Privacy at Loquala

Last updated: 29 September 2026

This page says plainly what Loquala collects — on this website and inside the app — what we do with it, who else sees it, and how to make us stop. It is written to be read, not to be survived.

Who we are

Vortas LLC, trading as Loquala, is the data controller for everything described here. Write to us at 265 Chelmsford St STE 7 PMB 1147, Chelmsford, MA 01824, USA, or reach us at hello@loquala.com about any of it. We are a small independent operation, not a company with a privacy department, so that address reaches the person who actually builds the thing. We have not yet appointed a representative in the EU or the UK under Article 27; until we do, write to the same address and we will answer.

What we collect

On this website: nothing, unless you ask us to tell you when a new city opens — then we store your email address, the language of the page you signed up from, and the fact that you ticked the consent box. We send one email asking you to confirm the address is yours, and nothing else is ever sent to it until you do. In the app, you have an account: an email address if you signed in with a link, or the name and address your Google or Apple sign-in gives us; guests get an account with no details attached at all. Alongside it we keep what your practice produces — the words you saved to your notebook, your session scores and the feedback that came with them, the sounds you find hard to pronounce, your estimated level, your streak and the minutes you have used, and a short note each character keeps about you so they remember your name and your usual order. For your range, we also keep a count of the individual words you have said in conversations and chats — each word, how often you said it, when you first and last said it and, for a verb, which form you used — but never the sentences they came in; it is kept with your account so it follows you across devices. If you buy a subscription we keep its status and the Stripe customer id that links it to you. If you send us feedback we keep what you wrote and, if you were signed in, your account’s email address. If you turn on notifications we keep a token identifying your device. To stop the free tier being drained, we count usage against your account, against a random identifier kept in a cookie on your browser (lt_uid, set when you first start a voice session and kept for a year), and against your IP address — the last two whether or not you are signed in. When you start a voice session we record, regardless of your analytics choice, a service log of that session — which activity you opened, its language and level, when it started and ended, how it ended, how many minutes were used and how many turns were spoken — tied to your account id. It never contains what you or the character said. We use it to run the service and to see where learners get stuck; it is kept with your other account data and deleted with your account.

What happens when you speak

A conversation is live audio, not a recording. Your microphone streams through LiveKit to Google Gemini, which listens and answers in real time; we have deliberately turned off the setting that would let Google hold that session for later, so nothing is retained there after you finish. As you talk, the app also sends each thing you say, as a short clip, to Microsoft Azure, which sends back the words it heard and how clearly you said them; the same happens when you practise a sound. In the slower push-to-talk mode, where it is offered, your clip goes to Azure to be turned into text, Google writes the character’s reply, and Azure speaks it. We keep the numbers, never the clips. The full written transcript of a conversation is stored only on your own device, and is deleted after seven days. It passes through OpenAI so we can grade the conversation, write your feedback and update the character’s note about you; OpenAI may keep what we send it for up to 30 days to check for abuse, and then deletes it. What we keep on our side is the outcome: your scores, the feedback you were shown — which can quote a few of your own words beside a more natural way to say them — and each character’s short note about you. Beyond that, the only part of what you say that we keep is a count of the individual words you used, for your range — never the sentences they came in. We never keep a recording of your voice; there is no audio of you stored anywhere in our systems.

Why we are allowed to

Running the app is what you asked us for, so your account and everything your practice produces is processed to deliver the service you signed up to. Analytics runs only on your consent — the banner is a real choice, nothing is measured until you allow it, and you can take it back at any time in Settings. Crash reports and the checks that stop spam and abuse run on our legitimate interest in keeping the app working and available; the crash reports are stripped of your words, your address and your identifiers before they are sent. Waitlist email runs on the consent you gave by ticking the box. We do not sell, rent, or share anything with anyone for their marketing, we do not profile you for advertising, and nothing here makes automated decisions about you. If you have an account, we may also email you about your conversation minutes and your plan — for example when your free minutes run out. That runs on our legitimate interest in telling you about a service you use, and you can turn it off in Settings or with the unsubscribe link in any of those emails.

How long we keep it

Your account and practice data stay until you delete your account, which you can do yourself in Settings once you are signed in. Deleting it removes your account and everything your practice produced, immediately, with one exception: the record of how many minutes the account used, and of any minutes we refunded, is kept under the account’s random id — never your name or email — so that deleting and signing up again cannot be used to reset a free allowance. The count of words behind your range is deleted with your account, like everything else. If you are paying for a subscription, deleting your account cancels it at once, and the unused part of the period you have paid for is not refunded. Guests cannot delete their account from Settings; a guest account is deleted automatically once it is more than thirty days old and has had no recent activity. Conversation transcripts on your device expire after seven days. Waitlist addresses stay until you unsubscribe. Analytics events expire after a year. Feedback you send us is kept after account deletion, address included — in our database and in its private ticket — because it is a conversation with us rather than part of your account; ask us and we will delete that too. The usage counts kept against IP addresses and browser identifiers are not tied to your account, so deleting it does not remove them, and at present they are not deleted automatically either; they exist only to stop abuse of the free tier.

Who else sees it

All of these are companies in the United States that process data on our instructions, under contract, and under the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses or their Data Privacy Framework certification — except Stripe, which acts on its own account, as explained below. Google, for the live conversation, for the character’s replies in the slower push-to-talk mode, for some written feedback, and for delivering notifications to Android devices. Microsoft Azure, for pronunciation scoring, for transcribing what you say in a conversation, and for the speech it reads aloud to you. OpenAI, for grading a conversation and writing your feedback, for writing the short note each character keeps about you, for looking up words for your notebook, and for translating messages you send us into English. LiveKit, which carries the audio. Supabase, which is our database, and Vercel, which serves the site and the app. Cloudflare Turnstile, which checks you are a person when you sign in or join the waitlist, and may set a cookie remembering that your browser passed; it is not used to follow you between sites. Sentry, which receives crash reports. Resend, which sends our email. Apple, for delivering notifications to iPhones. GitHub, where a message you send us is copied, with your email address if you were signed in, into a private ticket so we can answer it. Stripe, only if you buy a subscription: at checkout we give it your email address and your account id, and it collects and handles your payment details itself, as an independent controller under its own privacy policy — we never see your card number. Subscriptions are resold by Sold through Link, LLC, Stripe’s reseller, which is the merchant of record for the sale and appears at checkout as “Sold through Link”. And, only if you allow it, PostHog for analytics. Our fonts, images and audio are served from our own site, so nobody else sees you loading a page.

Analytics, and the choice you get

If you allow it, we use PostHog to see which pages and screens people open, what they press, and where they give up — and, in the app, to record a replay of your screen with every piece of text hidden, so we can watch the shape of somebody getting stuck without reading a word they wrote or said. It is tied to a random identifier for your account, not to your name, and the same identifier links your visit to loquala.com with your use of the app so we can tell whether the two connect. Say no, or simply ignore the banner, and none of it loads: no script, no cookie, no event. We also use Vercel Web Analytics, which counts visits without storing anything on your device or identifying anyone.

Your rights

You can ask us for a copy of what we hold about you, correct it, delete it, take it elsewhere, restrict what we do with it, or object to it — and we will answer within a month. Deleting your account in Settings does most of that instantly; for anything else, write to hello@loquala.com. Every email we send has an unsubscribe link. To withdraw consent for analytics, turn it off in Settings, or choose No thanks the next time the banner appears; withdrawing is exactly as easy as agreeing, and costs you nothing in the app. If you think we have got this wrong, you are entitled to complain to your national data protection authority — in the EU that is the regulator where you live, and in the UK it is the Information Commissioner’s Office. We would rather you told us first.

Children

Loquala is not directed at children under 16, and we do not knowingly collect anything from them. If you believe a child has an account, write to hello@loquala.com and we will delete it.