Privacy Policy

1. Who runs OtaKul

OtaKul is operated by an independent developer team. Our contact address for privacy matters is otakul82888@gmail.com. The project is open-source, and the code is available on GitHub.

2. What data we collect

• Account information — a username, an email address, and a password (stored only as a salted hash, never in plain text). You also choose an avatar and a display color.
• Content you post — reviews, episode ratings, replies, threads, community chat messages, war declarations, war entries, votes (likes/dislikes), and your anime list. This content is public by design: it is the community.
• Activity & gamification data — XP earned from likes, your rank (D to S+), badges, and guild memberships. This is shown on your public profile.
• Technical data — your IP address (used only for rate limiting and abuse prevention, and passed to our bot-protection provider for verification), the language preference cookie, and a session cookie that keeps you logged in.
• Email verification data — a temporary 6-digit code used to verify your email address during signup and password resets. Codes expire and are deleted.

We do not collect precise location, browsing history outside OtaKul, contacts, or payment information. There are no hidden trackers.

3. Why we collect it

• To run the service: accounts, sign-in, reviews, chat, threads, wars, and the XP/rank system.
• To verify email addresses so we can help you recover your account.
• To keep the community safe: rate limiting, bot protection, and blocking abusive behavior.
• To improve the site and, in the future, to display advertising that keeps the platform free (see Section 9).

4. Third-party services we use

• Cloudflare Turnstile — bot verification on the sign-up and login forms. Turnstile processes your IP address and browser signals to decide whether you are human. It is privacy-friendly and does not require you to solve puzzles. Cloudflare's privacy policy applies to that interaction.
• AniList, Kitsu and TVmaze — public APIs that provide anime titles, posters, banners, episode lists and thumbnails. No personal data is sent to them; requests are made from our servers.
• Email delivery (Gmail/Google APIs) — used to send verification and password-reset emails to the address you provided.
• Hosting provider (Render) — stores the servers and database that run OtaKul. Your data resides in their infrastructure.
• Font Awesome and Google Fonts — load icons and fonts; Google Fonts may log standard web requests when loading the font files.
• Charat (charat.me) — the anime art generator used for OtaKul's profile-picture assets. We do not send any personal data to Charat; avatars are static images hosted on our own servers. All credit for the profile-picture artwork goes to Charat and its creators.

None of these providers receive your OtaKul content. We never sell your personal data to anyone.

5. Cookies

• Session cookie (essential) — keeps you logged in. Without it you cannot use your account.
• Language preference — remembers whether you browse in English or Japanese.
• Cloudflare Turnstile — may set a short-lived cookie as part of its bot check on the sign-up/login pages.

We do not use advertising or analytics cookies today. If we add them later, we will update this policy first.

6. Who can see your data

Anything you post publicly (reviews, ratings, replies, threads, chat, war content) is visible to other users — that is the point of the site. Your email address is never shown publicly. Your XP, rank and badges are shown on your profile as part of the community experience.

7. How long we keep data

Your account and its content stay until you delete them. Public content you post (reviews, threads, chat) remains part of the community even if you delete your account, though we remove or anonymize your username attribution where technically feasible. Verification codes and pending registrations are deleted automatically after they expire. Server logs used for security are kept for a limited time and then erased.

8. Your rights

• Access — ask us what data we hold about you.
• Correction — update your profile, email, or avatar in your account settings.
• Deletion — delete your account and personal data.
• Portability — request a copy of your account data in a readable format.

To exercise any of these, email otakul82888@gmail.com and we will respond within 30 days. We honour these rights for users worldwide, including under the EU GDPR and similar laws.

9. Children's privacy

OtaKul is intended for users who are 13 years or older (or the minimum age required in your country). We do not knowingly collect data from younger children. If you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.

10. Monetization & ads

OtaKul is currently free with no advertising. To keep the site running we may, in the future, display non-intrusive ads or offer optional supporter perks. If that happens: ad providers may set their own cookies and process anonymized data to show relevant ads, and we will update this policy and tell you before enabling them. We will never sell your personal data.

11. Support & donations

OtaKul is free, and optional support from the community keeps it that way. We accept voluntary donations via PayPal (kanchanpresssindri@gmail.com) and UPI (9102700754@ptsbi, payable through GPay/PhonePe or your banking app).

• PayPal donations go through PayPal's own payment flow — we never see or store your card details, bank account, or PayPal password.
• UPI donations are initiated inside your own UPI app; only your UPI ID is visible to us in the payment receipt, and we never receive your credentials.
• Donations are voluntary and do not unlock any paid features or change how your data is handled. Support does not transfer any of your personal data to us beyond what the payment provider already processes.

If you ever have a question about a donation or prefer a different way to support the site, email us at otakul82888@gmail.com.

12. Security

Passwords are stored as salted hashes (never plain text), sessions are signed, bot protection is enabled on sign-up and login, and rate limits block brute-force attempts. No system is 100% secure, but we take reasonable measures to protect your data.

13. Changes to this policy

If we change how we handle data, we will update this page and note the new date at the top. Material changes will also be announced on the site.

14. Contact

Questions, concerns, or data requests? Email us at otakul82888@gmail.com or open an issue on our GitHub repository.