Are Your Conversations Stored? What the Privacy Policy Actually Says

Short answer: the privacy policy is the authority here, and this page will not soften it into something friendlier. It states that messages you send to other users are among the information collected, and that data is kept for as long as it is needed to run the service and meet legal obligations. It does not publish a fixed number of days.

Are chat messages stored at all?

Yes — the policy is explicit about it. Under "Information We Collect" it lists messages you send to other users alongside support requests and feedback, and it lists content you create — videos, photos, comments, messages — as a separate category. So the honest framing is not "nothing is kept" — message content is one of the things the service handles, and how long it is held for is governed by the retention section rather than by a promise on a page like this one. If you want the primary text rather than our summary, read sections 2 and 7 of the privacy policy directly.

How long is any of it kept?

The policy answers this in principles rather than in days. It says information is retained for as long as necessary to provide the service, comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes and enforce agreements. For an active account, that means as long as the account is active. It does not publish a fixed retention clock — no "30 days and gone" promise — and we are not going to invent one here. Check the effective and last-updated dates at the top of it; policies change.

Is a live video call recorded?

The policy does not publish a per-feature statement about recording live video streams — it sets out the categories of information collected and the principles for keeping it, and stops there. So treat a flat yes or no from anyone, this page included, as something they made up. What is safe to say is the practical rule: assume anything you say or show could exist somewhere afterwards. If not on the service's side, then on the other person's side, because any device on earth can point a second camera or run a screen recorder. If you would not want a clip of it to exist, keep it off the camera.

What happens when I delete my account?

The policy says that when you delete your account, personal data is removed or anonymised within a reasonable period, except where retention is required by law. Two qualifications come with it. Publicly shared content that other people have already viewed or interacted with may be kept in an anonymised form after deletion. And certain data may be held longer to meet legal, tax or regulatory requirements. So deletion is real, but it is a process with legal edges, not an instant erase button.

Is anything collected even if I never make an account?

The policy has a section for information collected automatically when you use the platform, and it is not written as conditional on signing up. It lists device information, usage data, approximate location derived from your IP address, and server logs that record your IP address, access times and system activity. That is ordinary web-infrastructure data rather than conversation content — every site you visit has some version of it — but it is worth knowing it exists before you assume that not registering makes you invisible.

Which parts of what I do are public?

The policy is unusually clear on this, with a visibility list. Nickname and display name, profile photo, your public profile page, videos and posts, blog content and public comments are all marked as things that may be public — and the profile page and published content may be indexed by search engines. Email address and phone number are marked private and never displayed publicly. Passwords are encrypted and never visible to anyone, including staff. There is also a notice that after you delete public content, search engines may take a while to catch up.

Can the other person save or screenshot me?

Yes, and no platform anywhere can honestly promise otherwise. A screen recorder, a second phone or a camera pointed at a monitor sit entirely outside anything a website controls, which is why "disappearing" features on any service are a courtesy rather than a guarantee. It is the most useful thing to know about video chat with strangers, and it has nothing to do with which site you picked. Decide what goes on camera on the assumption that it might be kept, and the rest of the privacy question gets much simpler.

Will anything be handed over to authorities?

The terms of service say that where reasonably necessary to protect the platform, its users, partners or the public, the service may preserve relevant records and cooperate with legitimate legal or regulatory requests. The same section notes that if an account is closed or access is terminated, some data may be removed or anonymised within a reasonable period while certain records are retained where necessary for legal compliance, security, fraud prevention, dispute handling or enforcement. That is standard for a platform with moderation and payments, and it is written down rather than implied.

What is never shown to anyone?

Per the visibility list: your password, which is encrypted and stated as never visible to anyone including staff, and your email address and phone number, which are marked private and never displayed publicly. Payment details are handled by third-party processors, and the policy says full card numbers are not stored. The security section also makes the standard, honest caveat that no method of transmission over the internet or electronic storage is completely secure — which is why the advice below is about what you choose to share, not about trusting any single lock.

What does all this mean for what I actually say?

Three practical habits cover most of it. Keep identifying details out of the first conversation — full name, address, workplace, school, the socials that lead to all three. Assume anything on camera could be captured by the person watching it, because it can. And treat "it is only a stranger" as a reason to be more careful rather than less, since a stranger is exactly the person with no reason to protect you. None of that requires paranoia; it is the same thinking you would apply to a conversation in a bar with the door open.

Does any of this change if I pay?

Not in the way people sometimes assume. The privacy policy applies to the service as a whole rather than to a tier of it, so paying does not buy a separate retention rule, and nobody should sell you one. What payment touches is billing data: the policy notes that when you make purchases, billing details and transaction information are collected, that processing is handled by third-party providers, and that full card numbers are not stored. What the paid side actually gets you is set out on the pricing page, and it is free to start without any of it.

Can I ask to see what is held, or have it removed?

The policy has a rights section, and it opens with an honest qualifier: depending on where you live, you may have certain rights over your personal data. The ones it lists are access — a copy of what is held about you; correction of anything inaccurate; deletion, subject to legal exceptions; portability, meaning a machine-readable copy you can take elsewhere; opting out of marketing email; and asking that processing be restricted in some circumstances. Requests go through the support contact given in that same section, and the policy says they are answered within a reasonable timeframe and in line with applicable law. Which rights actually apply to you is a question of local law, not of what any website promises.

Where do I read the real thing?

Two documents, both short enough to skim in a coffee break: the privacy policy for collection, retention, public visibility and your rights, and the terms of service for what happens to records around enforcement and account closure. If anything on this page ever contradicts them, they win — they are the binding text and this is a summary written by people who want you to read the binding text. Check the dates at the top of each when you do.

So, the short version?

Messages are among the data the service collects; retention is governed by need and by law rather than by a published countdown; deleting your account removes or anonymises personal data within a reasonable period with legal exceptions; profiles and published content are public and indexable; passwords, email and phone are not. And the part no policy can cover: the person on the other end has their own screen and their own recorder. Chat as though that is true. If you are curious what else is worth knowing about the person on the other side, start with where in the world they might be.