TEMPLATE — pending counsel review. This privacy policy is a working draft and must be reviewed by counsel before public launch. Nothing on this page is legal advice or a final commitment from KinStation.

Privacy Policy

Last updated: July 8, 2026 · Effective only after counsel review

KinStation (“KinStation,” “we,” “us”) is a pet-information platform operated by Nexude LLC, a New Jersey limited liability company (NJ Entity ID 0451490388) (“Nexude”). It provides a pet & plant encyclopedia covering common to exotic species, per-pet medical history, a behavioral AI assistant, a community Q&A, and related tools across the website, the mobile app, and any KinStation app. This policy describes what information we collect, how we use it, who we share it with, and what choices you have. KinStation is currently available to users in the United States only.

Information we collect

We collect the minimum we need to run the service. The categories below describe everything we currently touch:

Account information. You can create a KinStation account directly with your email address, a display name, and a password (which we store only as a salted hash — we never see it in plain text), or sign in with Nexude single sign-on, in which case we receive your email, Nexude user identifier, and display name from Nexude.
Community posts.If you post in the community Q&A, we store your questions, replies, the topics you tag, and any reports you file. Posts enter a moderation queue and do not appear publicly until approved.
Tank journals (build threads). If you publish a journal, its title, summary, dated entries, and any image URLs you link are public and shown on your public profile under your display name. Journals publish immediately (no pre-review) but can be hidden or removed if they break our rules.
Water-parameter tracker readings. If you use the water-parameter tracker at /tools/water-params, we store each dated reading you log — including temperature, pH, salinity, alkalinity, calcium, magnesium, nitrate, phosphate, ammonia, and nitrite — associated with your account. These readings are private to your account; they are never shown publicly, never shown on your public profile, and are not shared with other users.
Habitat Lab data. If you use the Habitat Lab, we store the habitat profiles you create (habitat type, subtype, name, volume, and settings), your parameter readings and any test-kit notes, your schedules, maintenance events, and inhabitant records. All of this is private to your account unless you explicitly opt in to sharing recent readings on a public journal you link (that setting is off by default and can be turned off at any time).
Habitat photos.Photos you add to a habitat’s timeline are either uploaded to a private S3 bucket and served via short-lived signed URLs, or stored as an external image URL you supply. They are private to your account.
Scan-a-reading photos.If you use “Scan test results” to fill a reading from a photo, that image is sent to our AI vision provider (Anthropic’s Claude API) to read the values, then discarded — we do not store the scan image, and the extracted numbers only pre-fill the form for you to review before you choose to save them. Nothing is logged automatically. Anthropic does not train on API content.
Camera stream URLs. If you attach a live-stream link to a habitat, we store the URL so your own pages can display it. Camera URLs are never published to other members. YouTube and Twitch embeds load client-side from those platforms and are subject to their privacy policies; other links open externally.
Care contacts.If you use the care-contacts rolodex, we store the details you enter about professionals you work with — names, phone numbers, email addresses, office addresses, and websites of vets, aquarists, breeders, stores, sitters, groomers, or trainers. Care contacts are private to your accountand never published. You are responsible for having the right to store a third party’s details.
Boards. When you create a board, we store its title, description, cover-image URL, the list of saved items it contains, and its visibility setting. Private boards are visible only to you and are never shown on your public profile or in the Boards directory. Public boards— title, description, item list, and cover image — are visible to anyone at the board’s URL, on your public profile if it is public, and in the KinStation Boards directory. Switching a board to private removes it from public view immediately.
Engagement & saves. When you like a post or save (bookmark) a species, morph, plant, or thread, we store that association with your account so we can show your saved items and display like counts. You can remove a like or save at any time by tapping it again.
Pet interests.If you pick pet categories you’re interested in during onboarding or in settings, we store that list to tailor what we show you. You can change or clear it at any time in account settings.
Your collection.When you mark a species or morph as one you keep (“I keep this”), we store that association so you can track your collection and its completion. If you make your profile public (it is off by default), the species in your collection are shown on your public profile.
Follows. When you follow a species or a community forum, we store that preference so we can build your personalized feed. Your follows are not shown on your public profile.
Public profile. Public profiles are off by default. If you turn yours on in settings, your display name, the species in your collection, the community threads you have published, and a reputation score and achievement badges derived from that activity become visible to anyone at your profile URL. You can turn it back off at any time to make your profile private again.
Launch-update emails.If you ask us to email you launch updates — for example, from a prompt shown when you try to save something while signed out — we store your email address for that purpose. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Notifications.We create in-app notifications to tell you about activity relevant to you — for example, when someone replies to a community thread you started. If you keep the reply-notification email setting on, we also email you about them. We may also send a weekly digest email summarizing new activity in the species and forums you follow. You can turn reply-notification emails and the weekly digest off independently in account settings at any time.
Suspensions. If your account is rate-limited or suspended for violating our rules, we keep a record of that for safety and abuse-prevention purposes.
Vaccine-certificate uploads (OCR).If you upload a photo or PDF of a vaccination certificate, we send the image to Amazon Textract to extract candidate fields for your review before anything is saved to your pet’s record. The image is stored in access-restricted storage tied to your account.
Shared records.If you mint a share link for a pet’s medical history, we record that the link exists, what it scopes access to, and when it is used, so you can revoke it.
Pet records you create.If you add pets, we store what you enter — names, species, photos you upload, weights, vaccination dates, allergies, medications, visit notes, and any free-text notes attached to a pet’s record.
Reviewer credentials. If you apply to volunteer as a veterinary reviewer, we collect your full name, license number, issuing US state board, and any documents you upload to verify your license. We use these only to verify you and to display your credentials next to content you sign off on.
Provider listing details. If you list a clinic or sitting service, we store your business name, address, phone, web and social URLs, species you serve, hours, and any photos or descriptions you submit. Listings are public once approved.
Behavioral AI conversations.When you ask the behavioral AI a question, we store the conversation so you can return to it. We may also retain anonymized portions to improve the model’s safety guardrails.
Operational & security logs.Our servers record IP address, user agent, timestamps, and request paths for security, debugging, and abuse prevention — including rate limiting, detecting automated/bot activity, monitoring failed login attempts (to temporarily lock an account after repeated failures), and blocking access from IP addresses or networks we associate with abuse or ban-evasion. Logs are retained for a limited operational window. Our bot-detection uses hidden form fields and submission-timing checks that collect no additional personal data beyond what you already submit.
Automated safety scanning of public posts.When you publish a public post — a community thread or reply, a tank or build journal or entry, a public habitat comment, a public board comment, or a group name or description — we process its text through an automated safety classifier that looks for dangerous or illegal content. When a post is flagged, we retain a snapshot of the content, a one-way hash of it, and the detected safety categories in a restricted moderation logthat is access-controlled to administrators, so a human can review it and so the same content an administrator clears as a false positive is not flagged and removed again. This data is used only for safety review and to reduce false positives over time — it is never used for advertising, profiling, or building an interest profile about you. We do not scan private messages (KinStation has no private-messaging feature).
Product & usage events.To understand how the product is used and improve onboarding, we record a small set of in-product events tied to your account — for example, when you finish the first-time setup steps (“activation”). We use these in aggregate to measure and improve the experience.
Referrals.If you use the invite (“Invite a Keeper”) program, we store your personal referral code and, when someone creates an account through your invite link, a record linking that account to you so we can credit your reward. If you signed up through someone else’s invite link, we store that you were referred by them. See the referral terms in our Terms of Service.
Pet & plant cards.When you create a card for a pet or plant, we store the card’s hero image (an upload or a linked image URL), the name and any nickname you give it, the short care summary text, the species or plant it is linked to, its rarity/conservation display, and any links you add to that pet’s own records, reminders, or trackers. A card’s visibility follows your profile and collection settings: if your profile is private (the default), your cards and collection are visible only to you; if you make your profile public, the species in your collection are shown as described in the Public profile section. The underlying medical records a card links to remain private to your account and are never made public by a card.
Per-pet notifications.We create per-pet and per-plant notifications — for example, a care reminder coming due or activity on a card — and surface them as an in-app “corner” notification badge, scoped to the specific pet or plant. If you have the relevant email or push notifications enabled, we also send them there. Each notification type can be turned off independently in account settings, and care reminders carry a one-click opt-out, consistent with our existing reminder settings.
Biome Dex usage. Browsing the Biome Dex does not create personal records about you beyond the general operational logs and aggregate product/usage events described elsewhere in this policy.
Group membership & visibility.When you create or join a group, we store your membership, your role (owner, moderator, or member), and the content you post in the group. Whether your membership is visible to others depends on the group’s privacy setting and your profile setting: membership in a public group may be shown to other members and, if your profile is public, may appear on your public profile; membership and contents of private and invite-only groups are visible only to members. You can leave a group at any time, which removes your membership; content you posted may remain subject to our retention and moderation rules.

Notification consent (web, Android & iOS).In-app and email notifications follow your account settings. Push notifications on the mobile app are sent only after you grant the operating system’s notification permission (Apple Push Notification service on iOS, Firebase Cloud Messaging on Android); you can revoke this in your device settings or in KinStation settings at any time. We do not use notifications for third-party advertising.

How we use the information

To provide the features you sign up for — encyclopedia, pet records, first aid, directories, and the behavioral AI.
To verify reviewers and providers before publishing their content.
To send transactional email such as sign-in links, verification confirmations, listing-status updates, and the reply notifications and weekly digest you have left enabled.
To send care-reminder emails when a pet’s vaccine or medication is coming due — only if you keep reminders on. Every reminder has a one-click opt-out, and you can turn a specific record’s reminder off too.
To send reef water-test reminder emails if you use the water-parameter tracker and haven’t logged a reading in a while — only if you keep these reminders on. Every reminder has a one-click opt-out.
To generate Habitat Lab task reminders and out-of-range alerts — in-app notifications when a scheduled task comes due or a reading you log falls outside your alert bounds and, with your consent, email (out-of-range alert emails are sent at most once per 24 hours per habitat). Every such email carries a one-click unsubscribe, and you can turn habitat reminders off account-wide in settings.
To send per-pet and per-plant reminder and activity notifications (in-app, email, or mobile push) about a specific pet or plant card — only where you have left those notifications enabled. Each type can be turned off independently in settings.
To measure how people find KinStation — when you use the Share button, the link includes first-party attribution parameters (e.g. utm_source=kinstation) so we can see that a visit came from a share. These carry no personal information and are not third-party ad tracking.
To investigate abuse, debug crashes, and improve safety guardrails.
To run automated safety scanning on public posts so we can detect dangerous or illegal content, hide the most serious content pending human review, surface crisis resources for self-harm content, and let administrators review and correct flags. We keep flagged snapshots, content hashes, and detected categories only for this safety-review purpose and to reduce false positives — not for advertising or profiling.

We do not sell your personal information. We do not run third-party advertising trackers, analytics pixels, or fingerprinting on KinStation surfaces.

Family of services (linking to Trovio)

KinStation is operated by Nexude LLC, which also operates other services, including Trovio, a personal collector’s vault. You can choose to link your KinStation account to a Trovio vault. Linking is optional and is always started by you from your Trovio settings; until you complete a link, none of the data below is shared.

What we share with Trovio when you link. Only the recognition data you authorize: your KinDex collection entries (the species and morphs you mark as ones you keep, including their rarity/conservation display and the estimated hobby-value string, which is carried as plain text and never parsed into a number), your keeper and reputation badges, and your KinStation Premium status. Sharing runs on a scheduled basis (typically nightly) and whenever you press “Sync now” on Trovio.

What we never share for this feature. Your email address, pet and medical records, Habitat Lab and water-parameter data, saved or bookmarked items, follows, group memberships, community post content, care contacts, and any browsing or usage history are not shared with Trovio. Only recognition items cross, and this cross-platform data is never used for advertising, profiling, or ad targeting.

Unlinking deletes the synced copies. You can unlink at any time from either your Trovio settings or your KinStation settings. Unlinking stops all further sharing immediately, and Trovio deletes the copies it synced within 24 hours— it keeps only an internal audit record that a deletion happened. This section is a working draft pending counsel review.

Third-party processors

A small set of vendors process data on our behalf under contract:

Amazon Web Services (AWS). Hosting, database, and file storage (EC2, RDS, S3) in US regions. We also use Amazon Textract to read vaccination certificates you upload for OCR, returning extracted text for your review.
Resend. Transactional email delivery (sign-in links, listing notifications). Resend receives the recipient email and message body.
Anthropic.The behavioral AI sends your question and the relevant grounded context to Anthropic’s Claude API to generate a reply. Anthropic does not train on API content by default.
OpenAI. We use OpenAI embedding models to compute vector representations of encyclopedia and first-aid content for semantic search. User-generated content sent for embedding is limited to what you choose to ask or post.
Cloudflare. DNS and edge protection for kinstation.com.

Cookies

KinStation uses a single first-party session cookie (kinstation_session for native accounts, or the shared nexude_session cookie if you sign in with Nexude) to keep you signed in. We do not set advertising cookies, analytics cookies, or third-party tracking cookies on KinStation pages.

Your rights

You can request a copy of your account data, ask us to correct information, or ask us to delete your account and associated pet records. Send requests to [email protected]. We respond within a reasonable window — usually a few business days while we are pre-launch. Some records (for example, content you have published as a reviewer or provider) may be retained in an anonymized form for editorial integrity.

Data retention

We keep account data for as long as your account is active. If you delete your account, we remove your personal data from primary systems within 30 days, except where we are required to keep records for legal or safety reasons (for example, a record of a banned account). Backups are rotated on a 90-day cycle and are access-restricted. Content you post inside a group follows the same retention and moderation rules as other user-generated content: leaving a group removes your membership, but content you posted may be retained subject to those rules.

Deceased users, authorized agents & legal process

The GDPR right to erasure and the CCPA right to deletion apply to living individuals. For a deceaseduser, we honor a documented deletion wish if one exists; otherwise our default is to memorialize (lock) the account. A verified executor may request a structured export of the deceased user’s own records. If you are in the EU, UK, or California, an authorized agent may submit an access, portability, or deletion request on your behalf with a signed authorization and government ID. We respond within 30 days (GDPR/UK) or 45 days (CCPA). All such requests go through identity- and authority-verification (certified proof, manual review, cooling-off, and — for high-authority requests — counsel review and two-person sign-off); we will never reveal a password or transfer login access. Where a valid court order, subpoena, or legal holdrequires it, we will preserve, produce, or erase data as ordered. Start a request at account access.

Children

KinStation is not directed at children under 13. If we learn we have collected information from a child under 13, we will delete it.

Changes to this policy

As we approach public launch we will update this policy. Material changes will be communicated by email to active accounts and posted here with a new “last updated” date.

Contact

Questions about privacy? Email [email protected]. Until forwarding is in place, you may also reach the operator directly at [email protected].