Privacy Policy

Rooted (“Rooted,” “we,” “us”) is operated by Rooted Education Corporation, 151 N Michigan Ave, Chicago, IL 60601. Rooted is an app that helps families share their heritage language with their children through short audio stories. You can reach us at meetrooted@gmail.com.

Rooted accounts are created and managed by a parent or legal guardian (“parent”). Children use Rooted through a parent’s account. We do not let children create their own accounts, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from a child without a parent’s consent.

From parents:

• Name, email address and password
• Your family’s language(s) and your own comfort level with the language
• Payment details, processed by Stripe, Inc.; we do not store full card numbers
• Survey answers and messages you send us
• Voice recordings, only if you choose to use voice narration (see section 5)

About your child, provided by you:

• First name or nickname
• Age or age range
• Language level and story preferences (for example favorite characters or interests)
• Details you add to a Custom Tale, such as family members’ names or places

Collected automatically when the app is used:

• Listening activity, such as which stories are played, how often, and which words have been introduced
• Device type, operating system, app version and crash reports

We do not collect your child’s precise location, photos, contacts or voice. Rooted does not include ads, public profiles or chat with other users.

As part of accepting our terms and using Rooted’s mobile app, you consent to allowing us to store data regarding your child such as their name, age (only by year and month), and interests that come up in our custom stories tailored for you. Please note, we store this data only to service the app and save information to give you as the user a personalized and streamlined experience. This data is never shared, sold, or used for any purposes other than delivering Rooted’s core experiences.

If you choose to have stories narrated in your voice or a family member’s voice, we ask for a short recording of the adult whose voice will be used. Before recording, we ask for that person’s written consent.

• We use voice recordings and the resulting voice model only to narrate your family’s stories.
• We never sell them, share them with other users, or use them for advertising.
• We never use them to train general AI models.
• Our voice provider, ElevenLabs, processes voice cloning. By accepting our terms, you are also accepting the terms of ElevenLabs as detailed here: https://elevenlabs.io/terms-of-use
• You can delete a voice recording and its voice model at any time in Settings. We delete the voice instantly and directly after any account closure.

• To provide Rooted: create your account, play stories, and personalize stories to your child’s age, language level and interests
• To bring back words at the right time, so your child keeps learning them
• To improve our stories and app, using aggregated or de-identified data where possible
• To communicate with you about your account, the beta and updates (you can opt out of non-essential emails)
• To keep Rooted safe and secure, and to meet legal obligations

We do not use children’s personal information for advertising, and we do not use it to train general AI models.

We never sell personal information. We share it only:

• If required by law, or to protect the safety of a child or others
• If Rooted is sold or merged, in which case this policy continues to apply to your information

We keep personal information only as long as needed to provide Rooted. When you delete your account, we delete your family’s personal information instantly.

At any time, you can:

• Review the personal information we have about you and your child
• Correct or update it
• Delete your child’s information or your whole account
• Withdraw consent for further collection

We use safeguards appropriate for children’s data, including encryption in transit and at rest, limited staff access, and a written information security program. No system is perfectly secure, and if a breach affects your information, we will notify you as required by law.

If we make material changes, especially to how we handle children’s information, we will notify parents by email and, where required, ask for new consent before the changes apply.

Questions about privacy? Email meetrooted@gmail.com or write to Rooted Education Corporation, 151 N Michigan Ave, Chicago, IL 60601. A real person on our team will respond. See also our Terms of Use.