Privacy Policy

1. Information We Collect

When you create an account, we collect your email address, username, and password (stored as a bcrypt hash). When you use the platform, we collect the content you create (reviews, journal entries, dispute messages) and your interactions (votes, favorites, reminders).

2. How We Use Your Information

• To provide and maintain the Pepper Scale platform
• To display your public reviews and contributions
• To compute strain rankings, vendor trust scores, and recommendations
• To send transactional emails (verification, password reset, drop reminders)
• To enforce community guidelines and prevent abuse

3. Information Sharing

We do not sell your personal information. Public content (reviews, ratings, usernames) is visible to all visitors. Private content (journal entries marked private, email addresses) is never shared publicly. We may share anonymized, aggregate data for research purposes.

4. Data Storage & Security

Your data is stored on servers hosted by Vercel and Neon (PostgreSQL). Passwords are hashed with bcrypt. File uploads are handled by Uploadthing. We use HTTPS for all connections and follow industry-standard security practices.

5. Cookies & Tracking

We use essential cookies for authentication sessions. We do not use third-party tracking or advertising cookies. We use Upstash Redis for rate limiting, which may store anonymized IP-based counters.

6. Your Rights

You can update or delete your account at any time from your settings page. Upon account deletion, your personal data is removed. Public reviews may be anonymized rather than deleted to preserve community data integrity.

7. Age Requirement

You must be at least 21 years old to use Pepper Scale. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone under 21.

8. Changes

We may update this policy from time to time. We will notify registered users of significant changes via email.

9. Contact

Questions about this policy? Reach out at privacy@pepperscale.app.