Privacy policy
Last updated October 2026. This is placeholder text written by the team, not yet reviewed by a lawyer. It states our real intent but is not final legal language.
Sceniq is in development
Sceniq is still being built and is not live yet. Once development is finished, Sceniq will be operated by a different company, and these pages will name it before it takes over.
Controller
Sceniq is in development and not live yet. During development, Saftladen GmbH, which develops the platform, is the controller for personal data processed on it.
Once development is finished, a different company will operate Sceniq and become the controller. This policy will name that company before any personal data passes to it. Reach us at privacy@sceniq.earth.
What we collect
Account data: your email address, name and password (stored as a salted hash, never in plain text). Purchase records: which guides you bought, when, and for how much, because we have to fulfil and account for them. Product usage: favorites, visited marks and basic guide-open events that make the product work and tell creators how their guides perform in aggregate.
Payments
Payments are processed by Stripe. Your card number never touches our servers; we receive a confirmation of payment, the amount, and the email you used at checkout. Stripe processes your data under its own privacy terms.
Photos from Unsplash
Creators can add photos from Unsplash to their guides. Unsplash's rules require these photos to load from Unsplash's servers, not ours. When you view such a photo, in a guide on the web or in the app, your browser or the app requests it from Unsplash Inc. in the United States. Unsplash receives your IP address and the technical details that come with every image request, such as your browser type, and counts the view for the photographer. We send Unsplash no account data or anything else about you. When a creator adds an Unsplash photo, our server tells Unsplash that the photo was downloaded; that message holds no personal data.
The legal basis is our legitimate interest in showing the photos creators choose, with the credit their photographers are owed. Unsplash processes this data under its own privacy policy.
For creators: finding photos
In the studio, Find photos searches Unsplash and Wikimedia Commons. Our server sends them the search text and, for photos near a spot's pin, the spot's coordinates, but not who you are. The photo previews load in your browser straight from Unsplash and from the Wikimedia Foundation, both in the United States, which receive your IP address. A Wikimedia Commons photo you add is copied to our storage, so people viewing your guide never load it from Wikimedia. The Wikimedia Foundation's privacy policy applies to the previews.
For creators: Instagram
Creators can connect an Instagram professional account to bring their own photos into their guides. We store the account's Instagram ID and username and an access token, encrypted, that lets us read the account's profile and posts and nothing else: we cannot post, comment or send messages. We read your posts only when you open your photos in the studio. A photo you import is copied into your guide together with the link to its post, and it stays there until you delete it.
We delete the stored ID, username and token when you disconnect in the studio, when you connect a different account, or when you remove Sceniq in Instagram's settings (Apps and websites) or ask Meta to delete your data, which tells us to do the same. The legal basis is your request to use the connection. Meta processes your Instagram data under its own privacy policy.
Email list
You can sign up for Sceniq emails, for example on the app page. We store your email address, where and when you signed up, and when you confirmed it. We use it to send you emails about Sceniq, such as the one when the app is out. The legal basis is your consent.
After you sign up, we send a link to confirm the address. If nobody confirms it within 7 days, we delete it. Every email we send to the list has an unsubscribe link, and you can also write to privacy@sceniq.earth. When you unsubscribe, we delete your address. We send these emails through our email provider Resend, from its EU region.
What we do not do
We do not sell personal data. We do not run third-party advertising trackers on the platform. Creators see aggregated statistics about their guides, not your private activity.
Retention
Account and purchase records are kept while your account exists and afterwards only as long as commercial and tax law requires. Email list addresses are kept until you unsubscribe, or 7 days if nobody confirms them. An Instagram connection is kept until it is deleted as described above.
Your rights
Under the GDPR you can request access to, correction of, or deletion of your personal data, ask for a portable copy, and object to certain processing. Write to privacy@sceniq.earth and we will respond. You also have the right to complain to a supervisory authority.