PULLSE

Privacy Policy

Last updated: October 2026

This Privacy Policy describes how Pullse (“we,” “us,” or “our”) collects, uses, and shares information when you use the Pullse mobile application (the “App”). By using the App, you agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this policy.

1. Information We Collect

We collect the following types of information:

  • Account Information: When you create an account, we collect your mobile phone number, which is how you sign in, and your display name and profile photo (if provided). Your phone number is never shown to other users.
  • Location Data: The App collects your precise geographic location in real time when the App is in use. This is essential to the core functionality of discovering nearby users and sending/receiving PULLSES. If you are in Public Mode, your location is shared with nearby users.
  • Heat Map Data: In Public Mode only, your location is counted toward an anonymous map of how busy places are. Private Mode users are never counted. See Section 5 for exactly what this involves and how it is used.
  • Messages: We collect the content of PULLSES you send through the App. PULLSES are temporary and are automatically deleted after their expiration period.
  • Your Pods: the phone numbers you send Pod requests to (or, for a request sent from a profile you saw nearby, that account and the name you saw), the people in your Inner Circle and Outer Circle and which circle you put each of them in, and the settings you choose for each person, such as whether they can see your location, in-range alerts, and whose Pod IMPULLSE notifications you receive.
  • Pod IMPULLSES: the two photos, text, stickers, the “where are you” description, and the start and end time of each Pod IMPULLSE you post, which Pods you shared it with, whether you invited them to pull up, and which Pod members have seen it, liked it or said they are pulling up. Everyone a Pod IMPULLSE reaches can see how many likes it has; only you see who liked it.
  • Device Information: We may collect information about your device, including device type, operating system, and unique device identifiers.
  • Usage Data: We collect information about how you use the App, including interactions, features used, and timestamps.

2. How We Use Your Information

We use your information to:

  • Provide and maintain the App’s core features, including location-based discovery and temporary messaging.
  • Display your profile (photo and approximate distance) to nearby users when you are in Public Mode. In Public Mode, you can also discover and PULLSE other nearby Public users. To keep profiles current, you are shown on Discover only while your selfie is less than 24 hours old; we remind you an hour before it expires, and after that you are hidden until you take a new one.
  • Share your Pod IMPULLSES with the Pods you choose and notify them when you post one, tell Pod members when you are nearby, and show your location to the Inner Circle members you allow.
  • Deliver PULLSE messages between users.
  • Improve, personalize, and develop new features.
  • Enforce our Terms of Service and protect against misuse.
  • Communicate with you about updates or changes to the App.

3. Information Sharing

Your Pods are your responsibility

  • You decide who joins your Pods, whether each person is in your Inner Circle or Outer Circle, and what each person gets from you.
  • Anything you share with a Pod member, including your location, where you say you will be, and your photos, can be screenshotted or passed on. We cannot take it back.
  • Add only people you know and trust, review your Pods and each person’s settings regularly in Manage Pods, and move, remove, or block anyone you no longer trust.

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

  • With Other Users: Your display name, profile photo, and approximate location are visible to nearby users based on your mode settings. PULLSE message content is shared with the intended recipient.
  • With Your Pods: people in your Inner Circle can see your live location on their Heat Map (unless you turn that off for them) and you on Discover when you are within about 400 feet, even in Private Mode. People in either Pod can see the Pod IMPULLSES you share with that Pod and get a notification when you come within about 400 feet. Your Outer Circle never sees your location, and while you are in Private Mode it cannot PULLSE you or be notified when you are nearby. Nobody outside your Pods sees any of this.
  • As Anonymous Heat Map Counts: in Public Mode only, your approximate area contributes to aggregated density counts that every user can see. These counts carry no name, photo, profile, or account identifier, and no other user can read your individual report. In Private Mode you are not included in them.
  • Service Providers: We use third-party services (such as Firebase by Google) to operate the App. These providers may process your data on our behalf.
  • Legal Requirements: We may disclose your information if required by law, legal process, or government request.
  • Safety: We may disclose information if we believe it is necessary to protect the safety of any person or to prevent illegal activity.

4. Data Retention

PULLSES are temporary. The sender chooses how long one lasts — 10 minutes, 30 minutes, or 1 hour — after which it can no longer be opened. Expired and unopened PULLSES, including any photographs they contain, are then deleted from our systems roughly 12 hours after they were sent.

We cannot guarantee that a recipient has not screenshotted or photographed a PULLSE before it expired. Please treat anything you send as something that may be kept.

There is one exception to the 12-hour deletion. If a PULLSE is reported to us, we keep a copy of it — including any photographs — together with the report, so that we can review what happened, respond to the person who reported it, and cooperate with law enforcement where we are required to. Reported content is kept for as long as we need it for those purposes and is not visible to other users. This means that if you send a PULLSE that someone reports, your photographs may be retained beyond the normal window.

Account information is retained as long as your account is active. You may delete your account at any time through the App’s Settings page, which will remove your data from our systems, with the exceptions below. Reports filed about you, and content preserved as part of them, may be retained after your account is deleted where we need them to keep other users safe or to meet a legal obligation.

So that deleting an account and signing up again cannot be used to get around blocks or sending limits, we also keep the following after your account is deleted. None of it is ever shown to other users.

  • A fingerprint of your phone number: a keyed one-way code made from the number, which cannot be turned back into the number itself. It is kept for as long as it is needed to connect the items below to a returning phone number.
  • Blocks placed by or against your phone number, until the person who placed them removes them. Blocks you placed also keep the name and photo you saw when you blocked that person, so you can recognise them in your Blocked People list.
  • Phone numbers you block directly, from your contacts or typed in. We do not store the numbers themselves, only the same kind of one-way code, together with the contact’s name or the last four digits of the number so you can recognise it in your Blocked People list. If you allow contacts access, only the numbers you choose are sent to us; the rest of your address book never leaves your phone. We never tell you whether a number you blocked belongs to a PULLSE user.
  • A record of when you sent PULLSES and to whom, used only to enforce the daily sending limits. Each entry is deleted 24 hours after the PULLSE was sent.

Pod IMPULLSES last only as long as you choose, up to 12 hours. When one ends, when you end it early, or when you post a new one, it and its photos are deleted from our systems, normally within about 15 minutes. A reported Pod IMPULLSE is kept with the report in the same way as a reported PULLSE.

5. Location Data

Your safety on the Heat Map, even in Public Mode

  • The Heat Map never shows any individual: no names, photos, or dots.
  • An area lights up only when at least 5 Public Mode users are there together.
  • Every glow is at least 1,000 feet across and is centered on a fixed map point, not on the people in it. The most the map can ever tell anyone is “somewhere in this 1,000-foot area.”
  • Private Mode users are never counted.

Location access is fundamental to the App’s functionality. By using the App, you consent to the collection and use of your precise location. You can disable location services through your device settings at any time, but this will prevent the App from functioning properly.

  • Public Mode: your location is actively shared with nearby users, and you can discover other Public users.
  • Private Mode: you are not discoverable, your location is never shown to strangers in any way, and you are never included in the Heat Map, not even as part of an anonymous count. Your device uses your location locally to allow you to discover nearby Public users. The only people who can ever see where you are in Private Mode are the people in your Inner Circle, and only in the ways you allow. Your Outer Circle cannot see you, PULLSE you, or be notified when you are nearby while you are in Private Mode.
  • Heat Map, Public Mode only: while you are in Public Mode, the App counts you toward an anonymous map of how many people are gathered in the same place. What is published contains no name, photo, profile information, or message content, and no other user can read your individual location report.

We combine Public Mode users’ reports and publish only a glow on the map. A glow appears only where at least five people have been close together for a few minutes. People within about 400 feet of one another count as one group, and because that grouping carries along anyone connected to them in turn, a large busy area shows up as one broad glow rather than many small ones. Each glow is centered on a fixed map grid point near its group rather than on the group itself, so every place within the same roughly 500-foot square produces an identical glow, and every glow is at least about 1,000 feet across. Published brightness is grouped into broad ranges rather than exact numbers, so five people and nine people look the same. A report stops counting a few minutes after your device last sends one, and straight away when you sign out, and we do not build location histories or profiles from them.

What a glow does not tell anyone: who is there, how many are there beyond a broad range, or where within the lit area any individual person is. The wider a glow, the less it says about where any one person is standing, and because a glow requires at least five people, no single person can be picked out as the reason an area lit up.

Switching to Private Mode removes you from the Heat Map within about a minute.

Your Pods: your Inner Circle is the small group of closest friends you have accepted, and it is the only exception to the rules above. Your Outer Circle never appears on the Heat Map. People in your Inner Circle see your face and live location on their Heat Map while PULLSE is open or in the background on your phone, unless you pause sharing or turn it off for them; you can also share only your rough area instead of your precise location. A Pod member’s pin disappears within a few minutes after you close the App. Only add people you trust to your Pods.

6. Security

We take reasonable measures to protect your information. However, no method of electronic storage or transmission over the internet is 100% secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security of your data.

7. Age Requirement

The App is intended for users who are at least 18 years old. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone under 18. If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a minor, we will take steps to delete that information.

8. Your Rights

You have the right to:

  • Access the personal information we hold about you.
  • Request deletion of your account and associated data.
  • Stop being discoverable by other users at any time by switching to Private Mode.
  • Stop all location collection, including your contribution to the anonymous Heat Map, by disabling location services for the App in your device settings.
  • Contact us with questions or concerns about your privacy.

9. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy within the App. Your continued use of the App after changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy.

10. Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at shamon@pullseapp.io.