Slate Privacy Policy

This policy explains what personal data Slate collects, why, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and your rights. It covers the Slate web app, the Slate iPhone app, and the Slate pages on alternate-reality.co.uk.

The short version

• We use your recordings, voice and words to write scripts, edit your videos and post them where you tell us.
• AI services process them for us. Most are in the US. Section 6 lists each one, what it gets and the terms it works under.
• We never sell your data, and we only use your face and voice for your own content.
• You can download your data, or delete your account, any time in Account > Your data.

1. Who we are

Alternate Reality Media Ltd is the controller of your personal data. That means we decide how it's used.

• Registered in England and Wales, company number 16333070.
• Registered office: 66 Paul Street, London, England, EC2A 4NA.
• Data protection fee registration with the Information Commission (ICO): ZB976857.
• Privacy contact: privacy@alternate-reality.co.uk, or by post to the address above.

2. What we collect

Your account

• Your email address and name. If you ask for access in the app, what you tell us about your business.
• One-time sign-in codes. Our sign-in provider, WorkOS, issues and checks them, and they expire after 10 minutes. If you sign in with Google, Google tells us your name and email address.
• Your sign-in session, plan, credits, whether you were invited, and which version of our Terms you agreed to, and how.

Your Brand Brain

• What you tell us during set-up: your business, audience, offer, website, tone and goals.
• If you talk instead of typing, we turn the recording into text. We don't keep the recording.

Your recordings and videos

• The video and audio you record or upload. These show your face and carry your voice.
• Transcripts, and delivery scores we work out from your takes: pace, pauses, energy, tone of voice, filler words, sound and lighting. We also save your device type with each take, to check recording quality.
• Scripts, captions, edits, feedback, the changes you ask for, and any views, likes, shares and saves you tell us about.

Studio

• Prompts you write, images or videos you upload, and what the AI makes.
• If you create an AI clone: the 8 to 30 photos you upload, the model trained from them, and when you gave consent.

Ad Twin

• Your training video, a recording of your consent, and the avatar and voice model made from them.

Connected social accounts

When you connect a network, it shares some details with us. We store them, with access tokens encrypted.

• YouTube: your channel ID, name, handle and picture. Permission to upload videos and read basic channel details.
• Instagram: your account ID, username, account type and picture. Permission to publish.
• Facebook: your Facebook user ID, and the name, ID and picture of your Page. If you share more than one Page, we use the first. Permission to publish to that Page.
• TikTok: your account ID, display name and username. Your posting options: privacy levels, and whether comments, Duets and Stitch are allowed. Permission to publish.
• LinkedIn: your member ID, name and picture. Permission to share posts. We don't ask LinkedIn for your email address.

We also keep what you post through Slate: the caption, when it went out, and the link or result for each network.

Payments

• Stripe takes your payment. We never see your full card number.
• We get your Stripe customer ID, what you bought, when, and whether payment worked.
• In the iPhone app, Apple takes payment for in-app purchases. Apple tells us what you bought, when, the price, and whether it was refunded. We never see your payment details.

Using Slate

• What you do in Slate, such as takes recorded, videos approved and posts sent.
• Errors and app version.
• Your IP address. We hold it in memory for up to an hour, to stop abuse. Our server logs also record it, and we delete them after 30 days. Our sign-in provider also uses it, with your device type, to stop automated sign-ups.

Talking to us: emails and support requests you send us.

The waitlist and website forms: your name, email address and the answers you give.

iPhone permissions

• Camera and microphone, to record your takes.
• Photos, to save videos when you ask, and to upload photos or videos you pick. Slate only gets the ones you choose. It can't browse the rest of your library.

3. How we use it, and why we're allowed to

We don't send marketing emails unless you've said yes, and every one has an unsubscribe link.

Do you have to give us your data? You need to give us your email address to have an account, and your recordings for us to edit them. The rest is up to you, but some features won't work without it.

4. AI and your content

AI providers. Slate uses AI services to transcribe, write, edit and generate. They process your content for us, under contracts and their own terms. Section 6 lists them. Sending your content to them is part of how Slate works. In the iPhone app, we ask your permission before your content first goes to an AI service.

Training. We don't train AI models on your content. Anthropic, which writes your scripts and plans your edits, doesn't train on it, and nor does ChatCut. When we use ElevenLabs or HeyGen, we switch their training off. Higgsfield, which makes Studio images and videos and your AI clone, works under its own terms, which let it use what it receives to improve its services. We ask for your consent before your content first goes to Higgsfield. Deleting Studio work or your AI clone removes it from Higgsfield within 30 days, but it can't undo any use Higgsfield has already made of it.

Your face and voice. We only use your AI clone and Ad Twin for your own content, and we don't use your face, voice or likeness for anyone else. We don't use them to identify you, with one exception: when you record your Ad Twin consent, HeyGen checks that the person in your consent clip is the person in your training video. That check is part of your explicit consent.

Decisions. AI scores your takes and suggests edits. None of it decides anything important about you, like money, work or your account. We check every edit before it's delivered.

Labels. When you post AI-made content, we switch on the network's AI label where the network lets apps set one.

Suggested captions. Captions that Slate's AI drafts for you are covered by this policy. You can edit them before posting.

5. Social networks

You choose to connect a network and what to post to it. When we post for you, the network receives your video, caption and settings, and handles them under its own privacy policy:

• Meta (Instagram and Facebook)
• TikTok
• LinkedIn
• YouTube (Google): see below

Disconnect any time. Go to Account > Your socials > Disconnect. We delete that network's tokens and details straight away, including the links to your posts in Slate. Where the network lets apps do it (YouTube, TikTok and Facebook), we also tell it we've stopped. Posts already published stay on the network until you delete them there.

YouTube. Slate uses YouTube API Services to upload videos to your channel when you ask it to.

• By connecting YouTube, you agree to be bound by the YouTube Terms of Service.
• Google's Privacy Policy: http://www.google.com/policies/privacy
• What we access: Google asks you to let Slate see your YouTube account and upload videos. We only read your channel's ID, name, handle and picture, and the processing status of videos you post through Slate.
• What we store: those details, your access tokens (encrypted), and the IDs and links of videos you upload through Slate.
• What we use it for: showing which channel you're posting to, uploading your videos, and showing your post history.
• We don't sell YouTube data, or use it for adverts or to train AI. Only the services that run Slate for us (section 6) handle it. Slate also stores a sign-in cookie and a few settings on your device: section 14 and our Cookie Policy list them.
• We refresh the channel details we store at least every 30 days, and drop YouTube video IDs and links from your post history after 30 days.
• You can remove Slate's access in Slate, or on Google's security settings page. If you remove it in Slate, we revoke the token and delete your YouTube data straight away. If you remove it at Google, we delete it within 7 days of noticing, and within 30 days at the latest.
• Slate's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

Facebook and Instagram data deletion. You can ask us to delete the data we got from Facebook or Instagram at any time. Our data deletion page has the steps.

6. Who we share it with

We share personal data only with the providers below, and only so they can do their job for Slate. Most of them work under a data processing agreement with us that limits what they can do with your data and protects it at least as well as this policy does. ChatCut and Higgsfield work under their own terms instead: the table shows what each one gets.

Slate's own server, database and your files are in the UK, on equipment we run ourselves.

We also share data:

• with the social networks you choose to post to (section 5);
• when the law requires it, or to protect people's safety or our legal rights;
• with a buyer, if we ever sell the business. They'd have to keep these promises.

We never sell personal data.

7. Data that leaves the UK

Most of our providers are in the US. When data goes there, we use one of these safeguards:

• the UK-US data bridge, for providers certified under the Data Privacy Framework and its UK Extension;
• otherwise, the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement, or the UK Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, with a transfer risk assessment.

Section 6 shows which applies to each provider. Ask us for a copy of a safeguard.

8. How long we keep it

When you delete your account, we straight away:

• cancel any plan you pay for;
• disconnect your social accounts and revoke our access where the network lets us;
• delete your account and everything in Slate's own systems: recordings, edits and earlier versions, scripts, Brand Brain, Studio work, files you sent for services, posts, credits and activity, and your sign-in record at WorkOS;
• move our Google Drive copy to the bin, which empties after 30 days.

Within 30 days we also delete the copies on our editing computer and at our providers. That covers your ChatCut projects, your AI clone and the photos you uploaded for it at Higgsfield, and your Ad Twin at HeyGen. Our encrypted backups clear within 30 days. Payment records stay in Stripe and our accounts for the period above, and Apple keeps its own records of App Store purchases. Posts already on your social accounts stay there.

9. How we protect it

• All traffic is encrypted in transit (HTTPS).
• Social access tokens are encrypted at rest (AES-256-GCM).
• Backups are encrypted (AES-256-GCM) before they leave our server.
• Sign-in codes are scrambled and expire after 10 minutes.
• Only team members who need it can see your content, for example to check an edit.
• Our providers are bound by contract to keep your data secure.

10. Your rights

You have the right to:

• get a copy of your data: Account > Your data > Download my data gives you everything in your account as a JSON file, with links to download your recordings and other files. Email us for anything else we hold;
• correct it: edit it in Slate, or ask us;
• delete it: Account > Your data > Delete account, or ask us;
• object to us using it for our legitimate interests, including improving Slate;
• restrict how we use it while a concern is sorted out;
• take it with you: the download is in a standard format (JSON), and its links give you your original files;
• withdraw consent for your AI clone or Ad Twin by deleting them. That doesn't affect what we did before.

To use a right, email privacy@alternate-reality.co.uk. It's free, and we reply within one month.

11. Complaints

If you're unhappy with how we've handled your data, you can tell us first at privacy@alternate-reality.co.uk. We'll confirm we've received it within 30 days, look into it, and tell you the outcome without undue delay.

You can also complain to the Information Commission (ICO), or call 0303 123 1113.

12. People in our customers' videos

Our customers sometimes upload videos with other people in them. We use those videos only to edit and post them for that customer, who must have your permission. To ask about a video you're in, email privacy@alternate-reality.co.uk.

13. Children

Slate is for people aged 18 and over. We don't knowingly collect data from children. If you think a child has signed up, tell us and we'll delete the account.

14. Cookies and device storage

Slate uses one cookie to keep you signed in, and a second one for 10 minutes while you sign in with Google. It also saves three small notes on your device: your teleprompter speed, and whether you've closed the install tip and the filming tips. It keeps its app files on your device so it opens fast. There are no advertising or tracking cookies. Our Cookie Policy has the details.

15. Changes to this policy

We'll update this policy when Slate or the law changes. If a change matters, we'll email you before it takes effect. The date at the top shows when it last changed.