Privacy Notice

Hot Talk is a prototype run by Hot Talk LLC. This notice explains, in plain terms, what information the app collects, why, and where it goes. Hot Talk uses virtual tokens only; we never ask for payment details. Tokens are play money and can't be cashed out.

What we collect and why

• Your sign-in details. Your email address and password, or, if you use Google sign-in, the name, email address and profile photo Google shares with us. We use these only to create your account and keep it secure. Passwords are handled entirely by Google Firebase Authentication; we never see or store them.
• Your profile. The username, display name and profile photo you choose, so other people can see who posted or traded.
• What you do in the app. Opinions you post, your trades and bets, and your token balance and portfolio. This is the app itself: it's needed to run the market, value portfolios and build the leaderboard. Trading and betting are also monitored for fair play, using this same activity, and a winning payout may be held for review if it looks like it was influenced by the people involved.
• Your age confirmation and agreement. When you sign up, or the first time you sign in after we update our Terms or this notice, we ask for your date of birth and your agreement to the Terms and this notice. We check your date of birth against our minimum age of 18 and then discard it: we keep only whether you met the minimum age, which versions of the Terms and this notice you accepted, and when. This record is private to you and the app's servers, and is deleted with your account.
• Images you upload. Profile pictures and images attached to opinions, so they can be shown in the app.
• Basic technical information. Like any website, our hosting provider receives your IP address and browser details with each request, which are used to deliver pages and protect the service from abuse.
• Your approximate location, to check eligibility. Trading, betting and posting are only available in the United States (and may be limited to certain states). Our hosting provider tells our servers the country and state your connection appears to come from, worked out from your IP address. We use it only to decide whether you can play, at the moment you try. We don't store it in our database; it may appear in our hosting provider's request logs along with your IP address.

Where it goes

• Google Firebase. Accounts are managed by Firebase Authentication. Your profile and activity are stored in the Firebase Realtime Database, and uploaded images in Firebase Storage. Data is encrypted in transit.
• OpenAI, for content moderation. Before a post goes live, its text and any attached image are sent to OpenAI's moderation service to screen for offensive content, such as hate, harassment and sexual content. The usernames and display names you choose are checked the same way. Only the content being checked is sent, not your email address or other account details.
• OpenAI, for the opinion generator. The generator uses the OpenAI API to write new opinions. To do that, the text of a handful of popular public opinions is sent to OpenAI as style examples. No usernames, email addresses or other account details are sent.
• OpenAI does not use data sent through its API to train its models, and keeps it for up to 30 days for abuse monitoring.
• Vercel. The app is hosted on Vercel, which processes the technical information above to serve the site.

We do not sell your information, show advertising, or use analytics or tracking services.

What is public, and your privacy settings

Hot Talk is a public market, so by default your profile is open: your username, display name, profile photo, the opinions you post, your trades in the activity feed, your balance, gains and losses, and your leaderboard position can be seen by anyone, including people who aren't signed in. Your holdings and the bets you've placed or received are only ever shown to signed-in players. Uploaded images are viewable by anyone with their link.

You can change this at any time under Profile → Settings → Privacy:

• Profile visibility. “Public” or “Signed-in only”. A signed-in-only profile can't be opened or searched by visitors, is left off the public leaderboard, and your trades show as “Anonymous trader” in the public feed.
• Show balance & P&L. Hides your balance, portfolio value, profit and loss and win rate from everyone else, including on the leaderboard.
• Show holdings & positions. Hides what you hold and the bets you've placed or received.
• Name in the activity feed. Shows your trades under your username or as “Anonymous trader”. Switching to anonymous also anonymises trades already in the feed; switching back only affects new trades.
• Appear on the leaderboard. Leaves you out of the public rankings.

These settings are enforced by our servers, not just hidden on screen: other people's browsers only ever receive the parts of your profile you've chosen to share. Opinions you post always show your username. Changes apply immediately, though a copy of the leaderboard someone already has open may take a moment to refresh.

Your email address, your name and photo from Google sign-in, your privacy and notification settings, and when you were last active are private: only you and the app's servers can read them. Trade monitoring records are only seen by Hot Talk staff.

Rejected content. If a post, image, username or display name is rejected by moderation, we keep a record of it for staff review: your account ID, a short excerpt of the text (or which image was flagged), the reason it was flagged and when. These records sit in a staff-only moderation queue that no other player can see. A rejected image is deleted straight away. We keep these records until staff have reviewed them and for as long as they're needed to deal with abuse; they aren't removed automatically when you delete your account, but you can ask us to remove them.

Cookies and browser storage

We only use storage that the app needs to work:

• Sign-in session. Firebase saves your session in your browser's storage so you stay signed in between visits. It is removed when you sign out.
• Google sign-in. If you choose Google sign-in, Google sets its own cookies on its sign-in pages, covered by Google's privacy policy.
• This notice. We remember that you've acknowledged the cookie banner so it doesn't keep reappearing.
• Your theme. If you pick light or dark mode, that choice is saved in your browser.
• A speed-up cache. The app keeps copies of data it has already loaded, such as opinions and prices, in your browser's storage (IndexedDB) so pages load faster on your next visit.

There are no advertising, analytics or other tracking cookies. You can clear this storage at any time in your browser settings; you'll simply be signed out and see the banner again.

How long we keep it, and your choices

We keep your account and activity for as long as your account exists. You can change your username, display name and photo from your profile at any time.

• Download my data. Under Profile → Settings you can download a copy of your account details, profile, settings, holdings, bets, trades and the opinions you've posted as a JSON file.
• Delete my account. Also under Profile → Settings, after confirming your password (or with Google). We delete your sign-in, email address, profile, profile photo, balance, holdings, bets and settings, and remove you from the leaderboard. Trades you made and opinions you posted stay in the market's history, because other players' prices and payouts depend on them, but they are shown as “Deleted user” and no longer linked to a profile. Images attached to those opinions stay with them.

For anything else, or if you can't sign in, email chat@hottalkllc.com. Hot Talk is not intended for anyone under 18.

Changes and contact

If the way the app uses data changes, we'll update this page, its version and its date, and ask you to review it the next time you sign in. Questions? Email chat@hottalkllc.com.