Privacy
Safa is built to know as little about you as it can and still work. This page says what it collects, why, who else handles it, and how to take it with you or delete it.
What we never do
- Sell your data
- Track you for ads
- Expose your precise location
- Make your worship public
What stays on your phone
These never reach our servers. There is no event for them; we can't log what we never collect.
- Your prayer times and alerts. They're worked out on your phone, and the alerts are scheduled there, so no server learns when you pray.
- Your worship. If you turn on personal worship tracking (it starts off), its marks stay on this phone: never synced, never scored, never seen.
- Your zakat figures. What you own and owe is worked out on the phone and never sent.
- Your precise location. Safa never receives it; see below.
- Your recent searches, your du'a favorites, your prayer settings and the places you keep prayer times for.
What we collect
| What | Why |
|---|---|
| Your account: from Apple or Google, an identifier for your sign-in, your first name and the email address they share with us (with Apple, this can be a private relay address). The city you choose. | To sign you in, greet you, keep your account if you use both Apple and Google, and reach you about your account. Your email is never shown to anyone. |
| What you add, if you choose: a profile photo, and your gender. | Your gender is used only to open sisters-only spaces, and is never shown anywhere. |
| What you contribute: the facts you confirm or correct, places you add, reviews, tips, photos, posts and answers, events you RSVP to, masjids you follow, places you save. | So your neighbors can see it, and so your profile can show what you've done for them. Saves are private. |
| Photos you upload. | We remove the location and every other hidden detail from each photo before it's stored. |
| Your approximate location, only while you look for places near you. | Sent with that request so we can answer it, then forgotten: never stored and never tied to your account. |
| A notification token from your phone, if you allow notifications from your account (replies, verification outcomes, event reminders). | To deliver them. Prayer alerts don't use it; they're scheduled on your phone. |
| Counts of how often places are viewed, without linking a view to you. | So a contributor can see how many people their work helped. |
| Your internet address, for a minute. | To stop abuse, such as too many requests at once. It isn't stored. |
| A crash log, only if you attach it to a problem you report. It starts off. | To fix what went wrong. |
Your location
Safa asks for your location only while you use the app, and you can say no: everything still works with a city instead. Your precise location never reaches Safa. When you look for places near you, the app sends an approximate position with that request and nothing else. To name your neighborhood, your phone asks Apple's maps service, under Apple's own privacy policy. Anything public, such as who confirmed a time, shows a neighborhood or a city at most, never more precise.
What other people see
Your first name and what you contribute, under the visibility you choose in Settings › Privacy: everyone, signed-in neighbors only, or hidden, where you appear as “a neighbor” everywhere and your contributions still count. Whatever you pick, there's no last-seen, no activity trail and no saves shown. Ever.
Who else handles your data
We share your data with no one to sell it or to advertise. These services run parts of Safa for us, handle only what that part needs, and are bound to protect it at least as well as this page does:
| Service | What it does for Safa |
|---|---|
| Render | Runs our servers and database, in the United States. |
| Cloudflare | Carries traffic to our servers and stores photos and backups. |
| Sentry | Records errors on our servers so we can fix them. |
| Apple | Sign in with Apple, notification delivery, and place names from Apple's maps service. |
| Sign in with Google. |
We'd disclose data to authorities only when the law requires it, and we'd tell you unless the law forbids it.
How long we keep it
- Your account and what you contribute, for as long as you keep your account.
- A data export, for 7 days after it's ready.
- Backups of our database, for 30 days.
Your choices
These are in Settings › Privacy, for everyone, wherever you live:
- See what we store: every stored field, and whether it lives on your phone or is synced.
- Download your data, ready within a day.
- Pause your account: your profile, posts, reviews and answers hide from everyone; nothing is deleted, and signing back in brings them back.
- Delete your account: your profile, reviews, tips, photos, posts, saves and drafts are deleted, everywhere, for good. Facts the community verified together, such as an iqamah time or a place you added, stay, and their author becomes “a former member”. You have 30 days to change your mind; signing back in cancels it. After that, deleted data leaves our backups within 30 days.
- Location and notifications: turn them off at any time in your iPhone's Settings.
If you can't use the app, write to support@safa.community and we'll do any of these for you.
Children
Safa isn't meant for children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect their data. If you think a child has an account, write to us and we'll delete it.
Changes
If this page changes in a way that matters, we tell you in the app before it takes effect. Policy and pledge notices are always on.
Questions
Write to support@safa.community.