Privacy Policy
Last updated: 31 October 2026
This policy explains what personal data VINEdots, a part of Vine Education Co. ("VINEdots", "we", "us"), collects when you use the VINEdots app (vineec.com/app and our iOS and Android apps), this website, our student and staff portal (vineec.com/vinedots) and our English classes, and what we do with it. We operate from Taiwan and handle personal data under Taiwan's Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA).
1. What we collect
| What | Examples | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Account details | Name, preferred name, personal email, work email, password (stored only as a secure hash) | You, or your school or employer when they enrol you |
| Sign-in with Google or Apple | Your Google or Apple account ID, email address and (Apple, first time only) your name | Google or Apple, when you choose that sign-in |
| Profile | Phone, job title, company, city, country, first language, time zone, bio, profile photo | You, or your teacher or company |
| Learning records | Class schedule and attendance, weekly dots and streaks, class notes, assessments and CEFR level, assignments and your uploads (files, photos, voice and video recordings), sign-in sheets and signatures, vocabulary and practice activity, messages and wall posts | You and your teachers, while you use the service |
| My Day (optional) | What you tell My Day you have to do, the events in a calendar you choose to connect, and your answer as text. Used only to make that practice session and not stored (see sections 4 and 5) | You, and your Google or Apple calendar if you connect it |
| Class recordings | Recordings of online classes, where your teacher records them. Kept on our server for 3 months, then deleted | Your class |
| Payments | Contracts, invoices and payment status. App store subscriptions are paid through Apple or Google; we receive the subscription status, never your card details | You, your company, Apple or Google |
| Usage and device | When you sign in or open the app, whether it is installed or in a browser, browser type, IP address, and which website page or campaign link brought you to us | Your device, automatically |
| Messages to us | What you send through Message Us, the contact and newsletter forms on this website, or email | You |
We do not knowingly collect sensitive data such as health or biometric data. Please do not put it in posts, notes or uploads.
2. How we use it
- To run your classes: scheduling, joining online lessons, attendance, notes, assignments, assessments and progress reports.
- To run your account: sign-in, password resets (we email you a one-time code), and keeping your account secure.
- To personalise learning: for example "Explain with AI" uses your name, job, company, level and the class note to write examples that fit you.
- To get you ready for your day: My Day uses what you tell it, or a calendar you connect, to make a short English practice for something you have coming up.
- To bill you or your company and keep financial records.
- To contact you about your classes, your account, your enquiry or newsletter you signed up for, and changes to this policy.
- To understand and improve the app and website, for example how often the app is opened.
We do not sell your personal data, and we do not use it for advertising.
3. Google and Apple sign-in
If you choose "Continue with Google" or "Continue with Apple", we receive a signed token from Google or Apple. We use it only to confirm who you are, match you to your VINEdots account by email, and sign you in. We keep your Google or Apple account ID and the email it gave us. If you use Apple's "Hide My Email", we receive and use Apple's relay address. You can stop using either option at any time and sign in with your email and password instead.
4. Calendars
Teachers and staff: Google Calendar sync
Teachers and staff can connect a Google account so their VINEdots classes appear on their Google Calendar. With your permission, we request access to create, update and delete calendar events (the calendar.events scope). We use it only to add, change and remove the VINEdots classes and meetings assigned to you. We do not read, store or use your other calendar events. You can disconnect at any time on My Schedule, which also revokes our access on Google's side.
Students: My Day
My Day can get you ready for something in your day. If you choose to connect a calendar, we read only the titles, start times and lengths of your events from yesterday to the next 36 hours, and only when you start a My Day session. We never read event descriptions, guests or locations, and we never change your calendar.
- Google Calendar: with your permission, we request read-only access (the calendar.readonly scope).
- Apple iCloud calendar: you paste the link Apple gives you when you turn on Public Calendar for one of your calendars. Anyone with that link can see that calendar, so share it only with us. You can turn Public Calendar off at any time in Apple's Calendar app, which stops the link working.
We do not store your calendar or its events on our servers. Your connection (your Google access or your iCloud link) is kept only on your own device, encrypted, in a cookie that only My Day can use. Each time you start a session, we read your events, use them to make that session (see section 5), and discard them. You can disconnect in My Day at any time; for Google this also revokes our access, which you can also do at myaccount.google.com/permissions.
VINEdots' use and transfer of information received from Google APIs to any other app will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. We do not use Google user data for advertising, do not sell it, do not let people read it except with your permission, for security, or to comply with the law, and do not use it to train AI models.
5. AI features
Some features (such as "Explain with AI", Warm Up and class planning for teachers) send the text of a class note and a short learner profile (first name, job, company, English level, first language) to an AI provider to generate an explanation or exercise. The AI also receives any information you enter during onboarding or when doing exercises. We use a third-party AI provider for this. We send only what the feature needs, never your password, email or payment details. The result is saved so classmates who open the same note see the same explanation. AI output can be wrong; your teacher remains the authority.
My Day uses Anthropic's Claude API. To make your session and give feedback on your answer, it sends what you tell it you have to do (or the events from a calendar you connected), your English level and short learner profile, the words already in your My Vocab, and your answer as text. Your phone's own speech recognition (from Apple or Google) turns your spoken answer into text; we never receive the recording. We do not store any of this. Only the new words you learn are saved to your My Vocab, each with a general example sentence that has nothing from your day in it. Anthropic does not use this data to train its models and deletes it from its systems within 30 days, unless it must keep it longer to enforce its usage policy or to comply with the law.
6. Who we share it with
We share personal data only with:
- Your teachers and our staff, who need it to teach and support you.
- Your employer or school, when they pay for or arranged your classes: attendance, hours used, progress and assessment results. They do not see your private messages, AI explanations or My Day sessions.
- Service providers who process data for us under contract: website and database hosting (JustHost, United States), email (Microsoft 365), sign-in (Google, Apple), calendar sync (Google), calendars you connect to My Day (Google, Apple), online class links (Zoom, Microsoft Teams), spam protection on website forms (Cloudflare Turnstile), AI (a third-party AI provider, and Anthropic, United States, for My Day) and app distribution and subscriptions (Apple App Store, Google Play).
- Authorities, when the law requires it, or to protect someone's safety or our legal rights.
These providers may store data outside Taiwan, including in the United States and other countries where those providers operate. We only use providers whose terms protect the data they handle for us.
7. Cookies and storage on your device
We use essential cookies only: to keep you signed in, and on this website to remember your language and where you came from when you follow a link to sign up. If you connect a calendar to My Day, an encrypted cookie that only My Day can use keeps that connection on your device, for up to 400 days or until you disconnect. The app also saves copies of pages and photos on your device so it works offline; they are cleared when you sign out or another person signs in. My Day keeps the session you are in on your device so you can carry on after closing the app; it is deleted when you finish or the day ends. We do not use advertising or tracking cookies. Google, Apple and Cloudflare set their own cookies when you use their sign-in buttons or our forms.
8. How long we keep it
We keep your data while you have an account or are taking classes with us. Financial records (contracts, invoices, attendance used for billing) are kept for 5 years, as Taiwan tax and accounting law requires. Class recordings are deleted from our server after 3 months. One-time email codes expire after 15 minutes. My Day keeps nothing about your day: not what you tell it, not your calendar, not the session or your answers. We keep only the words you choose to learn (in My Vocab) and a count of how often you practise. When data is no longer needed we delete it or make it anonymous.
9. Deleting your account
- If you created your account in the app or subscribed through the App Store or Google Play, you can delete it in the app under Profile, or by emailing info@vinedots.com. We delete your account and personal data within 30 days, except records the law requires us to keep.
- If you are in a VINEdots class program arranged by your school or employer, your account is part of that program. Ask us at info@vinedots.com and we will delete or anonymise what we can, keeping only the records we must keep for your program's contract and the law.
10. Your rights
Under Taiwan's PDPA you may ask us to show you your personal data, give you a copy, correct it, stop collecting, processing or using it, or delete it. You can update most details yourself on your Profile. For anything else, email info@vinedots.com. We will reply within 30 days. If you are in another country, you may have similar rights under your local law, and we will honour them.
11. Security
Passwords are stored as one-way hashes, sign-in codes are single-use and short-lived, Google and Apple sign-ins are cryptographically verified, calendar connections for My Day are encrypted and stay on your device, and all traffic uses HTTPS. Only staff who need your data can see it. No system is perfectly secure; if a breach affects you, we will tell you as the law requires.
12. Age requirement
VINEdots is for adults. You must be 18 or older to create an account or take classes. We do not knowingly collect personal data from anyone under 18, and if we learn that we have, we delete it.
13. Changes
We may update this policy. We will post the new version here with a new date, and tell you in the app or by email if the change is significant.
14. Contact
VINEdots, a part of Vine Education Co. (Taiwan tax ID 27525854)
Vine Dots LLC, 30 N Gould St, Sheridan, WY 82801, USA
Email: info@vinedots.com · Website: www.vinedots.com