Privacy policy
Last updated 11 November 2026. This policy is for the Fotolo app, run by Akash Samanta ("we", "us").
The short version
- We never upload or store your photos. If a photographer shoots on their own phone, photos travel directly from their phone to yours, encrypted, and are not kept on their phone or on our servers.
- We use your location only to match you with a photographer and to show your photographer where to find you.
- Payments happen directly between you and the photographer by UPI. We never see or hold your money or bank details.
- We don't sell your personal information.
What we collect and why
| Information | Why |
|---|---|
| Mobile number (verified by SMS through Firebase Authentication) | To create and secure your account and prevent fake accounts. |
| Name, gender, date of birth | Name is shown to the other person in a booking. Gender lets customers ask for a photographer of a particular gender. Date of birth confirms you are 18 or older. |
| Emergency contact number (optional) | If you press SOS, we text this person your live trip link and last location. |
| Precise location | Customers: to find nearby photographers and set the pickup point. Photographers: while online and during a job, including when the app is in the background, so customers can see them arrive and so we can check they have really arrived. |
| Photographer profile: phone model, hourly rate, specialties, bio, portfolio links, UPI ID, ID type and last 4 characters of an ID number | Shown to customers (except ID details and UPI ID, which are shown only to our reviewers or, for the UPI ID, to the customer after a shoot so they can pay). ID details are used to review photographers before they go live. |
| Booking records: times, price, ratings, in-app chat messages, dispute reports | To run the service, bill correctly, handle complaints and keep people safe. |
| Device push token | To send notifications such as new shoot requests. |
| Camera | Photographers use it to shoot, and to scan their UPI QR code. Photos are never saved by the app on the photographer's phone. |
| Photo library (write only, on the customer's phone) | To save photos your photographer sends you. |
| Advertising data (advertising ID, IP address, device and usage information) | Collected by Google AdMob to show and measure ads. See Google's policy below. |
Who sees your information
- The other person in your booking sees your first name or name, rating and, during the booking, your pickup point and live location (customers see the photographer's live location; photographers see the customer's exact pickup only after accepting).
- Your emergency contact, only if you press SOS.
- Our service providers: Google (Firebase Authentication and Cloud Messaging for sign-in and notifications; AdMob for ads), our hosting provider and database provider. They process data for us under their own terms.
- Authorities, if the law requires it or to protect someone's safety.
Phone numbers are never shown to the other person; chat happens inside the app.
Ads
Fotolo is free and shows ads from Google AdMob. AdMob may use your advertising ID to show ads. You can reset your advertising ID or opt out of personalised ads in your Android settings (Settings, Google, Ads). We never show ads during a shoot, on the camera screen or on the payment screen. See how Google uses information from apps that use its services.
How long we keep it
- Your profile and account data: until you delete your account.
- A photographer's last known location is overwritten each time it updates and removed when they go offline or delete their account.
- Trip-sharing links stop working two hours after a shoot ends.
- After you delete your account we remove your name, phone number, date of birth, emergency contact, photographer profile details, chat messages and rating comments. We keep a minimal anonymised record of each shoot and payment (time, duration, amount) because the other person needs it for their own records and for resolving disputes. Pickup points in those records are reduced to a rough area.
Your choices and rights
You can delete your account in the app (Account, Delete account) or follow the steps on our delete account page. You can ask us to correct or give you a copy of your data by emailing aks.samanta90915@gmail.com. You can turn off location or notifications in your phone settings, though the app needs location to work.
Security
Traffic between the app and our servers is encrypted. Photo transfers between phones are end-to-end encrypted. Photographers are reviewed before going live. No system is perfectly secure, so please tell us at once if you think your account was misused.
Children
Fotolo is for people aged 18 and over. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone younger. If you believe a child has an account, email us and we will remove it.
Changes
If we change this policy in a meaningful way we will update the date above and tell you in the app.
Contact
Akash Samanta, aks.samanta90915@gmail.com