Privacy Policy
This policy explains how TellHawk ("TellHawk", "we", "us") collects, uses, shares and protects personal information when you visit tellhawk.com, apply to the beta programmesubscribe to a plan, or use the TellHawk research application at terminal.tellhawk.com (formerly app.tellhawk.com, which continues to work) and the emails it sends (together, the "Service").
In short
- We collect what we need to run the Service, review applications and improve TellHawk.
- We never sell or rent your personal information, and we do not use advertising trackers or third-party analytics.
- In the app, we record how the product is used only after you agree to it.
- You can ask to see, correct or delete your information at any time by writing to privacy@tellhawk.com.
1. Who we are
TellHawk provides market research and strategy-testing tools. TellHawk is responsible for the personal information described in this policy and has designated a privacy lead who is accountable for our compliance with it. You can reach our privacy lead at privacy@tellhawk.com.
We handle personal information in line with Canada's Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) and, where they apply to you, the privacy laws of the place where you live.
2. Information we collect
When you visit tellhawk.com
The website sets no cookies of its own and runs no analytics of our own. Like any website, the servers that deliver it receive technical information with each request, such as your IP address, browser type, the page requested and the time. We use this only to deliver the site, keep it secure and prevent abuse. We use Cloudflare to deliver and protect the site; Cloudflare may collect aggregate traffic statistics through its Web Analytics service. Cloudflare Web Analytics does not use cookies and does not track individuals; it counts visits and page views only. See Cloudflare's privacy policy for details.
When you apply to the beta
- Your name and email address.
- Your country and your answers: what best describes you, years investing, the markets you trade or invest in, how you research a stock today, what you would like TellHawk to answer, and the time you can give each week.
- If you provide them: the tools you use now and a LinkedIn or other profile link.
- How you found the form: the website that linked you to it, or the campaign tag in the link you followed, if there is one.
- Whether you are willing to take part in a short call, and your agreement that we may contact you about the beta.
We use your IP address briefly to limit repeated submissions.
If you took part in our invite-only beta
When you applied, we collected your name, email address, country and your answers to the application questions, how you found the form, and whether you agreed to be contacted. To help us sort applications we calculated a simple score from your answers; a person read every application and made the decision. If you joined, your application stays with your account. If you did not join, we delete it when you ask us to. The form is no longer offered; this paragraph covers what we still hold from it.
When you use the TellHawk app
- Account and sign-in. Your email address, your plan and account status, the dates you were invited and last used the app, your acceptance of our terms (with the date and version) and the choices you made, such as whether we may contact you for an interview. Sign-in uses a one-time code that TellHawk emails to you; each code works once and expires after 10 minutes, only a scrambled (hashed) form of it is stored, and we never ask for or store a password.
- Your trading records in Trader, if you use it: the trades you log in the journal, and, if you connect Alpaca, your closed orders, which we read to fill the journal and label who closed each trade. We also store a monthly trading report for each month; by default our support team can open it to help you, and you can switch that off in Trader. Your broker API keys are stored encrypted.
- Product usage, only if you agreed to it (this is optional): which screens and features you use, time spent on screen, errors you run into, and simple feature details such as the ticker of a report you open. This is linked to your email address. We do not record what you type into search boxes.
- Feedback you choose to send: comments, ratings, bug reports and suggestions, survey answers (which may include how much you would pay for TellHawk), strategies you share with our team and their test results, and a testimonial if you give one. A bug report can include up to three screenshots and technical context: the screen you were on, the ticker, the app version, your browser and screen size, and recent error messages with email addresses and long numbers removed. You see this context before sending and can untick any part of it. Screenshots are stored with the report they belong to and deleted with it or with your account. They capture whatever is on your screen, so please leave out anything you do not want to share.
- Features you set up, such as price alerts, a watchlist digest, rules or API keys: the email address and settings you choose, and whether you confirmed the address.
- HawkAI, if you use it. HawkAI works only with an AI provider API key that you save yourself; there is no shared key. We store your key encrypted and use it only to answer your questions.
- Payments, once paid plans are available: payments are handled by Stripe. We receive your Stripe customer reference, plan, subscription status, billing period, price and currency. We never receive or store your full card number.
- Payments. When you subscribe, payments are handled by Stripe. Stripe collects your card details, name, email and billing address where it asks for them, and any tax identifier you give it. We never receive or store your full card number. We receive and keep your Stripe customer reference, the plan and interval you chose, the subscription status, the current billing period, whether it is set to cancel, the price and currency, and whether a payment has failed. We use a record that you have had a subscription to offer a free trial only once per person for each product.
- Messages you send us and our replies.
- Server logs: IP address, request times, the addresses requested and browser type, used for security and troubleshooting.
3. How we use it
| Purpose | Information used | Legal basis (where required) |
|---|---|---|
| Review beta applications and contact you about the beta | Application answers, email | Your consent; steps you asked us to take |
| Let you sign in and provide the features of your plan | Account and sign-in information | Performing our agreement with you |
| Send emails you asked for, such as alerts, digests and receipts | Email, feature settings | Performing our agreement with you; your consent |
| Understand how TellHawk is used and improve it | Product usage, feedback, survey answers | Your consent |
| Answer questions, fix problems and follow up on reports | Messages, reports, screenshots, context | Performing our agreement; our legitimate interest in a working product |
| Keep the Service secure and prevent abuse and fraud | Server logs, IP address, account status | Our legitimate interest in protecting the Service and its users |
| Process payments and keep business and tax records | Billing information | Performing our agreement; legal obligations |
| Offer a free trial only once per person and product | Subscription history linked to your email | Our legitimate interest in preventing abuse of free trials |
| Comply with the law and protect our rights | Any of the above, as needed | Legal obligations; legitimate interests |
To help us sort beta applications, we calculate a simple score from your answers. A person reads every application and makes the decision. We do not use your information for advertising, and we do not make decisions about you that have legal or similarly significant effects by automated means alone.
4. Consent and your choices
- Usage and feedback. Recording how you use TellHawk is optional: you choose it when you accept our terms, and you can use every plan without it. You can withdraw this consent at any time by writing to us, and we will stop recording your usage. Feedback, reports and survey answers you send us are always your choice.
- Usage and feedback. The free beta is offered in exchange for helping us learn how TellHawk is used, so agreeing to usage recording is a condition of joining it. You can withdraw this consent at any time by writing to us. We will then stop recording your usage; because it is a condition of the free beta, we may also end your beta access.
- Interviews and case studies. Optional. You can change your mind at any time.
- Testimonials. We only quote you publicly with your separate, explicit permission, which you can withdraw in the app or by email.
- Emails. Recurring emails, such as alerts and digests, include an unsubscribe link. We do not send marketing emails without your consent.
5. How we share it
We never sell or rent personal information, and we do not share it for advertising. We share it only as follows.
- Service providers that process it on our behalf, under contract, and only to provide their service to us:
- Cloudflare: delivers the website and app and protects them from attacks.
- Brevo: sends our emails, including your sign-in code.
- Stripe: processes payments once paid plans are available.Stripe: processes payments, and some payment data for its own fraud prevention and legal compliance, under its own privacy policy.
- Backblaze: stores our off-site backups.
- Our server hosting provider: runs the servers that host the Service.
- Your AI provider, if you use HawkAI. The questions you ask and the results of the data tools used to answer them go to the provider whose API key you saved, under your own account and that provider's terms and privacy policy. We do not choose or pay for that provider.
- With your permission, for example a testimonial you allowed us to publish.
- For legal reasons, when we believe in good faith that disclosure is required by law or a valid legal process, or is needed to protect the rights, property or safety of TellHawk, our users or others.
- Business transfers. If TellHawk is reorganised, merged or sold, personal information may be transferred to the organisation that continues the Service, subject to this policy. We will tell you before that happens.
6. Where it is stored
TellHawk is based in Ontario, Canada. Your information is stored on servers in Canada and the United States, and our service providers may process it in other countries. Information stored outside your country is subject to the laws of that country and may be accessible to its courts, law enforcement and national security authorities. We choose providers that commit to protecting personal information, and where the law requires it, such as for transfers from the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, we rely on appropriate safeguards such as standard contractual clauses.
7. How long we keep it
We keep personal information only as long as we need it for the purposes above, then delete it or make it anonymous.
| Information | How long |
|---|---|
| Beta applications | Until the beta programme ends, or sooner if you ask. If you join, your application stays with your account. |
| Beta applications (earlier invite-only beta) | Kept with your account if you joined. If you did not join, deleted when you ask us to. |
| Account information | While your account is open. Deleted when you ask us to delete your account. |
| Monthly trading reports | Kept for 12 months, then deleted automatically, or deleted with your account. |
| Product usage records | Deleted automatically after 12 months. |
| Bug reports, their screenshots, and strategies you share | Deleted automatically 12 months after we have resolved them, or sooner if you ask. |
| Other feedback, survey answers and testimonials | Until you ask us to delete them or delete your account. |
| Billing records | As long as tax and accounting law requires. |
| Billing records | Our subscription records (plan, status, billing period, price and the email address on the account) are kept for as long as tax and accounting law requires and so that a free trial is offered only once, and they are not removed when you delete your account. Stripe keeps its own payment records under its own retention rules. |
| Server logs and backups | For a limited period, then overwritten in the normal course. |
Some records are kept after you delete your account because we need them to keep the service secure and to meet accounting duties: security and audit logs of staff actions, the list of addresses that asked not to be emailed, and billing records. They are not used for marketing.
8. How we protect it
We use safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the information, including encrypted connections (HTTPS), sign-in with a one-time emailed code, without passwords, access limited to the TellHawk team members who need it, payments handled entirely by Stripe, and screenshots stored privately on our own servers. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, so we cannot guarantee absolute security. If a breach of security creates a real risk of significant harm to you, we will notify you and the relevant authorities as the law requires.
9. Your rights
Depending on where you live, you may have the right to:
- know what personal information we hold about you and get a copy of it, including in a portable format;
- have inaccurate information corrected;
- have your information deleted;
- withdraw your consent, subject to legal or contractual limits (see section 4);
- object to or restrict certain processing; and
- complain to a privacy regulator.
To use any of these rights, email privacy@tellhawk.com from the address linked to your account or application. We may need to confirm your identity first, for example by sending a single-use link to that address. We respond within 30 days and do not charge for reasonable requests. Deleting your account removes your account record, application, usage records, feedback, reports and their screenshots, shared strategies, survey answers, alerts, rules, digest subscription and API keys, together with your Academy progress, exam attempts and certificates, passkeys, display preferences, a saved HawkAI key, sign-in and device records, and your Trader, ProofRunner and support-ticket data. It also cancels any paid subscription immediately. The billing records described in section 7 are kept, and Stripe holds its own payment records under its own retention rules.
If you are not satisfied with our response, you can contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada. If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, you can contact your local data protection authority.
United States residents. Some U.S. states give residents rights to know, access, correct and delete personal information and to opt out of its sale or use for targeted advertising. We do not sell personal information or use it for targeted advertising. You can make any of these requests as described above, and we will not treat you differently for doing so.
10. Cookies and browser storage
- tellhawk.com sets no cookies of its own and stores nothing in your browser. Its fonts and images are served from tellhawk.com itself. Cloudflare, which delivers the site, may set a strictly necessary security cookie to protect it from automated abuse.
- The TellHawk app uses a strictly necessary sign-in cookie (named th_session) set by TellHawk's own servers, which keeps you signed in until you sign out or it expires. The app also keeps a few settings in your browser's local storage so it works as you expect: your display preferences, choices from the welcome guide, your acceptance of our terms, news filters, and the email address and access code for alerts, rules or a digest you set up. When usage recording is on, it keeps a random session number for the current browser tab only.
- Checkout and billing pages are hosted by Stripe, which may set its own cookies and similar technologies on those pages under its own privacy policy.
We do not use advertising cookies or tracking pixels, and our emails do not track opens or clicks. You can clear this storage at any time in your browser settings; you may then need to sign in and accept our terms again.
11. Children
The Service is intended for adults and is not directed at anyone under 18. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has given us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.
12. Other websites
The Service links to other websites, such as news publishers and official data sources. Their privacy practices are their own, and this policy does not cover them.
13. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. We will post the new version here with a new date. If a change is material, we will tell you by email or in the app before it takes effect and, where required, ask for your consent again.
14. Contact us
Privacy questions and requests: privacy@tellhawk.com. Anything else: hello@tellhawk.com. Our mailing address is available on request.
See also our Terms of Use.