Privacy policy

Shoo is responsible for the personal data described here. Our postal address goes up here before paid plans open. Email hello@shoo.bz, or use the form on the Help and contact page.

Today this site holds the bug guides, answers and blog, the detector on the scan page, the waiting lists and a contact form. The phone app is planned and not out yet, and the shop is closed and takes no orders. The parts of this policy about the app and the shop apply from the day each one opens.

We collect what we need to name your bug, answer your message and, later, send your order. We do not sell personal data and we do not use it for advertising profiles.

Optional cookies run only if you say yes, and you can change your answer any time from "Privacy choices" at the foot of every page.

When you choose a photo on the scan page and scan it, the photo goes over an encrypted connection to our server and on to Anthropic, the company behind the Claude AI model, which identifies the bug for us. Anthropic acts as our processor: it handles the photo only to give us the answer. Its commercial terms do not allow it to train its models on our customers’ photos. Our server deletes the photo as soon as the answer comes back.

We keep a record of every scan, without the photo: the date and time, the answer (the species, how sure it was, what the photo showed), the answers you gave (the room, how often you see them, children, pets, renting), the country your connection comes from, the time zone and language your device is set to, whether the screen is phone, tablet or desktop sized, and the site or campaign that brought you. The country is looked up from your IP address at that moment in a country database kept on our own server (IP Geolocation by DB-IP, db-ip.com); the address itself is not stored. We use these records to count scans, see which bugs people find and where, and make the detector better. Records without an account are deleted after 24 months.

If you allowed Analytics, your browser also keeps a random id (sh_vid) that goes with your scans, so we can see that several scans came from the same browser. It is not linked to your name, and the site deletes it if you take your yes back. To give each visitor one free scan, and to stop sign-in links being misused, we keep a scrambled form of your IP address (a salted hash), never the address itself: for 7 days after a free first scan, and for one hour after a sign-in link is asked for.

Your first scan needs nothing; your browser then keeps a cookie, sh_first, for up to 400 days, so the scan page knows the free scan was used. After that the scan page asks for your email. We do not send anything to check it: we add it to our list of scan sign-ups and link your scans to it, including the free one. Tips by email are a separate box, unticked: three short emails about the bug you scanned, two days, one week and four weeks after, each with a link to stop them. Your browser then keeps one cookie, sh_scanner, for up to 400 days, so your scans are counted against that email and matched to any tips you asked for; it holds a number and a check code, not the email itself. To see your scans on any device, sign in to an account with a link we email you, from My account. Scan sign-ups are kept like waiting list sign-ups (see below) and deleted on request. Each account gets a few free scans. When they are used up you can ask us to email you once, the day paid plans open: that adds your email to a plans list, kept the same way.

Scans made while signed in, or with an email you later sign in with, are saved to your account, under Scans. You can delete any scan there at any time, or write to us to delete them all. A photo is kept only if you tick the box to keep it when you scan, for 30 days, then it is deleted and the scan record stays. Deleting the scan sooner deletes the photo with it.

Please photograph the bug, not people. If a face, a document or anything private ends up in the frame, use another photo.

Features that are not built yet, like the trap tracker and Night Watch, will be described here before they launch.

When you join a waiting list we keep your email address, which list you joined, your answer to the question on the form (for example which phone you have) and the date. When you write to us we keep your name, email, order number if you give one, your message and the date.

With each one we note where the visit came from, such as a search engine, the name of the site that linked to us, or a campaign name, and the first page of the visit if you allowed analytics. Both are stored in our WordPress database and emailed to us.

We use them only to send the one email the form promises, or to answer you. We delete them after 24 months, unless the conversation turned into an order or an agreement we must keep records of. To be removed sooner, write to us and we delete them.

The cookie banner offers Accept, Decline and Choose as equal buttons. Your answer is saved in one cookie, sh_consent, for 6 months. Nothing optional runs before you answer.

Shoo needs a few cookies of its own to keep you signed in and to remember your cookie choice, and, once the shop opens, to keep your cart and checkout working. They hold no tracking and go away when they are no longer needed.

With Analytics allowed, we note which site or campaign led you to sign up (once the shop opens, also which one led to an order, using WooCommerce order attribution cookies), and the site remembers the first page of your visit for the length of the browser session. We also use Google Analytics, only with Analytics allowed, to see which pages help: which pages are read, roughly from which country, on which kind of device. It sets its own cookies (names starting with _ga), which last up to two years; if you take your yes back, the site deletes them. No marketing tools are switched on. If we add one, it is named in the banner and here, and it runs only with your yes.

We also count visits without cookies, for everyone: the page address and where the visit came from (with any campaign tag in the link), whether the screen is phone, tablet or desktop sized, the language your browser is set to, the hour, how far down the page you scrolled and roughly how long it was open, clicks on links to other sites (the site's name only), waiting list popup opens and signups, and addresses that do not exist. Each is only added to its own total for the day, so the counts cannot be linked to each other or to you. No IP address, browser details or identifier is stored. Daily totals are kept for 400 days.

The shop is closed for now and takes no orders. When it opens, an order needs your name, delivery and billing address, email, phone number and what you bought. We keep order records for as long as tax and accounting law requires.

Payments will be handled by a payment provider, named here before the shop opens. We never see or store your full card number.

Anthropic, for naming bugs from the photos you scan. GoDaddy, which hosts this site. Google, which runs our email and sends the site's emails, such as sign-in links and tips, from hello@shoo.bz through Gmail, and, only with your yes to Analytics, runs Google Analytics. A payment provider and the delivery company for your parcel, once the shop opens.

Each one gets only what its job needs. We share data with authorities only when the law requires it.

Shoo is based in Albania. Some of these companies process data in other countries, Anthropic and Google in the United States among them. Those transfers rely on the data protection terms each company offers its business customers.

You can ask for a copy of your data, ask us to correct it or delete it, object to how we use it, or withdraw consent. Write to us and we answer within one month.

You can also complain to a data protection authority: in Albania that is the Information and Data Protection Commissioner, or the authority where you live.

Shoo is not made for children, and we do not knowingly collect data from anyone under 16. If you think a child has sent us their details, tell us and we delete them.

When this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it. If a change affects data we already hold, we tell you before it applies.