Privacy

What we collect

• Scans. When you scan a barcode, the app sends the barcode number and the time to our server. We use it to find the product and to count which products are popular.
• An installation id. The app makes a random id on your device. It is sent with scans and contributions so we can limit abuse and avoid duplicates. It is not your name, and it is not linked to who you are. It is not an advertising id.
• Contributions. If you add a product, we receive the photos you choose to send (front, ingredients, kosher symbol) and the text you type or confirm, such as name, brand and ingredients.

The app does not collect your name, email, phone number, location, contacts, payment details, or crash and diagnostic data.

What becomes public

Products you contribute are published in the public product library on heykosher.com. Please do not include anything personal in your photos or text. Your installation id is not shown.

What stays on your phone

Barcode scanning and text recognition run on your device: with Google’s ML Kit on Android and Apple’s built-in camera and text recognition on iPhone. Camera frames are not uploaded. Only the photos you choose to submit leave your phone. Your settings, such as tradition and theme, are saved on the device.

Website analytics

Our website, heykosher.com, uses Google Analytics to count visits and see which pages are useful. It sets cookies in your browser and sends Google details such as the pages you view, how you arrived, your browser and device type, and an approximate location derived from your IP address. Google Analytics does not store full IP addresses. We use these numbers only in aggregate, we have not turned on Google’s advertising features, and we do not use them to identify you.

You can block these cookies in your browser settings or install the Google Analytics opt-out add-on. The site works the same without them. Google’s handling of this data is described in How Google uses information from sites that use its services.

The Hey Kosher app does not use Google Analytics or any other analytics service.

Who helps us

• Anthropic. When the kosher symbol cannot be read on your device, a cropped photo of the symbol only is sent through our server to Anthropic’s Claude API to identify the certifying agency. Anthropic processes it under its commercial terms and does not train on it. If that fails, the app falls back to on-device reading and your own choice.
• Open Food Facts. When a barcode is not in our library, we look it up on openfoodfacts.org to prefill the add form. Only the barcode number is sent.
• Google Analytics. Website visit statistics only, as described above. Not used in the app.
• Hosting. Our website and API run on Vercel. Our database runs on Neon. Both are in the United States. Contributed photos are stored with Cloudflare R2.

We share data with these services only to run the features above. We do not sell data. The app contains no third-party analytics or advertising SDKs.

Open data

Product data from Open Food Facts is under the Open Database License, and its images are CC BY-SA. Products you contribute may be credited alongside Open Food Facts and shared under the same open licenses. See the terms.

Security

Everything travels over HTTPS. No system is perfectly safe, but we keep what we hold small.

Deleting your data

Because there are no accounts, we have no sign-in to remove. To ask us to delete your scan history or a contribution, email support@heykosher.com. Include the barcode of any product you added and roughly when you added it. We reply within a few days.

Children

Hey Kosher is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect data from them.

Changes and contact

If we change this policy, we will update the date above. Questions? Write to support@heykosher.com or visit support.