ViYomi Privacy Policy

What the app does

ViYomi is a daily check-in app for families. An elderly parent who lives alone presses one button in the app each morning, "I'm OK". If no press is recorded by the time the family chose, the parent gets a reminder on the phone. If there is still no press after a grace period, the family members the family registered receive an alert asking someone to call: an SMS, a voice call, or both, as chosen for each of them.

The app has no location tracking, no microphone, no camera, no access to the phone's contact list and no advertising.

What is stored

Entered during setup

• The parent's name, grammatical gender and app language. The gender is used only to word Hebrew text correctly.
• How the parent's name is pronounced, if it was entered. It is used only in the voice call, so that the name sounds right.
• The parent's phone number, only if it was entered in an earlier version of the app. It is not used in any message.
• Names and phone numbers of the family contacts, up to five, which of them is the primary contact, and how the alert reaches each of them: by SMS, by a voice call, or both.
• The daily deadline, the grace period and the time zone, Shabbat mode and the city used for candle-lighting times, and a pause until a chosen date.

Created while the app is used

• Per day: whether a press was recorded and when, which reminders and messages were sent, and whether the day was skipped for Shabbat, a holiday or a pause.
• A log of the messages and calls sent: the recipient, the type, the text (for a call, what it says) and whether it went out.
• For each round of alert calls: who was called, in what order, and how each call ended, for example a person answered, voicemail, or no answer.
• About the phone: a Firebase installation ID used for notifications, the app version, the device model, the manufacturer and the Android version.
• An anonymous Firebase Authentication user ID. It is not linked to a Google account and does not identify the owner of the device.
• Crash reports (Firebase Crashlytics): the type of failure, the device model and the app version, with no names and no phone numbers.

What is not stored

Location, the phone's contact list, photos, recordings and the content of personal messages. The app does not request location, camera, microphone or contacts permissions.

Why the data is used

Only to run the service: to remind the parent, to notice a day without a press, to alert the family contacts by SMS or by a call, and to fix faults. There is no advertising use, no profiling and no sale of data to anyone.

Contacts: how they are added and how they opt out

Sample messages

Messages are sent in Hebrew. English translations are given here for readers who do not read Hebrew.

• וי יומי: הוגדרת לקבל עדכונים על רחל. אם רחל לא תלחץ בבוקר "אני בסדר", תישלח אליך הודעה כאן. מידע על השירות: viyomi.web.app. להסרה: …
  "ViYomi: You have been set up to receive updates about Rachel. If Rachel does not press 'I'm OK' in the morning, a message will be sent to you here. About the service: viyomi.web.app. To stop: …"
• וי יומי: רחל עוד לא לחצה היום "אני בסדר". היא הייתה אמורה ללחוץ עד השעה 10:00, וקיבלה תזכורת. כדאי שמישהו יתקשר אליה.
  "ViYomi: Rachel has not pressed 'I'm OK' today. She was supposed to press by 10:00, and she received a reminder. Someone should call her."
• וי יומי: רחל לחצה עכשיו "אני בסדר" (10:47). הכל בסדר.
  "ViYomi: Rachel pressed 'I'm OK' just now (10:47). All is well."

Voice calls

Contacts who chose it get the alert as a voice call, alone or together with the SMS. The calls go one at a time: first the primary contact, then the others in list order, until a person answers or the list runs out. The call plays a short message with the parent's name, or with the name as written in the "how to say the name" field, and hangs up. It is not recorded, and nobody is asked to say or press anything.

The calls are placed by Twilio, to every number, Israeli numbers included. It receives the recipient's number and what the call says, plays it, detects whether a person or an answering machine picked up, and reports to the server how the call ended, so the server knows whether to call the next contact.

Removal through the link or by email stops the calls too. Replying STOP stops the SMS only.

The paid version

The paid version is bought inside the app, as a Google Play subscription. Google Play takes the payment under its own terms, and card or other payment details never reach the app or us.

After a purchase, the app sends our server the purchase token, an identifier Google Play gives each purchase. The server checks it with Google Play, acknowledges the purchase there, and keeps the token, the subscription's status and the date it ends. That is how the paid version is turned on, and how one subscription is kept to one family. The server also gets updates from Google Play when the subscription renews, is canceled or is refunded. No payment details, order numbers, amounts or Google account details are kept.

Data about the paid version is kept for as long as the family is registered, and is deleted with the rest of its data: when all data is deleted from the app's settings, or automatically after a year without contact with the server. Deleting the data does not cancel the subscription, which is canceled in Google Play. Payment data is used only to turn the paid version on, never for advertising, and the app contains no advertising or analytics libraries.

A local authority's program

A local authority can run a program in which its staff see each morning which of the older people who joined it pressed "I'm OK". The authority adds the name and phone number of each person it invites, one by one or from a file, and may put each of them in an area, such as a neighborhood, to divide the work among its staff. The parent joins only by themselves, from their own phone: they type that number, receive a code at it by SMS, and read a consent screen that says what the authority will see. Nobody else can add them. Until the parent joins, the authority sees only the name, number and area it added itself, and nothing about the family.

While the parent is in the program, its staff see the name the authority gave them, their phone number and their area, whether they pressed "I'm OK" each morning and at what time, whether the family got an alert, whether the phone is not connected, and whether the service is paused: from the day the parent joined, up to 30 days back, in a file they download as well. They never see the contacts, the phone's details, the messages sent, or any location. The authority's staff can record that they followed up on a day, with a short note that must not contain medical information.

Joining sends one SMS to the primary contact, saying that the parent joined. The parent can leave the program at any moment, from the app's settings. On leaving, or when the authority removes the parent, the authority stops seeing them at once, and everything the program kept about them is deleted: the name, the phone number, the area, the date of joining and the follow-up records. The log of the staff's actions keeps only what they did and when, without saying about whom. The authority's report keeps only numbers, how many pressed on each day and in each area, without names. When an authority's program ends, everything kept in it is deleted.

The authority's staff sign in to the panel with an email address that was invited in advance, through a one-time link sent to it. For that their name and email address are kept, and every view of a parent's history, every export and every action of theirs is logged.

Who the data is shared with

Nothing is shared with anyone else, other than where the law requires it. Which provider carries a message follows the recipient's country code, and all calls go through Twilio. If another provider is added, this page will be updated before any message or call goes through it.

No mobile information will be shared with third parties or affiliates for marketing or promotional purposes. Contacts' phone numbers and their consent to receive text messages are never shared with anyone for such purposes, and never sold.

How long the data is kept

• Day records, the log of messages and calls, and the record of each round of calls are deleted automatically after 90 days.
• The rest of the family's details are kept for as long as the family is registered.
• In a local authority's program: follow-up records and the report's numbers are deleted after 30 days, and the log of its staff's actions after a year. Leaving the program, or being removed from it, deletes at once everything the authority kept about the parent, and so does deleting the family.
• A family whose app has not been in touch with the server for a year is deleted automatically, with all its data.
• The app's settings include deleting all data. That removes the family from the server and the data from the phone, and cannot be undone.

Security

• The app has no direct access to the database. Every operation goes through authenticated server functions.
• Data is encrypted in transit (HTTPS) and at rest, on Google Cloud infrastructure.
• SMS and call provider credentials are not in the app.
• A report on a call is accepted by the server only when Twilio has signed it.

Your rights

You may ask to see the data held about you, to correct it or to delete it. Deleting is also possible from the app's settings — see how to delete your data. To get in touch: arielosh8@gmail.com.

Children

The service is meant for adults. It is not directed at children under 16 and does not knowingly collect data from them.

Changes

Any change to this policy will be published on this page, with a new update date.