Privacy Policy

You can explore the website without signing in. To log your surf, request photos, use messages or keep your account across devices, verify your email with a one-time link or code. We use that email to authenticate you. Your session stays in this browser until you sign out; original photos are downloaded only when you request them.

Makai is a project by Anthony Chávez and Gema Domínguez. For any privacy matter, write to hola@makaisurf.app. We reply within 30 calendar days at the latest.

The app works as a guest. Opening it creates an anonymous identity: a random identifier, with no email, no phone number and no name. We ask for no sign-up to browse beaches, conditions or sessions.

Only if you want your profile to survive across devices can you use Sign in with Apple. In that case we receive the identifier Apple hands us and, if you allow it, your email. If you choose to hide it, Apple gives us a relay address and we never see the real one.

• Public name and role (surfer or photographer): so others know who they are meeting. You pick the name; it does not have to be your legal one.
• Account identifier: to tie your sessions and photos together. Inside the app, others see you through a public identifier that differs from the internal one.
• Location for nearby beaches: the website can use an approximate area derived from your IP address. If you choose “Use my location”, your browser asks permission for a single location reading. Makai uses it to sort beaches, without saving it to your account or sending it to a map provider. You can instead choose a beach manually. In the mobile app, location is optional and used while you use the app; we keep no location history.
• Photos and videos you pick: only the files you explicitly select in the system picker. Makai cannot reach the rest of your library, the camera or the microphone.
• Session content: title, notes, times, chat messages and coverage offers, so the plan works.
• Basic app usage: to catch errors and understand what breaks. There is no advertising analytics.
• Waitlist email: if you leave it on this site, we use it only to tell you when we launch.

When a photographer uploads a moment it stays private and pending. Nobody else can see it — not even the people who were in the water — until its author taps “deliver”. From then on, only those who took part in that session get access.

Storage is never public: every view uses a temporary signed URL. On upload we strip EXIF and XMP metadata, including the geolocation cameras and phones embed by default. The server rejects any file that still carries it.

Photographers can bring photos from their own Instagram professional account into their Makai portfolio. When you do, we ask Instagram only for the list of your photos and the image files you tick. We do not read or store your Instagram username, profile, captions, comments, likes or the links to your posts, and we never publish anything to Instagram. The access Instagram grants us is kept in an encrypted cookie in your browser for under an hour and is discarded when the import ends; nothing about your Instagram account is saved on our servers. The imported photos become ordinary portfolio photos: re-encoded, stripped of metadata, and removable from “My portfolio” at any time. You can also revoke Makai’s access from your Instagram settings.

• We do not track you, inside the app or anywhere else.
• No IDFA, no Apple tracking prompt, no advertising SDKs.
• We do not sell or rent personal data to anyone.
• We do not read your contacts or any health data.
• We do not send push notifications yet. When we turn them on we will ask you then and update this page.

The database and files live on Supabase, on European Union servers (Ireland). Sea and wind conditions come from Open-Meteo and carry no personal data.

We keep your profile and content while your account exists. Delete it and everything goes immediately. Abuse reports may be kept as long as needed to handle the complaint, even if the reported account is gone.

You can access, correct and delete your data. The fastest route is inside the app:

• Correct: edit your profile (name, role, photo) whenever you like.
• Delete: Profile → Delete my account. Deletion is immediate and final; there is no recycle bin.
• Access or export: write to hola@makaisurf.app and we will send you a copy.
• Block and report: you can block anyone and report content from within the app.

If you believe we handle your data poorly, you may complain to your country’s data protection authority.

Makai is not aimed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly ask them for data. If you find that a child has given us information, write to us and we will delete it.

If we change how we handle data, we update this page and its date. When the change matters, we will also say so inside the app.

Questions? Support.