Who we are

TookBooks™ helps readers discover YA books, keep shelves, publish optional public profiles, and participate in moderation-aware reviews and circles.

This policy explains what data we process, why we process it, and the choices available to you.

What we collect

Account details: email, username, hashed password, birth year where required for eligibility, optional bio, optional profile photo URL.

Reading & social graph: shelves, ratings, reviews, highlights, quotes, follows, invitations, moderation flags where applicable.

Safety & abuse prevention: moderation events, appeals, administrator notes needed to investigate reports.

Technical identifiers: HTTP session cookie, rate-limit tokens, timestamps, coarse IP-derived signals if your host logs them, browser errors if you enable telemetry (e.g., Sentry).

Cookies & storage

We rely on strictly necessary cookies (and similar mechanisms) so you remain signed in and so we can mitigate abuse.

We do not use advertising trackers in the reference deployment of this app.

Analytics & measurement

Server logs may include coarse IP-derived signals if your reverse proxy attaches them—see hosting docs. TookBooks™ does not load ad-tech or social pixels by default; describe any Plausible, Umami, GA4, or similar tools in ANALYTICS_DISCLOSURE when you enable them.

Why we use data

Provide and secure the service, authenticate you, show shelves and reviews you choose to share, power search, and display community activity you opt into.

Detect spam, harassment, and policy violations; respond to safety reports; improve reliability and investigate incidents.

Children & teens

TookBooks™ is intended for users who meet the minimum age stated in the Terms (13+). We do not knowingly collect data from children under that threshold without verifiable parental consent.

Parents needing removal or minors’ data workflows should route through CONTACT_EMAIL until PARENTAL_RIGHTS_EMAIL is staffed.

Retention

We keep data only as long as needed to operate the service, satisfy legal obligations, or resolve disputes. Backups may persist for a limited period consistent with how your host stores snapshots.

Your controls

Update profile fields, adjust privacy toggles, delete your own reviews when policy allows, block other users, and request account help through the contact channel above.

International transfers

If you access TookBooks™ from outside the region where servers run, your data may be processed there. Use the service only if you are comfortable with that processing.

Third parties

Book metadata may come from Open Library. Search indexes may be hosted on Meilisearch. Hosting, TLS termination, database, and observability providers depend on your deployment.

Contact

For privacy questions, use the Contact page (set CONTACT_EMAIL so we can reply from production).