Privacy Policy

1. Introduction

Kink Link (“the App,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) is operated by Cascade Digital Media LLC. This Privacy Policy explains what personal information we collect, how we use it, who we share it with, and what rights you have regarding your data.

By creating an account or using Kink Link, you agree to this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the App.

Kink Link is intended exclusively for adults aged 18 and older. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone under 18.

2. Information We Collect

2.1 Information You Provide Directly

• Account information: Email address, username, and password (stored in encrypted form — we never see your plaintext password).
• Consent and acceptance records: We record that you confirmed your date of birth, acknowledged the content warning, and accepted the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy, along with the date, time, and version accepted. If you opt out of arbitration (see the Terms of Service), we record that choice and its date.
• Age verification records: To confirm you are at least 18, we record your date of birth and, where an age or identity check is required, the method used (self-declared date of birth, automated facial age estimation, or identity-document verification), the result of the check, non-image results such as an estimated age band and a liveness score, a reference identifier that lets us retrieve the check from our verification provider, and the date and time. We do not store the selfie or identity-document images used for these checks — those are processed by our verification provider (see Section 4.2) under its own retention schedule.
• Profile information: Date of birth, gender identity, sexual orientation, relationship style, BDSM role preferences, kink interests, bio, title, profile photo, additional photos, and social/external links you choose to add.
• Location information: City, region, and country you enter on your profile. If you enable the “nearby members” feature, we also collect your approximate GPS coordinates. For your safety, these coordinates are rounded to a coarse grid (roughly a third of a mile) before they’re stored — we never store or display your exact location, and other members cannot use the app to pinpoint precisely where you are. You can disable location sharing at any time in your profile. If you choose to add them, we also collect and display on your profile the travel plans you enter (destination city and dates) and the names of upcoming events you plan to attend; this information is visible to other members and you can remove it at any time.
• Messages: The content of direct messages and group messages you send and receive within the App.
• Social connections: Friend requests you send or receive, your friend connections, winks you send or receive, and the members you block. Winks automatically expire 30 days after they are sent. We use this to operate social features and to enforce your blocks.
• Photos: Images you upload to your profile albums, avatar, and banner; photos you share in messages; and photos you post to Buy/Sell marketplace listings. All uploaded photos are automatically scanned by our content moderation systems (AWS Rekognition and Sightengine) to detect prohibited content and AI-generated images before they become visible to other members. When you upload a photo outside your primary profile album, you also provide a declaration of whether the photo contains explicit content; this declaration and its timestamp are stored as part of the photo’s record.
• Content moderation records: For each photo you upload, we store the results of automated screening (moderation labels and confidence scores from our scanning providers) and the photo’s moderation status. If a photo is rejected, we store the reason and any appeal you submit. If an account repeatedly attempts to upload prohibited content, we record internal notes about that activity.
• Marketplace listings: If you use the Buy/Sell marketplace, we collect the listing title, description, price, category, condition, and photos you post, and the honesty/reliability ratings and comments you give or receive from a buyer or seller after a completed transaction.
• Payment information: If you upgrade to a paid membership, payment is processed by a third-party payment processor. We do not store your card number, CVV, or full payment details — our payment processor handles this and provides us only with a customer reference ID and subscription status.
• Support communications: If you contact us at support@kinklinkapp.com, we retain that correspondence.

2.2 Information Collected Automatically

• Device and usage data: When you use the App, we and our service providers may collect your IP address, device type, operating system, app version, and general usage patterns. We also temporarily log the IP address of sign-up and invite-code requests to limit automated abuse.
• Push notification tokens: If you enable push notifications, we store a device token to deliver notifications to your device.
• Profile visits: We record when members view your profile so you can see who has visited. This is a feature of the App, not background tracking.
• Anti-abuse signals: We compute and store signals used to detect automated or abusive accounts, such as a bot-likelihood score derived from account and usage patterns.
• Analytics events: Our analytics provider collects events about how users use the App (for example, screens viewed, features used, and onboarding steps completed) to help us understand usage and improve the App. These analytics are not linked to your profile or identity and are not used for advertising.

2.3 Sensitive Information

Your profile may include information about your sexual orientation, gender identity, and sexual interests and preferences. This is special category personal data under applicable law. We collect and process this information solely based on your explicit, freely given consent when you create and populate your profile. You may delete this information at any time.

If you complete an age or identity verification check, our verification provider processes an image of your face (and, on the document path, your identification document) to estimate your age or confirm your identity. This is a biometric process carried out only to verify age or identity, only when you actively take part in a check, and the underlying images are not retained by Kink Link. See Section 5.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to:

• Create and maintain your account
• Verify that you are at least 18 years old, including through a third-party age-estimation and identity-verification provider
• Display your profile to other verified adult members
• Enable messaging, winks, friend connections, profile visits, groups, blocking, and other social features
• Deliver push notifications based on your preferences
• Process payments for premium membership via our payment processor
• Send transactional emails (account verification, password reset, system notices) via our email service provider
• Understand how the App’s features are used and improve the App
• Show you nearby members if you enable location sharing
• Scan uploaded photos using automated content moderation systems to detect prohibited content (including explicit imagery involving minors, hate symbols, and graphic violence) and AI-generated images before making them visible to other members
• Enforce our Terms of Service, including suspending or removing accounts that violate community standards
• Detect and prevent fraud, abuse, spam, and unauthorized access, including automated systems that assess accounts for signs of bot or abusive activity and flag them for staff review
• Investigate reports of harassment, threats, non-consensual image sharing, and other violations — which may include admin review of private messages, uploaded photos, and private group content (membership, chat, and forum posts) involving the reported account or group
• Comply with legal obligations

We do not use your data for advertising. We do not sell your personal information to third parties.

4. How We Share Your Information

4.1 With Other Members

Your profile information (username, photos in non-private albums, bio, interests, location city/region) is visible to other verified adult members of Kink Link, subject to your privacy settings. Messages you send are visible to their recipients. If you enable online status, other members can see when you are active; you can disable this at any time in your profile settings, and your online status is shown in real time — we do not keep a history of when you were online. Marketplace listings you post are visible to other members while active, and honesty/reliability ratings and comments from a completed transaction are visible on your profile. If you join a group, your username and profile are visible to that group’s other members, and content you post in a group is visible to its members. Your profile visibility and what you share is under your control within the App.

4.2 With Service Providers

We share data with the following third-party providers who process it on our behalf:

Each provider is contractually bound to use your data only to provide services to us and to maintain appropriate security standards.

4.3 Legal Requirements

We may disclose your information if required to do so by law, court order, or government authority, or if we believe disclosure is necessary to protect the rights, property, or safety of Cascade Digital Media LLC, our members, or the public.

4.4 Business Transfers

If Cascade Digital Media LLC is acquired, merged, or its assets are transferred, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction. While this is not our intent with building this app, we will notify you via email or in-app notice before your information becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

5. Age Verification

Kink Link is restricted to adults aged 18 and older, and we take active steps to verify age.

5.1 Date of Birth

During onboarding you must enter your date of birth and acknowledge that you are an adult. If the date you enter indicates you are under 18, your registration is stopped and no profile is created. Your date of birth is stored as part of your account record and is never displayed to other members.

5.2 Age and Identity Checks

As part of onboarding you must also complete an age verification check before you can access the App. Depending on your location, applicable law, and the result of earlier steps, this check is carried out by our third-party verification provider, Didit, and takes one of the following forms:

• Facial age estimation: You take a live photo of your face in the App. The image is sent to Didit, which estimates from facial characteristics whether you appear to be at least 18. Kink Link does not store this image — it is transmitted to Didit for the check and then discarded by the App.
• Identity document verification: If facial age estimation does not confirm your age, or you cannot use a camera, you complete a document check hosted by Didit: you photograph a government-issued ID and take a selfie, and Didit confirms the document is genuine, that the selfie matches it, and that the date of birth on the document is 18 or older. Kink Link does not receive or store the ID or face images from this step — only the outcome.

5.3 What Kink Link Stores

From these checks we store: your date of birth; which method was used (self-declared, facial age estimation, or identity document); the outcome (pass, fail, or needs review); non-image results such as an estimated age band and a liveness score; a reference identifier that lets us retrieve the check from Didit; and the date and time. We do not store the selfie or identity-document images.

5.4 Our Verification Provider

Didit acts as our data processor for age and identity checks and is contractually bound to use the data only to perform them. Didit retains the data for a verification session for up to one month and deletes any facial biometric template together with the session. Didit operates a United States entity (Didit Identity, Inc., Delaware) and a separate European entity (Didit Identity Spain, S.L.). See Section 4.2.

5.5 If Verification Is Temporarily Unavailable

If our verification provider cannot be reached when you register, you may be allowed to finish creating your account on a provisional basis and asked to complete verification the next time you open the App. Until you do, adult content is hidden from your account.

5.6 Biometric Processing

Facial age estimation, and the selfie match within document verification, involve processing of biometric characteristics by Didit. This processing occurs only to confirm your age or identity, only when you actively take part in a check, and the underlying images are not retained by Kink Link. You choose whether to complete these checks; if verification is required for your account and you complete neither the facial nor the document path, you will not be able to access the App.

5.7 Ongoing Verification

We may re-check age or identity if we have reason to believe an account holder is under 18, and we may suspend or terminate accounts that fail verification or that we cannot verify. Accounts found to belong to minors are terminated and their data deleted, except where we are legally required to preserve it.

6. Data Retention and Account Deletion

We retain your personal information for as long as your account is active.

6.1 What Happens When You Delete Your Account

When you request account deletion, your account is immediately deactivated — you are signed out and your profile becomes invisible to other members. Your data is then permanently and irreversibly purged from our active systems after a 14-day retention period. This window exists to support law enforcement cooperation and comply with legal hold obligations. Once the 14-day period elapses, deletion cannot be undone.

The following occurs when deletion is finalized after the retention period:

6.2 Retention for Active Accounts

For active accounts, we retain your personal information for as long as your account exists. Data that you remove from your profile (such as photos you delete or profile information you clear) is deleted promptly from our active systems.

After the deletion described above, residual copies of data may remain in our routine disaster-recovery backups. These backups are not used in the ordinary operation of the App, are encrypted, and are overwritten on a rolling basis, generally within 30 days.

If your Premium membership lapses, groups you created may be locked or reassigned as described in the Terms of Service (Section 8.8). A locked private group and all of its content is permanently deleted after 90 consecutive days locked.

A photo that is rejected by content moderation is retained for up to 30 days, or until any appeal is finally decided, and is then deleted. Automated moderation labels, scores, and status for a photo are kept for as long as the photo exists.

7. Security

We take the security of your data seriously, including data that is sensitive in nature. Our security measures include:

• Encrypted connections (HTTPS/TLS) for all data in transit
• Row-Level Security on all database tables, ensuring users can only access data they are authorized to see
• Private photo storage with signed, time-limited URLs (photos are not publicly accessible via direct links)
• Hashed password storage (we never store plaintext passwords)
• Regular security reviews of our access controls and infrastructure

No system is completely secure. If you believe your account has been compromised, contact us immediately at support@kinklinkapp.com.

In the event of a data breach that affects your personal information, we will notify you as required by applicable law, including applicable state and federal data breach notification requirements. We will make reasonable efforts to notify affected users promptly and provide information about what data was affected, what steps we are taking, and what steps you can take to protect yourself.

8. Your Rights

8.1 All Users

Regardless of where you live, you have the right to:

• Access: Request information about the personal data we hold about you. We will work to fulfill such requests and, where technically feasible, provide your data in a usable format.
• Correction: Update or correct inaccurate information (most profile data can be updated directly in the App).
• Deletion: Request deletion of your account and personal data. You can delete your account in the App under the menu (top left) → My Profile → Delete Profile, or by emailing support@kinklinkapp.com.
• Withdraw consent: You may withdraw consent to processing your sensitive information (sexual preferences, orientation, etc.) at any time by removing that information from your profile or deleting your account.

8.2 European Economic Area (EEA), UK, and Switzerland — GDPR Rights

If you are located in the EEA, UK, or Switzerland, you have additional rights under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or equivalent laws:

• Right to portability: Request your personal data in a structured, machine-readable format where technically feasible. We will work to fulfill portability requests in a timely manner.
• Right to restriction: Request that we restrict processing of your data in certain circumstances.
• Right to object: Object to processing based on legitimate interests.
• Right to lodge a complaint: You have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority.
• Right regarding automated decision-making: We use automated systems to screen uploaded images for prohibited content and to flag accounts that show signs of automated or abusive behavior. These systems can automatically reject, hold, or remove an image. They do not, by themselves, suspend, restrict, or terminate an account — a member of our team reviews the matter before any account-level action is taken. Where an automated decision removes your content, you may request human review (an appeal) for most categories of content, though certain categories (such as hate symbols and imagery) are not eligible for appeal. Member visibility and search results are based on filters you apply, not on algorithmic scoring or ranking of members.
• Automated age estimation: We use an automated facial age-estimation check during sign-up to confirm you are over 18. If it cannot confirm your age, you are offered an identity-document check as an alternative. A failed or unavailable check prevents access to the App but does not by itself delete an existing account; you may contact support@kinklinkapp.com to request human review.

Legal bases for processing:

We process your personal data under the following legal bases:

• Consent: for sensitive data (sexual orientation, kink interests) and for push notifications
• Contract performance: to provide the services you signed up for
• Legitimate interests: for security, fraud prevention, and service improvement
• Legal obligation: where required by applicable law

International data transfers:

Your data is stored and processed in the United States. Transfers from the EEA to the US are made under Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) as approved by the European Commission, which our service providers maintain.

To exercise your GDPR rights, contact us at support@kinklinkapp.com. We will respond within 30 days.

8.3 Washington Residents — My Health MY Data Act

If you are a Washington State resident, where Cascade Digital Media LLC is located, you have rights under Washington’s My Health MY Data Act (MHMD Act) with respect to consumer health data. The MHMD Act defines consumer health data broadly to include information about sexual orientation and gender identity — categories of data that Kink Link collects as part of your profile.

Under the MHMD Act, you have the right to:

• Access: Confirm whether we are collecting your consumer health data and receive a copy of it.
• Withdraw consent: Withdraw your consent for the collection or sharing of your consumer health data at any time. You may do this by removing the relevant information from your profile or by deleting your account.
• Deletion: Request deletion of your consumer health data. You can delete your account and all associated data in the App under the menu (top left) → My Profile → Delete Profile.

We do not sell consumer health data. We do not share your sexual orientation, gender identity, or related profile information with third parties for advertising or marketing purposes. To exercise your rights under the MHMD Act, contact us at support@kinklinkapp.com.

8.4 California Residents — CCPA

If you are a California resident, you have the following rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA):

• Right to know: Request disclosure of the categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you.
• Right to delete: Request deletion of your personal information, subject to certain exceptions.
• Right to opt out of sale: We do not sell your personal information.
• Right to non-discrimination: We will not discriminate against you for exercising your CCPA rights.

To submit a CCPA request, email support@kinklinkapp.com with the subject line “CCPA Request.”

9. Cookies and Tracking

Kink Link is a mobile and web application. We use session tokens (stored locally on your device) to keep you logged in. We do not use advertising cookies or cross-site tracking technologies.

We do not currently respond to browser or device Do Not Track signals, as no uniform industry standard for how online services should respond to such signals has been established.

10. Children’s Privacy

Kink Link is strictly for adults aged 18 and older. At sign-up we require every user to enter a date of birth and to pass an age-estimation or identity-verification check designed to prevent anyone under 18 from creating an account. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18. If we become aware that a user is under 18, we will immediately terminate their account and delete their data. If you believe a minor has created an account, please immediately contact us at support@kinklinkapp.com.

11. Third-Party Links

Your profile may include links to external platforms (social media, personal websites, etc.) that you add voluntarily. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of those external sites.

12. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make material changes, we will notify you via in-app notice or email at least 30 days before those changes take effect. Material changes to this Privacy Policy are bundled with a new Terms of Service version. When that occurs, the App will present the updated Terms for your explicit re-acceptance before you may continue using the Service — your acceptance of the updated Terms also constitutes your acceptance of the updated Privacy Policy.

13. Contact Us

For privacy-related questions, requests, or complaints:

For account deletion requests, you may also use the in-app option under the menu (top left) → My Profile → Delete Profile.