Last updated 03.07.2025
PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING OUR SERVICE ON THIS MOBILE APPLICATION
This document (“Privacy Policy”) aims to outline the information that we collect, why we collect it, how it is used and your choices and rights regarding your information. Thank you for taking the time to read it.
WHO WE ARE AND HOW TO CONTACT US
Sphere App Ltd is the controller and company responsible for your personal data (“we” “us” or “our” in this Privacy Policy):
Contact Details:
Sphere App Ltd
20 Wenlock Road,
London N1 7GU
If you have any questions, please contact us by email at:
hello@sphereapp.co.uk
Please do not write to us at the above address.
2. WHERE THIS PRIVACY POLICY APPLIES
This Privacy Policy applies to websites, apps, events, and other services we operate within under the brand “Sphere.” For simplicity, we refer to all of these as our “services” for the purpose of this Privacy Policy.
3. HOW AND WHAT TYPES OF PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT
In order to enable users to maximise their professional networks and build meaningful connections, we need to collect personal information.
Your basic profile information is used to help connect you with other relevant Sphere users, and is also used to allow other potential Sphere connections understand a bit about you, if they want to connect.
3.1 Information we receive from you:
When you create an account on Sphere, you provide us with personal details to set-up your profile including your name, email address, company, and phone number.
You can choose to share additional information with us, such as opting to connect Sphere with your LinkedIn, or providing bio details.
You may also upload other content such as photos, videos and audio clips, and in order to upload these you may allow us to access your camera, photo album or microphone.
Whereby you provide the above information, you consent to us using it for the purposes as identified and laid out in this Privacy Policy.
When you choose to participate in our promotions, events, or competitions, we collect the information that you use to register and enter.
When you choose to participate in surveys or market studies, you give us your insights into our products and services, responses to our questions and testimonials.
If you contact us, through our support team or on social media (Instagram etc), then we collect the information that you give us in order to assist you.
If you share information with us about other people (for example you recommend a friend to Sphere), then we process this information on your behalf in order to complete the request.
We monitor and process your messages and other content you upload in order to secure our services, and try to keep our community as safe and enjoyable as possible.
3.2 Information we receive from others:
Users may provide information about you, through the course of using our services, for instance as they interact with you, or if they contact support about you if they believe you have violated our Terms and Conditions.
You may decide to share information with us via your social media account. For example, if you decide to create and login to your Sphere account via your social media account or other account (e.g. Google, apple or Instagram), or if you upload content onto Sphere from one of your social media accounts (e.g. Facebook or Instagram).
Where our ads are published on a Partner’s service, we may receive information about you.
Where legally allowed, we can also receive information about users who have violated Sphere’s Terms and Conditions from third parties, as part of our efforts to ensure safety and security for all Sphere users.
3.3 Information generated or automatically collected when you use our services:
When you use our services, this generates technical data about which features you’ve used, how you’ve used them, and which devices you have used to access our services.
Usage information e.g. when you logged in, features you’ve been using, actions taken, information shown to you, and ads that you interacted with, interactions with other users
Hardware and software information about your device e.g. IP address, device ID, device type, apps settings, app crashes, advertising IDs, or other technologies (e.g. web beacons, pixels and SDKs) that may uniquely identify a device or browser.
3.4 Information collected with your consent:
Precise geolocation data – if you give us your consent and enable your ‘Location Services’, then we can collect your precise geolocation from your device. This collection of geolocation can occur in the background even when you aren’t actively using our services, if the permission you gave permits such collection.
Profiling data – we will use your profile data to match you with other relevant users.
4. WHY WE COLLECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
The main reasons that we require and use your information is to deliver and improve our services. Additionally, we may use your information to help keep you and our community safe, and to provide you with advertising that may be of interest to you.
4.1 To administer your account and provide our services to you (performance of a contract with you to provide you with the Services and consent with respect to electronic marketing)
Create and manage your account
Provide you with Customer support
Communicate with you about our services, competitions and other promotions
4.2 To help you connect with other Sphere users (performance of a contract with you to provide the Services)
Recommend you to other Sphere users, e.g. as part of ‘Sphere Suggestions’
Enable users to search and connect with other users
4.3 To provide offers and operate advertising and marketing campaigns (necessary for our legitimate interests to study how users use our Services, to develop them and inform our marketing strategy)
Perform advertising campaigns
Reporting / measure effectiveness of these campaigns
Communicate with you about our services that we think might be of interest to you
4.4 To improve our services / develop further relevant services (necessary for our legitimate interests to improve our Services and to inform our marketing strategy)
Administer focus groups, market studies and surveys
Review interactions with our support team
Understand how users typically use our services to improve them
Develop new features and services (e.g. a new feature raised in a focus group)
4.5 To prevent and fight fraud and other illegal or unauthorised activities (necessary for your vital interest and to comply with legal obligations)
Find and address suspected or alleged violations of our Terms and Conditions
Better understand and prevent violations of our Terms and Conditions, through retaining data related to any violations in an attempt to prevent recurrences.
Enforce or exercise our rights, as set out in our Terms and Conditions.
Communicate to individuals who have reported any suspected or alleged violations to our Support team.
4.6 To ensure legal compliance
Comply with legal requirements
Assist law enforcement
4.7 To enforce legal rights or defend or undertake legal proceedings
for our legitimate interests, i.e. to protect our business, interests and rights
5. HOW WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
Given our goal is to help you to make meaningful professional connections, the main sharing of users’ information is with other users.
5.1 With other users
You share information with other users when you voluntarily disclose information on the service (e.g. setting up your profile). Please make sure that all information and content that you share is stuff that you are comfortable with being seen by others.
Should you choose to limit the audience for all or part of your profile, or for certain content or information about you, then your content or information will only be visible according to the settings that you have applied. However, if someone contacts our Support team and makes a claim that you have violated our Terms and Conditions then we may communicate to the user any actions that we have taken as a result of their enquiry.
5.2 With our service providers and other partners
We use vendors to help us operate, distribute, market, and improve our services, such as through data hosting and maintenance, analytics, customer care, marketing, advertising, payment processing and security operations. We also share information with vendors who distribute and assist us in advertising our services. For instance, we may share limited information on you in hashed, non-human readable form to advertising vendors. We follow a strict vetting process prior to engaging any vendor or working with any partner. Our vendors and partners must agree to strict confidentiality obligations.
5.3 For corporate transactions
We may transfer your information if we are involved, whether in whole or in part, in a merger, sale, acquisition, divestiture, restructuring, reorganisation, dissolution, bankruptcy or other change of ownership or control.
5.4 With law enforcement / when required by law
We may disclose your information if reasonably necessary: (i) to comply with a legal process, such as a court order or search warrant, government / law enforcement investigation or other legal requirements; (ii) to assist in the prevention or detection of crime (subject in each case to applicable law); or (iii) to protect the safety of any person.
5.5 To enforce legal rights
We may also share information: (i) if disclosure would mitigate our liability in an actual or threatened lawsuit; (ii) as necessary to protect our legal rights and legal rights of our users, business partners or other interested parties; (iii) to enforce our agreements with you; and (iv) to investigate, prevent, or take other action regarding illegal activity, suspected fraud or other wrongdoing.
6. CROSS-BORDER DATA TRANSFER
When we transfer personal information outside of the United Kingdom, we ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by ensuring that one of the following safeguards are in place:
We will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed by the UK to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data; OR
We may use specific standard contractual terms approved for use in the UK which give the transferred personal data the same protection as it has in the UK, namely the International Data Transfer Agreement or the International Data Transfer Addendum to the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses for international data transfers. To obtain a copy of these contractual safeguards, please contact us on the details set out above; or
Such other safeguard as may be permitted under applicable data protection laws.
7. YOUR RIGHTS AND CHOICES
7.1 Access / Update Settings
Account settings can help you access, rectify or remove information that you provided to us and that’s associated with your account directly within the service. If you have any questions please contact our Support team.
7.2 Device permissions
Mobile platforms can have permission systems for specific types of device data and notifications, such as phone contacts, pictures, location services, push notifications and advertising identifiers. You can change your settings on your device to either consent or oppose the collection or processing of the corresponding information or the display of the corresponding notifications. Of course, if you do that, certain services may lose functionality.
7.3 Uninstall
You can stop all information collection by an app by uninstalling it using the standard uninstall process for your device.
Remember that uninstalling an app does NOT delete/close your account. To close your account, please use the corresponding functionality on the service.
7.4 Delete and close account
You can close your account by using the corresponding functionality directly on the service, we will delete your personal data after our retention period detailed in section 8 below.
7.5 Complaints
In certain countries, including in the European Economic Area and the United Kingdom, you have a right to lodge a complaint with the appropriate data protection authority if you have concerns about how we process your personal information. The data protection authority you can lodge a complaint with may be that of your habitual residence, where you work or where an alleged infringement took place.
7.6 Update your personal data
If you would like to correct your personal data because it is incorrect or accurate please contact our Support Team.
7.7 Request transfer of personal data
If you would like to do this please contact our Support Team.
8. USER CONDUCT & ACCOUNT TERMINATION
We are committed to maintaining a safe, respectful, and legally compliant environment for all users. By using our app, you agree not to engage in any behavior that:
Violates any applicable laws or regulations
Harasses, threatens, or harms others
Infringes on intellectual property or privacy rights
Involves spamming, hacking, or misuse of the platform
Attempts to circumvent app security or misuse features
We reserve the right to suspend or permanently remove (ban) your access to the app, without prior notice, if we determine that you have violated these terms or engaged in conduct we believe may harm other users or the integrity of the platform.
In cases of permanent account removal, we may also delete or restrict access to your data and content, in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
9. HOW LONG DO WE RETAIN YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
We keep your personal information only as long as we need it for legitimate business purposes (as laid out in Section 4) and as permitted by applicable law. If you decide to stop using our services, you can close your account and your profile will stop being visible to other users. Note that we will close your account automatically if you are inactive for a period of two years. After your account is closed, we will delete your personal information, as laid out below:
To protect the safety and security of our users, we implement a safety retention window of three months following account closure. During this period, we keep your information in the event that it might be necessary to investigate unlawful or harmful conducts. The retention of information during this safety retention window is based on our legitimate interest as well as that of potential third-party victims.
Once the safety retention window elapses, we delete your data and only keep limited information for specified purposes, as laid out below:
a) We maintain limited data to comply with legal data retention obligations: in particular, we keep transaction data for 10 years to comply with tax and accounting legal requirements. We may also need to keep “traffic data” / logs for one year to comply with legal data retention obligations. We also keep records of consents users give us for five years to evidence our compliance with applicable law.
b) We maintain limited information on the basis of our legitimate interest: we keep customer care records and supporting data as well as imprecise location of download/purchase to support our customer care decisions, enforce our rights and enable us to defend ourselves in the event of a claim, profile data in anticipation of potential litigation, for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims, and data necessary to prevent users who were banned or people who were found to be under the age of 18 from opening a new account, for no longer than necessary to ensure the safety and vital interests of our users.
c) Finally, we maintain information on the basis of our legitimate interest where there is an outstanding or potential issue, claim or dispute requiring us to keep information (in particular if we receive a valid legal subpoena or request asking us to preserve data (in which case we would need to keep the data to comply with our legal obligations) or if data would otherwise be necessary as part of legal proceedings).
10. NO CHILDREN ALLOWED
Our services are restricted to individuals who are 18 years of age or older. We do not permit individuals under the age of 18 on our platform. If you suspect that a user is under the age of 18, please contact Support.
11. PRIVACY POLICY CHANGES
Because we’re always looking for new and innovative ways to help you build meaningful connections and strive to make sure explanations about our data practices remain up-to-date, this policy may change over time. We will notify you before any material changes take effect so that you have time to review the changes.
12. THIRD PARTY LINKS
Our website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins, and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements.
13. COMPLAINTS OR CONCERNS
If you have any complaints or concerns about how we are processing your personal data, then please contact the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO):
By telephone on: 0303 123 1113
Or fill out a form online: https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/contact-us-public/. However, we would always appreciate the opportunity to try and resolve your complaint in the first instance.