Terms & Privacy Policy
Watfoe (“we,” “us,” or “our”) provides the Watfoe messaging services and related websites, apps, and features (“Services”) to users worldwide.
Terms of Service
Acceptance of terms
By accessing or using our Services, you agree to these Terms.
Registration
You must provide accurate information when creating an account. You can sign up with either your email address or phone number. We require your first name, and you may optionally add a last name, profile photo, and username. We also ask for your date of birth to confirm that you meet the minimum age required to register for our Services in your country or territory. If your phone number or email changes, you are responsible for updating it in your account settings.
Address book
You can grant us permission, if permitted by applicable laws, to access the phone numbers and emails in your mobile address book on a regular basis, including those of both the users of our Services and your other contacts. Learn more about our contact upload feature here.
Age
You must be at least 13 years old, or the minimum age required in your country or territory, to use our Services. If you are not old enough to agree to these Terms in your country or territory, your parent or guardian must agree on your behalf.
Devices and software
You are responsible for the devices, operating systems, and data connections needed to access our Services. You consent to receive and install updates. You also consent to our sending you notifications via our Services from time to time, as necessary to provide our Services to you.
Fees and taxes
You are responsible for carrier data plans, internet charges, and any other fees or taxes associated with your use of our Services.
User content
You are responsible for the content you create, send, or share, and for ensuring you have the rights to do so. We may remove content or take account action when required by law or when content violates these Terms.
Acceptable use
You must use our Services in accordance with these Terms and any posted policies. If you violate them, we may take action with respect to your account, including disabling or suspending access, and you agree not to create another account without our permission.
Legal and acceptable use
Use our Services only for lawful, authorized, and acceptable purposes. You may not use our Services to violate the rights of others (including privacy, publicity, or intellectual property rights), to harass or threaten, to promote violence, hatred, or exploitation (including of children), to publish false or misleading statements, to impersonate others, or to send illegal or impermissible communications (including bulk or automated messaging). Our Services are for personal use unless we expressly authorize other uses.
Harm to Watfoe or our users
You may not reverse engineer, decompile, or attempt to extract code from our Services; send malware or harmful code; gain or attempt unauthorized access; disrupt the security or availability of our Services; create accounts through automated means; scrape or collect user information in unauthorized ways; sell, resell, or charge for our Services without permission; or build or distribute unauthorized clients, APIs, or services that mimic or depend on our Services.
Reporting tools
Do not misuse reporting, safety, or appeals channels, including by submitting fraudulent or groundless reports.
Keep your account secure
You are responsible for keeping your device and account secure and must notify us promptly of any unauthorized use or security breach.
Third-party services
Our Services may allow you to access or interact with third-party websites, apps, or services, such as optional backup providers. Those third-party services are governed by their own terms and privacy policies, and we are not responsible for their practices.
Licenses and ownership
You keep ownership of your content. We own the trademarks, logos, and intellectual property associated with our Services.
Your license to Watfoe
To operate and provide our Services, you grant Watfoe a limited, non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host, store, transmit, display, and process your content solely to provide our Services. This license ends when your content is deleted from our systems, except where continued storage is required by law or for legitimate safety or security purposes.
Watfoe’s license to you
We grant you a limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use our Services in accordance with these Terms.
Termination
You may stop using our Services or delete your account at any time. We may suspend or terminate access to our Services if you violate these Terms, if required by law, or if needed to protect our users or our Services. We will provide notice when reasonable, but may act without notice when necessary. You can contact us through the Help Center to appeal a suspension or termination.
Disclaimers
YOU USE OUR SERVICES AT YOUR OWN RISK AND SUBJECT TO THE FOLLOWING DISCLAIMERS. WE PROVIDE OUR SERVICES ON AN “AS IS” BASIS WITHOUT ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND FREEDOM FROM COMPUTER VIRUS OR OTHER HARMFUL CODE. WE DO NOT WARRANT THAT ANY INFORMATION WE PROVIDE IS ACCURATE, COMPLETE, OR USEFUL, THAT OUR SERVICES WILL BE OPERATIONAL, ERROR-FREE, SECURE, OR SAFE, OR THAT OUR SERVICES WILL FUNCTION WITHOUT DISRUPTIONS, DELAYS, OR IMPERFECTIONS. WE DO NOT CONTROL, AND ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR, CONTROLLING HOW OR WHEN OUR USERS USE OUR SERVICES. WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ACTIONS OR INFORMATION (INCLUDING CONTENT) OF OUR USERS OR OTHER THIRD PARTIES. YOU RELEASE WATFOE, ITS AFFILIATES, AND THEIR DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, PARTNERS, AND AGENTS FROM ANY CLAIM, COMPLAINT, CAUSE OF ACTION, CONTROVERSY, OR DISPUTE, AND DAMAGES, KNOWN AND UNKNOWN, RELATING TO OR ARISING OUT OF ANY SUCH CLAIM YOU HAVE AGAINST ANY THIRD PARTIES.
Limitation of liability
To the fullest extent permitted by law, Watfoe and its affiliates will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or any loss of profits, revenue, data, or goodwill. Our total liability for any claim arising out of or relating to our Services will not exceed the amount you paid to use our Services in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim.
Indemnification
To the fullest extent permitted by law, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless Watfoe, its affiliates, and personnel from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, losses, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or related to your use of our Services, your content, your violation of these Terms, or your violation of any law or the rights of a third party. You agree to cooperate with us in the defense of any such claim.
Changes to these terms
We may update these Terms from time to time. If we make material changes, we will notify you through our Services or by other reasonable means before the changes take effect. Your continued use of our Services after the effective date means you accept the updated Terms.
Privacy Policy
We collect and receive certain information to operate, provide, maintain, improve, and support our Services. The information we collect depends on how you use our Services. Some information is required to create and use an account, and without it we can’t provide our Services. Other information is optional and only collected if you choose to use specific features. If you don’t provide the information needed for a feature, you won’t be able to use that feature. You can manage permissions in your device settings.
Information you provide
You provide information when you create an account and use features within our Services. Some information is required to use our Services, while other information is optional.
Your account information
You must provide your email address or phone number and first name to create an account. You may optionally add a last name, username, and profile photo. We also ask for your date of birth to confirm that you meet the minimum age required to register for our Services in your country or territory. Depending on your visibility settings (Everyone, Contacts, Selected contacts, or Nobody), we show your first name or username, profile picture, and about to other users on Watfoe.
Your messages
We do not access or read the content of your messages. Messages are end-to-end encrypted by default and stored on your devices.
Undelivered messages. If a message cannot be delivered immediately (for example, if the recipient is offline), it is kept in encrypted form on our servers for up to 30 days as we try to deliver it. If a message is still undelivered after 30 days, it is automatically deleted from our servers.
Media delivery. Media is temporarily stored in encrypted form with third-party cloud storage providers to facilitate delivery and is deleted after a maximum of 30 days.
Your connections
You can grant us permission, if permitted by applicable laws, to access the phone numbers and emails in your mobile address book on a regular basis, including those of both the users of our Services and your other contacts. You can create, join, or get added to groups depending on your preferences; group names, photos, descriptions, and membership are associated with your account.
Customer support
When you contact us for support or otherwise communicate with us, you may provide information related to your use of our Services, including copies of your messages, device details, and how to contact you (such as an email address).
Automatically collected information
We automatically collect certain information to keep our Services working, secure, and reliable.
Usage and log information
We collect service-related diagnostic and performance information, such as crash logs, error reports, and the date and time you created your account.
Device and connection information
We collect information about your device and connection, including your device model, operating system, app version, IP address, language, time zone, network or carrier, and device identifiers. We do not receive your battery level or signal strength.
Location information
If you forward your location within a message, we collect precise location information from your device for that feature. We also derive your country from your IP address to help apply legal requirements (such as minimum age rules) and to honor profile access feature controls by country or continent, or restrictions to specific IP addresses.
Cookies
We use essential cookies for our Services to keep you signed in, remember preferences, and maintain security.
Push notifications
We collect push notification tokens and related device identifiers to deliver notifications from our Services.
How we use information
We use information to provide and maintain our Services, keep them secure, and support you.
Provide and operate
To create and manage accounts, deliver messages, enable features you choose to use, and keep our Services running reliably.
Safety and security
To prevent spam, abuse, fraud, and other harmful activity; to protect users and our Services; and to comply with applicable laws, legal processes, or enforceable governmental requests.
Support
To respond to support requests, investigate issues, and communicate with you about your account, service messages, or product updates.
Preferences and settings
To remember your settings, language, and other choices so our Services work the way you prefer.
Sharing and disclosure
We share information only as needed to run our Services or as described below.
Service providers
We share information with vendors who help us operate our Services, such as hosting providers, third-party cloud storage providers for media delivery, email or SMS services, customer support tools, and push notification providers.
Other users
Information you share with others is visible to those recipients and group members, including your profile details (such as profile picture and about) and presence information (such as online and typing status). Contact discovery by email or phone, and who can add you to groups without your approval, can be controlled in your settings.
Legal and safety reasons
We may share information to comply with applicable laws, legal processes, or enforceable governmental requests, or to protect the rights, safety, and security of our users, our Services, and the public. When required, we may provide account identifiers (such as your email address or phone number) and IP address. MESSAGE CONTENT IS END-TO-END ENCRYPTED AND NOT ACCESSIBLE.
Business transfers
If we are involved in a merger, acquisition, restructuring, or sale of assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction, subject to appropriate safeguards.
Data retention
We keep information only for as long as needed to provide our Services, meet legal obligations, and protect safety.
Account information
We retain account information while your account is active. If you delete your account, we delete or de-identify your account information within 7 days, unless a longer retention period is required by law.
Messages and media
We do not retain message content on our servers in the ordinary course. Undelivered messages and media are handled as described above in “Your messages.”
Session and IP records
We store IP addresses associated with login session records. Sessions are designed to reduce frequent logins and update as network conditions change. We retain session and IP records while a session remains active and for a limited period thereafter for security.
Support communications
Support communications are retained for up to 90 days after resolution so we can follow up and improve support quality.
Push notifications
Push notification tokens are retained while your account is active and removed when you log out or uninstall the app.
Your choices
You can control how information is used and shared within our Services.
Account and profile
You can update your profile information at any time and delete your account if you choose.
Privacy controls
You can control who sees your profile (Everyone, Contacts, Selected contacts, or Nobody), your online and typing indicators, read receipts, and who can add you to groups. You can also block or report other users, and turn off contact discovery.
Notifications
You can manage in-app and push notification preferences from your device settings or within the app.
Device permissions
You can grant or revoke permissions such as contacts, camera, microphone, and location in your device settings.
Children’s privacy
Our Services are not directed to children under 13 years old. In some countries or territories, the minimum age to use our Services may be higher, and that local minimum applies.
Underage accounts
If we learn that a user is under the applicable minimum age, or that their age was provided inaccurately, we may suspend or delete the account for violation of our Terms.
Parent or guardian contact
Parents or guardians who believe a child has provided personal information should contact us so we can review and take appropriate action.
International transfers
We operate globally, so your information may be processed in countries other than where you live and where data protection laws may differ. When we transfer personal information, we take steps to protect it consistent with applicable legal requirements.
Changes to this policy
Please review our Privacy Policy from time to time. We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make material changes, we will notify you through our Services or by other reasonable means before the changes take effect. Your continued use of our Services after the effective date means you accept the updated policy.
Contact
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or our data practices, please contact us through our Help Center.