Privacy Policy
Last updated 15 September 2026. Applies to the n-earshot app for iPhone and Android and to n-earshot.com.
The short version. We never sell individual-level data. The product runs on aggregated, anonymised street-pocket statistics; nothing we publish can single out a household. We keep your phone number only in scrambled form, we never track your location, and the microphone never records audio. What follows is the full picture.
1. Who we are
n-earshot is operated in Australia by LLM Family Investments Pty Ltd (ACN 610 504 482) as trustee for the LLM Family Trust (ABN 27 213 698 865), trading as n-earshot.com ("n-earshot", "we", "us"). We are the entity responsible for the personal information described here. Contact us at privacy@n-earshot.com.
We handle personal information in line with the Australian Privacy Principles in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth), whether or not the Act requires us to.
2. What we collect, and why
You can use the map and see the score for any address without giving us anything. The rest depends on what you choose to do.
| What | When | Why | How it is held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phone number | When you sign in | One account per person; one rating per address per person; sending you the sign-in code | Only as a salted cryptographic hash. The number itself is not stored after the code is sent. We cannot recover it from the hash. |
| Sign-in codes and sessions | When you sign in | Verifying it is you | As hashes; codes expire in 5 minutes, sessions in 180 days |
| Location | Only when you tap the locate button, or when you rate an address | Centring the map; confirming you are at the address you are rating | Used in the moment on your phone. Never collected in the background, never stored as a history. A rating does not store your coordinates. |
| Sound level | Only if you add the optional 30-second sample to a rating | An indicative measurement alongside your rating | The microphone is analysed on your phone into a single number (an A-weighted level). Audio is never recorded, stored or uploaded. |
| Ratings | When you rate an address you live at | The Resident-rated part of the score | A number, fixed tags, an optional level, the address, and the hash of your phone number. There is no free-text field by design. Published only pooled with neighbours within 100 m. |
| Saved addresses and alert settings | When you save an address | Your shortlist, comparisons and alerts | With your account until you remove them or delete the account |
| Noise profile | When you choose one under Profile | Re-weighting reports for the hours you need quiet | With your account |
| Push notification token | When you allow notifications | Delivering alerts | With your account; removed when you delete the account |
| Email address | Only if you give one: the updates list, the hotels list, or the daily alert digest | Sending what you asked for | Until you unsubscribe or ask us to remove it. Every email carries an unsubscribe link. |
| Purchase status | When you buy the Moving Pass or redeem a free-week code | Opening the full reports you paid for, on any of your phones | Which pass you hold and when it ends. Payment is taken by Apple or Google; we never receive card or bank details. |
| Feedback | When you answer "Does this match?", appeal or report ratings, or ask the help assistant | Calibrating the score, moderating ratings, improving our help | See sections 4 and 5 |
| Technical logs | Every request | Keeping the service running and protecting it from abuse | Network address, time and request path, kept briefly. We do not run advertising or analytics trackers, and the app contains no analytics or advertising SDK. |
3. Ratings and publishing
- Ratings are published only as a pooled number per street pocket (within 100 metres). Nothing is shown for a single house, and there is no free text, so nothing can name a person or a neighbour.
- Our moderators see an individual rating only when handling an appeal by a property owner or a report of abuse on that pocket, and only to decide whether to quarantine or keep it. Appeal reasons go to a moderator only and are never published.
- Aggregated, anonymised street-pocket statistics may be used in the product and licensed to others. Nothing we license identifies a person or a household.
4. The AI features
Deepdive. When a full report's written brief is generated, the report's figures and evidence (never your identity, location or account) are sent to Anthropic's Claude model to write it. Reports are about addresses, not about you.
Help assistant. The question you type on the help page or under the ? in the app is sent, with which platform and screen you are on, to an AI model running on Amazon Bedrock in Australia. It answers only from our published help. Each question and answer is kept for 90 days, with no link to your account, so we can see what our help is missing. If you tick Check against my account, the assistant is also told your pass status, noise profile, how many addresses you have saved and how many have alerts on, and whether you have set a digest email or notifications: never your phone number, addresses, ratings or location. Please do not type personal details into the box. Nothing you type is used to train any model.
5. Who we share with
We share personal information only with the providers below, only for the purposes above, and never for their own marketing.
| Provider | What | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon Web Services | Hosting, the database, sending sign-in texts and emails, the help assistant's model (Amazon Bedrock) | Sydney, Australia |
| Apple and Google | Payments for the Moving Pass, delivering notifications, and app distribution | Their own terms apply; data may be processed overseas |
| RevenueCat | Confirming purchases with Apple and Google, identified by your account id (a random string), never your phone number | United States |
| Expo | Routing push notifications, and delivering app updates | United States |
| Mapbox | Map tiles. Your phone requests the map images it displays, which reveals your network address and the area viewed | United States |
| Anthropic | Writing the Deepdive from a report's evidence (no personal information) | United States |
Some of these providers are outside Australia. Where personal information goes overseas we choose providers whose commitments are at least as protective as those in this policy. We may also disclose information where the law requires it.
We do not sell personal information, and we do not share it with data brokers or advertisers.
6. How long we keep it
- Your account and everything attached to it: until you delete it. Deleting your account removes the account, your saved addresses, alert settings, push token and digest email at once. Your ratings survive only inside the anonymous street-pocket pool, with their link to your account removed.
- Two things survive deletion by design, stored as the hash of your phone number and nothing else: that this number has rated a given address (so a rating cannot be repeated by deleting and re-creating an account), and that it has used its free week.
- Sign-in codes: 5 minutes. Sessions: 180 days.
- Email list addresses: until you unsubscribe.
- Help assistant questions: 90 days, never linked to an account.
- Shared reports: a link you create shows the report as it was at that moment for as long as the link exists; email us to have one removed.
- Technical logs: briefly, for security and reliability.
7. Security
Everything travels over encrypted connections. Phone numbers, sign-in codes and session tokens are stored only as cryptographic hashes. The database sits in a private network in Sydney. Operator secrets are kept in a managed secrets store and never in code. No system is perfectly secure; if we learn of a breach affecting you, we will tell you and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner as the law requires.
8. Your choices and rights
- Use it without an account. Search, the map and every score work signed out.
- Location and microphone are asked for only when needed, and you can refuse. Refusing location means you cannot rate an address; refusing the microphone means no sound sample.
- Notifications can be turned off in your phone's settings, or per address under Saved.
- Delete your account yourself under Profile, at any time.
- Access and correction. Email privacy@n-earshot.com to ask what we hold about you, to correct it, or to have it deleted. Because we hold your phone number only as a hash, we will ask you to confirm the number so we can find your record. We aim to reply within 30 days.
- Complaints. Write to us first. If you are not satisfied, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner at oaic.gov.au.
9. Children
n-earshot is for adults choosing where to live. It is not directed at children under 16 and we do not knowingly collect their information. If you believe a child has created an account, email us and we will delete it.
10. Changes
When this policy changes we update the date at the top and, for material changes, tell signed-in users in the app. The current version is always at n-earshot.com/privacy.
11. Contact
Privacy: privacy@n-earshot.com
Everything else: info@n-earshot.com
Help: n-earshot.com/support
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