Privacy Policy
Effective date: June 1, 2026 · Last updated: June 15, 2026
My Crochet Studio ("we", "us", or "our") operates mycrochetstudio.com. This policy explains what information we collect, why we collect it, how we use it, and what rights you have over it. We've written it in plain language — no legalese.
1. Information we collect
a) Information you give us directly
- Name and email address (when you create an account or sign in with Google)
- Profile avatar (if signing in with Google)
- Pattern preferences, skill level, and crochet projects you choose to save
- Yarn stash entries and project journal content
- Support messages you send us
- Optional profile details you may add, such as why you crochet
b) Information we collect automatically
When you visit My Crochet Studio — whether or not you have an account — we automatically collect certain technical and usage information to operate and improve the service:
- Device and browser information: browser type and version, operating system, device type (desktop, mobile, tablet), and screen characteristics
- Approximate location: country, region, and city derived from your IP address. We do not collect GPS or precise location data
- Pages and features visited: which pages you viewed, how long you spent on them, which features you used, and the order of your navigation
- Referring website: the website or search engine that sent you to us, including the search query you used (if applicable), so we can understand how people discover My Crochet Studio
- Campaign parameters: UTM tags present in the URL when you arrived (e.g. utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign)
- IP address: used to derive your approximate location and to protect the service from abuse. Not used for individual profiling
- Language preference: your browser's preferred language
We use a unique visitor identifier (a random ID stored in a cookie called _mcs_vid) to link page views across a visit. This identifier contains no personal information.
c) Payment information
Payments are processed exclusively by Paddle, our Merchant of Record. We never see or store your card number or payment credentials. Paddle's own privacy policy governs how payment data is handled.
3. How we use your information
- To provide the crochet pattern generation service and related features
- To remember your preferences and personalize your experience
- To understand which features are popular and where we can improve
- To understand how visitors discover My Crochet Studio (e.g. from search engines or social media)
- To send you transactional emails (account confirmation, password reset, billing receipts)
- To send you optional product updates and tips — you can unsubscribe at any time
- To process payments securely via Paddle
- To detect and prevent abuse, fraud, and security threats
- To comply with legal obligations
We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with third parties for their own marketing purposes.
4. Legal basis for processing (GDPR)
If you are in the European Economic Area, United Kingdom, or Switzerland, we process your personal data under the following legal bases:
- Contract — processing necessary to provide the service you signed up for (account, patterns, billing)
- Legitimate interests — analytics to improve the service, security monitoring, referrer attribution. We balance these interests against your privacy rights
- Consent — analytics cookies in jurisdictions where consent is required. You may withdraw consent at any time
- Legal obligation — retaining transaction records as required by applicable law
5. Data retention
- Account data — retained while your account is active, plus 30 days after deletion to allow recovery
- Analytics and visit data — retained for 24 months, then automatically deleted
- Payment records — retained for 7 years as required by financial regulations
- Support correspondence — retained for 2 years
6. Your rights
Depending on your location, you may have the following rights. To exercise any of them, email us at hello@mycrochetstudio.com.
- Access — request a copy of the personal data we hold about you
- Correction — ask us to fix inaccurate or incomplete data
- Deletion — request that we delete your account and associated personal data. You can also delete your account from your profile settings
- Restriction — ask us to stop processing your data in certain circumstances
- Portability — receive your data in a structured, machine-readable format
- Objection — object to processing based on legitimate interests
- Withdraw consent — withdraw any consent you have given, including for analytics cookies
EEA/UK users may also lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority. We would appreciate the chance to address concerns directly first.
7. California residents (CCPA)
If you are a California resident, you have the following rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act:
- Right to know — the categories and specific pieces of personal information we collect, how we use it, and whether we disclose it to third parties
- Right to delete — request deletion of personal information we have collected from you, subject to certain exceptions
- Right to opt out of sale — we do not sell your personal information to third parties
- Right to non-discrimination — we will not discriminate against you for exercising your CCPA rights
To exercise your rights, email hello@mycrochetstudio.com with "CCPA Request" in the subject line. We will respond within 45 days.
8. Data security
We use industry-standard measures to protect your data: encrypted HTTPS connections, hashed passwords (bcrypt), access controls, and regular security reviews. No method of transmission or storage is 100% secure — we cannot guarantee absolute security, but we take it seriously.
9. Third-party services
- Paddle — payment processing and subscription management
- Resend — transactional email delivery
- Google Analytics — aggregate website analytics
- Anthropic — AI-powered pattern generation (your pattern prompts are processed by Anthropic's API)
- ip-api.com — IP geolocation (used to derive country/city; no personal data retained by the provider)
Each service has its own privacy policy. We only share the minimum data necessary for them to provide their service to us.
10. Children's privacy
My Crochet Studio is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us and we will delete it promptly.
11. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. We'll update the "Last updated" date at the top and, for material changes, notify you by email or by a notice on the site. Your continued use of My Crochet Studio after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the revised policy.
12. Contact us
If you have questions about this policy or how we handle your data, please contact us at:
My Crochet Studio