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Transparency· 6 min read

Exactly What Data We Access, What We Don't, and Why

Most apps bury their data practices in 40-page privacy policies written by lawyers for lawyers. We're doing the opposite. Here's a plain-English, platform-by-platform breakdown of every data point Yenesow can access, what we explicitly cannot access, and how we protect everything.

📱 iPhone Contacts

📱Phone Contacts (iOS Contacts Framework)
✓ Access
Names — First name, last name, nickname, middle name
✓ Access
Phone numbers — All phone numbers with labels (mobile, home, work)
✓ Access
Email addresses — All emails with labels
✓ Access
Birthdays — Used for birthday nudges and milestone tracking
✓ Access
Company & job title — Used for auto-categorization (Professional vs. Friend)
✓ Access
Contact photo — Thumbnail only, displayed in the app
✓ Access
Postal addresses — With labels (home, work). Used for event suggestions
✓ Access
Relationship labels — iOS relationship fields (mother, father, spouse, etc.) — used for Family auto-categorization
✓ Access
Social profiles — Any social media usernames stored in the contact card
✗ No Access
Notes — We do not access the notes field on contact cards
✗ No Access
Call history — We cannot see who you called, when, or for how long
✗ No Access
Text messages / iMessage — We cannot read any messages, ever
✗ No Access
Photos library — We only access the contact thumbnail, not your photo library
✗ No Access
Location data — We never request or access your location

Important: You choose exactly which contacts to import. We never bulk-access your entire address book without your explicit selection.

💼 LinkedIn

💼LinkedIn (OAuth 2.0 / OpenID Connect)
Limited
Your profile name — First and last name from your LinkedIn profile
Limited
Your profile email — The email associated with your LinkedIn account
Limited
Your profile photo — Your LinkedIn profile picture URL
✗ No Access
Your connections list — LinkedIn's API does not allow third-party apps to access your connections. We cannot see who you're connected to.
✗ No Access
Your messages — We cannot read LinkedIn messages or InMail
✗ No Access
Your posts or activity — We cannot see what you post, like, or comment on
✗ No Access
Your job applications — We cannot see your job search activity

LinkedIn integration is primarily for identity verification — confirming you are who you say you are. Due to LinkedIn API restrictions, we cannot import your professional network. Contacts must be added manually or via phone contacts.

🔐 What Yenesow Actually Uses

🧠Your In-App Context (Tune Up + AI Chat)
✓ You Share
Tune Up questionnaire responses — Relationship closeness, contact frequency goals, relationship context, and what matters to you about each connection
✓ You Share
AI Chat conversations — What you tell the AI Relationship Coach feeds into smarter nudges and event suggestions
✗ No Access
Your messages (SMS, iMessage, WhatsApp, etc.) — We never access any messaging platform. Period.
✗ No Access
Your emails — We do not connect to Gmail, Outlook, or any email service
✗ No Access
Your call history — We do not access phone call logs or frequency data
✗ No Access
Your social media activity — We do not monitor posts, likes, or interactions on any platform

Yenesow's AI only knows what you tell it. We don't scrape, sync, or monitor any external communications. Your relationship health scores are built entirely from the context you share within the app and the contact metadata you import from your iPhone.

📘 Facebook / Meta

📘Facebook (Graph API)
Limited
Your profile name — For identity verification
Limited
Your profile email — The email associated with your Facebook account
✗ No Access
Your friends list — Facebook's API only returns friends who also use Yenesow. We cannot see your full friends list.
✗ No Access
Your posts, photos, or timeline — We cannot see any of your Facebook content
✗ No Access
Messenger conversations — We cannot read any messages

Facebook integration is limited to finding friends who also use Yenesow. Due to Facebook API restrictions (post-Cambridge Analytica), third-party apps have very limited access to user data.

🔐 How We Protect Everything

Encryption at rest: All data stored in our database is encrypted using AES-256, the same standard used by banks and government agencies.

Encryption in transit: All data transmitted between your phone and our servers uses TLS 1.3 — the latest and most secure transport protocol.

Infrastructure: Our backend runs on AWS with VPC isolation, security groups, and IAM role-based access control. Database access requires authentication through AWS Secrets Manager.

Data retention: When you delete your account, all your data enters a 30-day grace period (in case you change your mind), then is permanently and irreversibly deleted from all systems including backups.

Data export: You can request a full export of all your data at any time from Settings. We'll compile everything and deliver it within 72 hours.

No third-party sharing: Your data is never sold, shared with advertisers, or used to train AI models for other users. Your relationship data is yours alone.

The Bottom Line

We access the minimum data needed to help you manage your relationships, and nothing more. We can't read your messages on any platform. We can't see your call history. We can't access your email content. We don't track your location.

What we can do is help you remember birthdays, notice when a relationship needs attention, and give you a reason to pick up the phone. That's it. That's the whole product.

If anything in this report is unclear, or if you have questions about a specific data point, email us at privacy@yenesow.com. We'll answer in plain English, not legalese.

Privacy-first relationship management

Yenesow is built on the principle that you shouldn't have to sacrifice privacy to stay connected with the people you love.

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