Privacy & Cookies Policy

1. Who We Are

Jantascope is a digital news platform operated by Keyzen, with its registered office at G-45 Sej Plaza, Chunilal Giridharilal Marg, Malad West, Mumbai, Maharashtra 400064, India. We are the data controller for the personal information collected through our Services.

Data Protection Contact: support@jantascope.com

2. What Information We Collect

2.1 Information you provide directly:

• Account registration information (name, email address, password)
• Profile information (display name, profile photo if uploaded)
• Communications and correspondence (support requests, feedback, complaints)
• Content you create (comments, poll votes, game scores, bookmarks)
• Newsletter subscription preferences

2.2 Information collected automatically:

• Device information (device type, model, operating system, screen resolution)
• Browser information (browser type, version, language preferences)
• Network information (IP address, approximate geographic location at city level)
• Usage data (pages visited, time spent, click patterns, scroll depth, search queries)
• Referral data (how you arrived at our Services, referring URLs)
• Performance data (page load times, errors, crash reports)
• Advertising identifiers (device advertising ID where applicable)

2.3 Information from third parties:

• Social login providers (if you sign in via Google or other social accounts, we receive basic profile information as permitted by your social account settings)
• Analytics partners (aggregated demographic and interest data)

3. How We Use Your Information

We use personal information for the following purposes:

• Providing Services: To deliver news content, operate your account, process bookmarks, manage subscriptions, and enable interactive features such as polls and games.
• Personalisation: To recommend content relevant to your reading interests and preferred categories.
• Communication: To send push notifications (where opted in), service updates, breaking news alerts, and respond to your inquiries.
• Improvement & Analytics: To analyse usage patterns, diagnose technical issues, measure content performance, and improve the user experience.
• Advertising: To serve relevant advertisements through our advertising partners, including Google AdSense, and to measure advertising effectiveness.
• Security & Fraud Prevention: To detect, investigate, and prevent malicious activity, unauthorized access, spam, and service abuse.
• Legal Compliance: To comply with applicable laws, regulations, court orders, or lawful government requests.

4. Legal Bases for Processing

We process your personal data on the following legal grounds:

• Contractual Necessity: Processing necessary to provide the Services you have requested (e.g., account management, delivering content).
• Legitimate Interests: Processing necessary for our legitimate interests, including platform security, fraud prevention, service improvement, and business analytics, provided these interests do not override your fundamental rights.
• Consent: Where you have given specific consent for processing, such as receiving marketing communications or enabling optional cookies. You may withdraw consent at any time.
• Legal Obligation: Processing necessary to comply with legal requirements applicable to us.

5. Cookies and Similar Technologies

We use cookies, web beacons, local storage, and similar technologies to operate and enhance our Services. Cookies are small text files stored on your device by your browser.

5.1 Types of cookies we use:

• Strictly Necessary Cookies: Required for the operation of our Services (e.g., authentication, security, load balancing). These cannot be disabled.
• Performance & Analytics Cookies: Help us understand how visitors use our Services, which pages are visited most often, and identify errors. We use Google Analytics for this purpose.
• Functionality Cookies: Remember your preferences and settings (e.g., language, theme, region).
• Advertising Cookies: Used by our advertising partners (including Google AdSense) to deliver relevant advertisements and measure their effectiveness. These cookies may track your browsing activity across different websites.

5.2 Managing cookies:

You can control cookies through your browser settings. Most browsers allow you to refuse or delete cookies. Please note that disabling cookies may affect the functionality of our Services. For more information about managing cookies, visit aboutcookies.org.

5.3 Third-party cookies:

Our advertising and analytics partners may set their own cookies when you interact with our Services. We do not control these third-party cookies. Please refer to the respective privacy policies of these providers for details on their data practices.

6. Advertising and Third-Party Partners

We display advertisements on our Services through Google AdSense and other advertising networks. These partners may use cookies and similar technologies to collect information about your interactions with our Services and other websites to provide advertisements tailored to your interests.

Google AdSense: Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads based on your visits to our Services and other sites on the internet. You may opt out of personalised advertising by visiting Google Ads Settings.

Google Analytics: We use Google Analytics to collect anonymised usage data. Google Analytics uses cookies to help analyse how users use our Services. You can opt out by installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.

7. Data Sharing and Disclosure

We do not sell your personal information. We may share data in the following circumstances:

• Service Providers: Trusted third parties who perform services on our behalf, such as cloud hosting, content delivery, email delivery, analytics, and customer support, under strict confidentiality agreements.
• Advertising Partners: Limited data shared with advertising networks to serve and measure advertisements, as described in Section 6.
• Legal Requirements: Where disclosure is required by law, regulation, court order, or governmental authority.
• Protection of Rights: Where necessary to protect our rights, safety, property, or the rights of our users or the public.
• Business Transfers: In connection with a merger, acquisition, reorganisation, or sale of assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction.

8. International Data Transfers

Our Services are primarily operated from India. If you access our Services from outside India, your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in India or other countries where our service providers operate. We ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your personal data in accordance with applicable data protection laws.

9. Data Retention

We retain personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, including to satisfy any legal, regulatory, accounting, or reporting requirements. Specific retention periods depend on the nature of the data and the purpose of processing:

• Account data: Retained for the duration of your account and up to 30 days after deletion request.
• Usage and analytics data: Retained in identifiable form for up to 26 months, after which it is anonymised or deleted.
• Communication records: Retained for up to 3 years for customer service and legal purposes.
• Legal obligation data: Retained as required by applicable law.

10. Data Security

We implement appropriate technical and organisational security measures to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, alteration, disclosure, or destruction. These measures include:

• Encryption of data in transit using TLS/SSL protocols
• Secure password hashing and storage
• Regular security assessments and vulnerability testing
• Access controls and authentication for internal systems
• Employee training on data protection practices

While we strive to protect your personal data, no method of transmission over the internet or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security.

11. Your Rights and Choices

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have the following rights regarding your personal data:

• Right of Access: Request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
• Right to Rectification: Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete personal data.
• Right to Erasure: Request deletion of your personal data, subject to certain legal exceptions.
• Right to Restriction: Request restriction of processing of your personal data in certain circumstances.
• Right to Data Portability: Request a machine-readable copy of your personal data.
• Right to Object: Object to processing based on legitimate interests, including profiling and direct marketing.
• Right to Withdraw Consent: Where processing is based on consent, you may withdraw consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of prior processing.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at support@jantascope.com. We will respond to your request within 30 days or as required by applicable law.

12. Children's Privacy

Our Services are intended for a general audience and are not directed to children under the age of 16 (or the applicable minimum age of digital consent in your jurisdiction). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children below this age.

If we become aware that we have inadvertently collected personal data from a child without appropriate parental or guardian consent, we will take steps to delete that information as soon as possible. If you believe a child has provided us with personal data, please contact us at support@jantascope.com.

13. Push Notifications

With your permission, we may send push notifications to your device for breaking news alerts, personalised content recommendations, and important service updates. You can manage your notification preferences at any time through:

• Your device's notification settings (iOS: Settings > Notifications; Android: Settings > Apps > Jantascope)
• In-app notification preferences
• Browser notification settings (for web push notifications)

14. Account Deletion

You may request deletion of your account and all associated personal data at any time. Upon receiving a valid deletion request:

• Your account will be deactivated immediately
• Personal data will be permanently deleted within 30 days
• Some anonymised or aggregated data may be retained for analytics purposes
• Data required to be retained by law will be kept for the legally mandated period

To request account deletion, email support@jantascope.com with the subject line “Account Deletion Request” from your registered email address.

15. Third-Party Links

Our Services may contain links to third-party websites, applications, or services that are not operated by us. We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third-party sites or services. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of every site you visit.

16. Compliance with Indian Law

This policy is compliant with the Information Technology Act, 2000 and the Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011, as applicable. We also adhere to the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (DPDPA) requirements where applicable.

For users in the European Economic Area (EEA), United Kingdom, or other jurisdictions with comprehensive data protection laws, we process your data in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and equivalent local legislation.

17. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy & Cookies Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, technology, legal requirements, or other factors. When we make material changes, we will:

• Update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page
• Provide prominent notice on our Services (such as a banner notification)
• Where required, seek your consent before applying significant changes

We encourage you to periodically review this page for the latest information on our privacy practices. Your continued use of our Services after any changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

18. Grievance Officer

In accordance with the Information Technology Act, 2000 and rules made thereunder, the name and contact details of the Grievance Officer are provided below:

19. Contact Us

If you have any questions, concerns, or requests regarding this Privacy & Cookies Policy or our data practices, please contact us: