YUI Experience Network
Privacy Policy
This policy explains, in plain English, what YUI Experience Network collects during beta testing, why we use it, what other travelers can see, and how you can obtain or delete your data. YUI is the short brand name used throughout this policy.
Information we collect
- Account information provided by the signed-in service, such as your email address and display name, together with security cookies and session information needed to keep you signed in.
- Your Traveler Profile and Japan Trips, including country, age range, preferred travel style, trip dates and context, profile photo and introduction.
- Published Japan Stories and private Drafts, including trip context, text, tags, upload status and photos.
- Comments and your Helpful or Thank you activity.
- Private Beta Suggestions, Beta Feedback, copyright or content reports, and moderation appeals you send.
- Hashed network and device identifiers used to detect unusual reaction activity. YUI does not intentionally store the plain IP address in reaction logs.
- Administrative, moderation and audit records needed to understand important changes and keep the beta safe.
How we use information
- To display Stories and Traveler Profiles.
- To match trip context in Similar Traveler.
- To calculate Helpful, Thank you and Travelers Helped.
- To provide comments, reactions, Drafts, editing and account features.
- To detect abuse, investigate suspicious activity and protect contribution totals.
- To improve the beta, respond to questions and fix failed operations.
What is public
A published Story may show your chosen profile name, country, trip context, Story text, photos, representative title and contribution counts to people using YUI. Comments may show your profile image, name and country. Drafts are not public.
What stays private
Your email address, Drafts, unlinked uploads, Beta Feedback and Beta Suggestions, copyright or content reports, moderation appeals, raw moderation notes, hashed network or device identifiers, account deletion requests and export requests are not shown to ordinary travelers. You can see your own suggestions; authorized administrators can review them. Draft photos can be viewed only by you and authorized administrators.
What administrators can review
Authorized community administrators can review accounts, Stories, Draft metadata, photos, comments, reactions, suspicious-activity flags, deletion and export requests, and audit history when needed to operate or protect YUI. Access is limited to administrator-only pages and APIs.
Photos and Cloudinary Direct Upload
New Story photos, including supported JPEG, PNG, WebP, HEIC and HEIF files, are uploaded directly from your browser to Cloudinary using a short-lived signed request. The photo body does not pass through YUI’s application server. Cloudinary processes the image, applies delivery transformations, creates display and thumbnail variants, and delivers them through its CDN. YUI verifies the resulting asset and stores its stable image record and provider identifier.
YUI rejects assets when provider verification detects GPS, camera serial numbers, user comments, MakerNote or other private metadata. Safe technical display information such as orientation, color space and ICC profiles may remain. Public Story photos can be viewed by people using YUI; Draft photos are limited to the owner and authorized administrators. Earlier beta photos remain in Cloudflare R2 and use YUI’s existing image-delivery route.
Retention
Unused uploads are normally marked for deletion after 24 hours. A deleted account has a 30-day recovery period and is then eligible for permanent deletion. Hashed IP and device identifiers are initially retained for 90 days, then removed from operation logs or converted into non-identifying aggregate information. Beta Suggestion text may be retained as an improvement record after account deletion, but the submitter link, name, email and contact permission are removed. Essential anonymized audit entries may be kept for up to 365 days to document security, deletion and moderation decisions.
Access, export and deletion
Open Data & Account Settings to download a JSON copy of your data, including your Beta Suggestions, or request account deletion. You can also delete individual Stories and comments, remove profile photos, and remove Story photos without deleting your account. Account deletion immediately hides your Profile and Stories and schedules permanent deletion after the 30-day recovery period.
At permanent deletion, YUI first requests deletion of associated Cloudinary assets and confirms the provider result. It then removes associated R2 objects and D1 account records and writes an anonymized audit record. If provider deletion fails, the account purge does not continue: the asset is marked for deletion retry so that it is not silently orphaned. Limited anonymized records may remain as described under Retention.
International Privacy Rights
Depending on your country or region, you may have rights regarding your personal data. You may request access, export, deletion or correction through the contact page. Existing Data & Account Settings remain the fastest way to export your data or request account deletion during the beta.
Cookies and sessions
YUI and its hosting sign-in service use cookies or equivalent session mechanisms that are necessary for authentication, account security and beta consent. YUI does not use advertising cookies or sell activity for targeted advertising. Browser and operational logs may record limited request and error information for security and reliability.
Sharing, processors and infrastructure
YUI does not sell personal information and does not provide it to advertisers. Cloudflare provides the Sites hosting environment, D1 database and R2 object storage used by YUI. Cloudinary receives new photo uploads directly, processes and stores those assets, and delivers transformed images through its CDN. These providers process information only as needed to supply infrastructure and image services under their applicable terms and privacy commitments.
Limited information may also be disclosed when required for legal compliance, security, fraud prevention, or to protect people and the service.
Contact
Use Data & Account Settings for access, JSON export, correction through profile editing, or account deletion. For other privacy questions, use the private Beta Feedback route linked throughout YUI and label the message “YUI privacy.” Copyright reports, content reports and moderation appeals have dedicated forms on the Contact page. Include only the email used to sign in and do not send identity documents unless YUI specifically asks for them.