Shelest

Privacy Policy

1. Introduction

This Privacy Policy describes how Next Standard Limited (“Shelest,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) processes personal information that we collect through our digital or online properties, products, or services that link to this Privacy Policy (including, as applicable, our websites, applications, platforms, and social media pages), as well as our communications and other activities described in this Privacy Policy (collectively, the “Services”).

Your use of the Services is also governed by our Terms of Service, which incorporate this Privacy Policy and our Research Agreement by reference. Affirmatively accepting the Terms includes accepting the Research Agreement and consenting to the collection, use, and disclosure of Research Data described in that agreement.

2. Personal information we collect

Information you provide to us. Personal information you may provide to us through the Services or otherwise includes the following, depending on the Services and features you use:

  • Contact data, such as your first and last name, email address, mailing address, professional title and company name, and phone number.
  • Demographic data, such as your city, state, country of residence, postal code, and age.
  • Communications data based on our exchanges with you, including when you contact us through the Services, social media, or otherwise.
  • User-generated content and input data, such as photos, images, audio, videos (including face and mouth recordings), transcripts, corrections, comments, questions, messages, works of authorship, and other content or information that you generate, transmit, or otherwise make available on the Services, as well as associated metadata.
  • Context and derived data, including the application in use, surrounding text and other application content made available to the Services, outputs, labels, annotations, and features derived from audio, video, and other inputs. This may include biometric identifiers or biometric information where defined by applicable law.
  • Other data not specifically listed here, which we will use as described in this Privacy Policy or as otherwise disclosed at the time of collection.

Metadata includes information on how, when, where and by whom a piece of content was collected and how that content has been formatted or edited. Metadata also includes information that users can add or can have added to their content, such as keywords, geographical or location information, and other similar data.

Automatic data collection. We and our service providers may automatically log information about you, your computer or mobile device, and your interaction over time with the Services, such as:

  • Device data, such as your computer or mobile device’s operating system type and version, manufacturer and model, browser type, screen resolution, RAM and disk size, CPU usage, device type, IP address, unique identifiers, language settings, network information, and general location information such as city, state or geographic area.
  • Usage data, such as pages or screens you viewed, how long you spent on a page or screen, the website you visited before browsing to the Services, navigation paths between pages or screens, information about your activity on a page or screen, access times and duration of access, system logs, performance measurements, recording times and durations, and diagnostic data.

Third-party sources. We may combine personal information we receive from you with personal information falling within one of the categories identified above that we obtain from service providers that provide services on our behalf or help us operate the Services or our business.

3. How we use your personal information

We may use your personal information for the following purposes or as otherwise described at the time of collection:

Service delivery and operations. We may use your personal information to:

  • provide the Services;
  • enable security features of the Services;
  • communicate with you about the Services, including by sending Service-related announcements, updates, security alerts, and support and administrative messages; and
  • provide support for the Services, and respond to your requests, questions and feedback.

Service personalization, which may include using your personal information to understand your needs and interests; personalize your experience with the Services and our Service-related communications; and remember your selections and preferences as you navigate webpages.

Service improvement and analytics. We may use your personal information to analyze your usage of the Services, improve the Services, improve the rest of our business, help us understand user activity on the Services, including which pages are most and least visited and how visitors move around the Services, and to develop new products and services.

Research and model development. We may use Research Data to develop, train, evaluate, and improve our current and future AI models, products, and services and for other machine learning purposes, as described in the Research Agreement and subject to your consent choices.

Compliance and protection. We may use your personal information to:

  • comply with applicable laws, lawful requests, and legal process, such as to respond to subpoenas, investigations or requests from government authorities;
  • protect our, your or others’ rights, privacy, safety or property (including by making and defending legal claims);
  • audit our internal processes for compliance with legal and contractual requirements or our internal policies;
  • enforce the terms and conditions that govern the Services; and
  • prevent, identify, investigate and deter fraudulent, harmful, unauthorized, unethical or illegal activity, including cyberattacks and identity theft.

Further uses. In some cases, we may use your personal information for further uses, in which case we will ask for your consent to use your personal information for those further purposes if they are not compatible with the initial purpose for which information was collected.

4. How we share your personal information

We may share your personal information with the following parties, subject to the restrictions in this Privacy Policy and the Research Agreement:

  • Service providers. Third parties that provide services on our behalf or help us operate the Services or our business (such as hosting, databases and file storage, AI and speech processing, model training, usage analytics, crash reporting, and account sign-in). Depending on the Services and features you use, these providers include Vercel for hosting; Neon for databases and file storage; Modal for model training infrastructure; ElevenLabs and Typesafe for AI and speech processing; ClickHouse for usage analytics; Sentry for crash reporting; and Google for account sign-in. Providers processing Research Data on our behalf must maintain appropriate data protection safeguards and may not use that data for their own model training or other independent purposes.
  • Third parties designated by you. We may share your personal information with third parties where you have instructed us or provided your consent to do so.
  • Professional advisors. Professional advisors, such as lawyers, auditors, bankers and insurers, in the course of the professional services that they render to us.
  • Authorities and others. Law enforcement, government authorities, and private parties, as we believe in good faith to be necessary or appropriate for the Compliance and protection purposes described above.
  • Business transferees. We may disclose personal information in the context of actual or prospective business transactions (e.g., investments in Shelest, financing of Shelest, or the sale, transfer or merger of all or part of our business, assets or shares). We may also disclose your personal information to an acquirer, successor, or assignee of Shelest as part of any merger, acquisition, sale of assets, or similar transaction, and/or in the event of an insolvency, bankruptcy, or receivership in which personal information is transferred to one or more third parties as one of our business assets. Such a transfer does not expand the permitted uses of Research Data under the Research Agreement.

5. Research Data, biometrics, and no sale

We do not sell your personal information within the meaning of applicable state privacy laws. We do not sell, rent, or independently license Research Data, including recordings, transcripts, application context, and associated derived data. We do not process your personal information for targeted advertising purposes.

We do not use face or voice data to identify you, authenticate your identity, or match your identity against other datasets. These restrictions apply to our service providers when they process Research Data on our behalf.

References to personal information include information about individuals from which they are either directly identified or can be identified. Face and voice recordings and their derived features may remain personal information even when names and other direct identifiers have been removed.

We may create aggregated, de-identified and/or anonymized data from your personal information and other individuals whose personal information we collect. We may use this data for our lawful business purposes, including analyzing and improving the Services, and to train our AI models and for other machine learning purposes. We will not attempt to reidentify any such data. The no-sale and independent-licensing restrictions above continue to apply to Research Data after these transformations, as do your consent choices.

6. Retention

We generally retain personal information to fulfill the purposes for which we collected it, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements, establishing or defending legal claims, or for fraud prevention purposes. To determine the appropriate retention period for personal information, we may consider factors such as the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal information, the potential risk of harm from unauthorized use or disclosure of your personal information, the purposes for which we process your personal information and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, the Services and features you use, your requests, and the applicable legal requirements.

Subject to those legal requirements, we apply the following schedule:

  • Account data is kept while your account is active. After you ask us to delete your account, we ordinarily complete deletion of associated service data, including models trained for you, within 30 days. We may keep a minimal record of your agreement, withdrawal, or deletion request and any fraud or security record.
  • Research Data is kept until you withdraw consent or request deletion, or until the purpose for which we collected it has been satisfied, whichever comes first. In all cases, biometric identifiers and biometric information are destroyed no later than three years after your last interaction with Shelest, unless a shorter period applies.
  • Usage data is generally kept for no more than 24 months, and server logs for no more than 30 days.

When we no longer require the personal information we have collected about you, we will delete or anonymize it, or isolate it from further processing where retention is required by law. Research Data is also subject to the retention and destruction provisions of the Research Agreement, including any shorter applicable legal deadline.

Backup and disaster-recovery copies may remain for up to 7 days after deletion until overwritten or deleted in the ordinary backup cycle. During that period, we isolate them from further business processing, including model training, except as needed for disaster recovery, security, or legal compliance. If restored, they remain subject to applicable deletion requests and processing restrictions. Any retained copies remain subject to applicable legal deletion deadlines.

7. Cookies and similar technologies

The Services may use cookies, web beacons, pixels, and similar tracking technologies to collect information about your use of the Services. Cookies are small data files that are placed on your computer or mobile device when you visit a website. Cookies serve different purposes, like helping us understand how a site is being used, letting you navigate between pages efficiently, remembering your preferences, and generally improving your browsing experience.

Most browsers let you remove or reject cookies. To do this, follow the instructions in your browser settings. Many browsers accept cookies by default until you change your settings. Please note that if you set your browser to disable cookies, the Services may not work properly.

8. Security and international transfers

We employ technical, organizational and physical safeguards designed to protect the personal information we collect. However, security risk is inherent in all internet and information technologies and we cannot guarantee the security of your personal information.

We may use service providers that operate in other countries. Your personal information may be transferred to locations where privacy laws may not be as protective as those in your state, province, or country. Where required by applicable law, we use appropriate safeguards for these transfers, such as standard-form contracts approved by relevant authorities for this purpose.

9. Your choices and privacy rights

Deletion requests. You can request deletion of your personal information by emailing support+privacy@shelest.app. We handle requests subject to applicable law and the retention and destruction provisions of this Privacy Policy and the Research Agreement.

Declining to provide information. We need to collect personal information to provide certain services. If you do not provide the information we identify as required or mandatory, we may not be able to provide those services, subject to applicable law.

Withdrawal of consent. When we use your personal information based on your consent, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time by emailing support+privacy@shelest.app. The Research Agreement describes withdrawal in relation to Research Data.

State privacy rights. This section applies to residents of U.S. states to the extent they have privacy laws applicable to us that grant their residents the rights described below. These laws may provide residents with some or all of the rights listed below. However, these rights are not absolute and some state privacy laws do not provide these rights to their residents. Therefore, we may decline your request in certain cases as permitted by law.

  • Information. You can request information about the categories of personal information we have collected, their sources, the business or commercial purposes for collecting them, and the categories of third parties to whom we disclosed personal information.
  • Access. You can request a copy of the personal information that we have collected about you.
  • Correction. You can ask us to correct inaccurate personal information that we have collected about you.
  • Deletion. You can ask us to delete the personal information that we have collected from you.
  • Appeal. You can appeal our denial of any request validly submitted.
  • Nondiscrimination. You are entitled to exercise these rights free from discrimination as prohibited by applicable state privacy laws.

European privacy rights. If you are located in the European Economic Area or United Kingdom and applicable data protection laws apply to our processing, you may also ask us to restrict the processing of your personal information; object to processing based on legitimate interests; and transfer a machine-readable copy of your personal information to you or a third party of your choice. If you are not satisfied with our response to a request you make, or how we process your personal information, you can make a complaint to the data protection regulator in your habitual place of residence.

Requests and authorized agents. We may request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and process your request. Under some state privacy laws, you may enable an authorized agent to make a request on your behalf. However, we may need to verify your authorized agent’s identity and authority to act on your behalf.

10. Other sites and services

The Services may contain links to websites, applications, and other online services operated by third parties. In addition, our content may be integrated into web pages or other online services that are not associated with us. These links and integrations are not an endorsement of, or representation that we are affiliated with, any third party. We do not control websites, applications or online services operated by third parties, and we are not responsible for their actions. We encourage you to read the privacy policies of the other websites, applications and online services you use.

11. Children

The Services are not intended for use by anyone under 18 years of age. If you are a parent or guardian of a child from whom you believe we have collected personal information in a manner prohibited by law, please contact us. If we learn that we have collected personal information through the Services from a child without the consent of the child’s parent or guardian as required by law, we will comply with applicable legal requirements to delete the information.

12. How to contact us

If you have questions about our practices or if you would like to exercise any privacy related right that may be available to you, please contact us at support+privacy@shelest.app.

Next Standard Limited is the controller in respect of the processing of your personal information covered by this Privacy Policy for purposes of applicable data protection laws.

13. Changes to this Privacy Policy

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time. If we make material changes to this Privacy Policy, we will notify you by updating the date of this Privacy Policy and posting it on the Services or other appropriate means. Any modifications to this Privacy Policy will be effective upon our posting the modified version (or as otherwise indicated at the time of posting).

We will ask for your consent to use your personal information for further purposes if they are not compatible with the initial purpose for which information was collected.