your information

Use Settings > Account & Security > Your data & privacy for an account export and supported profile, topic, and deletion controls. The export is a portable JSON data file. It can include your account and profile, topics, relationships and safety choices, retained listening records, posts and uploads, media details, creator declarations, policy and OpenAI permission records, reports, appeals, moderation outcomes, handle history, and deletion status.

To create and deliver it, we process a request identifier, one-way account and retry-key hashes, status, a limited delivery count, timestamps, and a temporary snapshot. Retained listening records include the algorithm label where recorded. Notification exports include retained event references and registration details, but omit push tokens, sign-in-session identifiers, and provider credentials.

The self-service export does not contain every record that Heard or its providers may hold. It excludes passwords, session and multi-factor credentials, raw storage keys, other users’ private profile or contact information, staff identifiers, raw moderation transcripts, provider logs, details restricted by legal holds, and support or rights correspondence that cannot reliably be connected to your account. You can request applicable excluded records through the privacy-request process below. Ranking summaries are excluded because they have no listener link and cannot reliably be attributed to one account. Available account-owned audio may be supplied through a public address or a private link valid for 15 minutes. Once you save or share a copy, Heard’s protections and deletion controls may no longer cover it.

Other requests and appeals

Email support@discoverheard.com with “Privacy request” in the subject for sign-in email changes, excluded records, an authorized-agent request, an appeal, or anything without a self-service control.

We offer U.S. users a process for access, correction, deletion, portable copies, authorized-agent requests, and appeals, subject to proportionate verification and lawful exceptions. Depending on applicable law, you may also withdraw consent or limit certain sensitive-data uses. Stronger legal rights remain available. We may request information reasonably necessary to verify identity and an agent’s authority. We will not unlawfully discriminate against you for exercising privacy rights.

To appeal a denial, reply and state that you are appealing. We will explain a denial and any applicable appeal or regulator-complaint route. Product limits and support availability do not extend a legal response deadline or replace a required response.

11 Security and processing locations

We use administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards, including restricted access, encrypted transmission, private storage for unpublished audio, permissions that expire, limited logging, and separate review and publication controls. No service can guarantee perfect security. Use a unique password, keep credentials out of support messages, and report suspected account or data risks promptly.

Although Heard is intended for U.S. users, information may be processed in the United States and other places where our providers and their service providers operate. We will review regional compliance before intentionally offering Heard outside the United States.

12 Children and teenagers

Heard is for adults 18 and older. People under 18 may not create or use an account or submit content. We do not collect a birth date or identity document for age verification, and parental permission does not create an exception or a child account.

If we learn that someone under 18 is using an account, we will restrict that use and address the information under applicable law. If we have actual knowledge that we collected information from a child under 13 in circumstances covered by COPPA, we will stop unauthorized collection or use and promptly delete it, unless a specific legal retention duty applies. Any retained material is limited to that duty and kept under restricted access.

Report concerns through the Child Safety Standards. Do not copy or forward suspected child sexual abuse material to Heard.

13 Policy changes and contact

We may update this policy when our service, providers, practices, or the law changes. The version and effective date appear at the top. We will give notice and obtain any new consent required by law before a material change takes effect. We will not use previously collected information for a materially incompatible purpose without the notice, choice, or consent required by law.

For privacy questions or requests, contact Justin Lauinger, Heard’s individual publisher, at support@discoverheard.com or visit Heard Support. The mailbox is active and operated by the publisher, but is not staffed 24 hours a day. Do not email passwords or authentication codes.