Privacy notice

1. Who is responsible

Atoll Maker is part of Atoll Ecosystems, London, United Kingdom, which is the controller of the personal data described in this notice. Write to support@atollmaker.com or use the contact form. For users in Brazil, Atoll Ecosystems also acts as the person in charge of data protection (encarregado) under the LGPD, at the same address.

The Portuguese version of this notice (Política de privacidade) applies to users in Brazil.

2. What is collected, why, and on what basis

Your email address and a password are needed to open an account; without them the application cannot be used. Everything else described here is collected as you use the service.

Visiting atollmaker.com

Each visit to a public page is counted: the page address, the time spent on it, the page that linked to it, the browser and type of device, and the network address of the connection, from which the country is derived. Presses on the main buttons are counted with the button and the page language; a beta request is counted with the answer to “how did you hear about Atoll Maker”, and a contact message with its subject, without the name, the email address or the message. Nothing is stored on your device to do this, so a visit is not linked to any other visit or to an account. The records are kept by PostHog in its European Union region. The page typeface is loaded from Google Fonts, which receives the network address of the connection.

Basis: our legitimate interest in knowing how the site is found and used.

Requesting the beta

The beta form collects your full name, email address, whether you are a professional or building your own pond, and how you heard about Atoll Maker. They are stored in our database and emailed to us so the request can be answered. If an invitation is sent, the invitation records the email address, the name we write on it and when it was used, and the invitation itself is sent by email.

Basis: steps taken at your request before an account is opened.

Contacting us

The contact form sends your name, email address, the subject and your message to our mailbox. It is not stored in our database. Emails you send us are kept in our mailbox.

Basis: our legitimate interest in answering you; where the message concerns your plan, the contract with you.

Your account

Your email address and password, handled by our authentication provider, and a sign-in session kept in a cookie. Hobby, Pro and beta accounts can be used on one computer at a time; for them we keep the browser, operating system and country of the computer holding the account and when it took over, and a record of each change of computer with the account’s email address.

Basis: the contract with you.

Your designs and files

Each design you save, with its project details, which may include your practice’s name, address and contact details, your client’s name and the site address; up to 20 earlier versions of each design; designs moved to the trash until you delete them for good; imported 3D models and product cards; photographs you add to the works booklet; and your saved presets. A working copy of the open design is kept on your device.

If you enter details of your own clients, you are responsible for having the right to do so; we use them only to provide the service to you.

Basis: the contract with you.

Locating the site

An address typed in the site search is sent to Google Maps Platform as you type, to suggest and locate places; the map, the aerial image and, when opened, the 3D view of the site are loaded from Google. The site’s coordinates are sent to Open-Meteo to read the local climate and time zone. Your device’s location is read only when you press “My location”.

Basis: the contract with you.

Using the application

While you are signed in, the application records how it is used, to find faults and improve the service: the actions completed, such as a project created or a drawing set generated, with counts and size ranges but not the design itself; the errors it meets; the device’s capabilities and performance, such as the number of processor cores, memory, screen size and graphics device; the address of the first page opened and the page that linked to it; and a recording of the application’s interface during the session. In the recording, text typed into any field is masked; the project’s own details (its name, the client, the site address and the practice details) are masked wherever they appear; and the site’s coordinates are left out. Your account is identified by its internal identifier; a beta tester who joined through an invitation is also identified by the name written on it. These records are kept by PostHog in its European Union region. Nothing is recorded in the application while you are signed out.

Under a random identifier kept on your device and not linked to your account, the application also records in our database: the steps reached, choices made and settings used in the lessons; the hints and setup steps seen and the warnings opened; camera and view-switch timings, with the screen size; and the timing of each pipe-routing update, with, when Auto layout is pressed, the pond outline and the positions of the filter, the equipment and the retaining walls, so that the layout can be reproduced to find faults.

The country of your connection is read to show the right market and currency; it is not stored, except in the one-computer record described under “Your account”.

Basis: our legitimate interest in keeping the service working and improving it. Usage records and recordings are part of how the service is run and cannot yet be switched off for a single account while you are signed in; you may ask us at any time to delete those already kept.

The pond book

If you ask for the pond book at the end of the lessons, your email address and the project name are recorded so that the book can be sent to you when it is ready.

Basis: the contract with you, including steps taken at your request.

Ask Atoll

A question put to the assistant is sent, with the recent conversation, the interface language and the step you are on, to OpenAI or Anthropic to produce the answer, together with a one-way hash of your account identifier. We do not store the conversation, and it is left out of the session recording. When OpenAI answers, it is asked not to store it; when Anthropic answers, the conversation is handled under Anthropic’s own data-retention terms.

Basis: the contract with you.

Reporting a fault or requesting a feature

Opening the report key takes a screenshot of the application, which is sent with the report unless you remove it. A report sends its title and description, your email address and account identifier, the project and file name, the browser and device details, the errors and the performance log kept on your device, the screenshot, and a link to the session recording. Reports are kept in a private GitHub repository; screenshots are kept in our database storage, with a link to each valid for one year in the report. The performance test page sends its results automatically when a test run ends, with your email address and browser details, and they are kept the same way.

Basis: our legitimate interest in fixing faults; the contract with you.

Lessons, libraries and imports

Lesson videos are played by YouTube, whose player script is loaded from youtube.com and whose player runs in its privacy-enhanced mode, and by Vimeo; both receive the network address and device details when a video loads. Browsing the online library loads the catalogue and the files you import from Poly Haven. Importing STEP or IFC files, or exporting a 3DM (Rhino) file, loads the library that reads or writes them from jsDelivr; importing a compressed 3D model loads its decoder from Google. Textures and models are delivered through Cloudflare. Each of these receives the network address of the connection.

Basis: the contract with you.

Paying for a plan

Paid plans are not on sale yet; when they are, they will be sold by Paddle, our reseller and Merchant of Record. Paddle collects your payment details and billing information as a controller in its own right, under its own privacy notice; we receive from Paddle your name, email address, country, the plan bought and the state of the payment.

Basis: the contract with you.

3. Information stored on your device

The public pages of atollmaker.com store nothing on your device.

The application stores, to work: the sign-in session cookie; a cookie naming the type of device, for one year; the working copy of the open design, the interface settings and the choices made in the lessons, in local storage; and local copies of your files, in the browser’s database. To find faults and improve the service, it stores from sign-in onwards the PostHog identifiers, in a cookie kept for up to one year that remains after you sign out and in local storage, and the recording’s working data in session storage; the random identifier described under “Using the application”; a list of the projects already counted as completed; the results of a performance test not yet sent; and a performance log that leaves your device only in a fault report.

4. Who receives personal data

These providers handle personal data for us, each for the purpose given:

• Supabase: database, sign-in and file storage, in the European Union (Ireland).
• PostHog: visit counting, usage records, error reports and session recordings, in its European Union region.
• Vercel: hosting of the website and the application; every request passes through it.
• Cloudflare: storage of imported 3D models and product cards, and delivery of textures and models.
• Resend: sending our emails.
• Google: our mailbox.
• OpenAI and Anthropic: answers from the assistant.
• GitHub: fault reports and feature requests.

These receive the data described above as controllers in their own right, under their own privacy notices: Google (Google Maps Platform, Google Fonts and the 3D file decoder), Open-Meteo (climate and time zone of the site), YouTube and Vimeo (lesson videos), Poly Haven (the online library), jsDelivr (file libraries) and Paddle (the sale of paid plans).

Personal data is not sold and is not used for advertising. It may be disclosed where the law requires it.

5. Transfers outside the UK and the EEA

Several of these providers are based in the United States, among them Vercel, Cloudflare, Resend, Google, OpenAI, Anthropic, GitHub and Vimeo, and may process personal data there. For the providers that handle data for us, we rely on the safeguards each offers in its data processing terms, such as standard contractual clauses or the UK International Data Transfer Addendum. You can ask us which safeguards apply and for a copy.

6. How long personal data is kept

• Account and designs: while the account exists. Deleting your account deletes at once the account, its designs and their earlier versions, presets, booklet photographs, the record of your plan and the device records.
• Imported 3D models and product cards, fault reports, the pond book request, the invitation record and the records kept in our database under the random identifier are not removed by deleting the account; they are deleted when you ask us.
• Visit and usage records and session recordings kept by PostHog: until the end of the retention period of our PostHog plan, when PostHog deletes them, or earlier if you ask us.
• Beta requests: for as long as the beta runs, and deleted within 12 months after it ends unless you have become a user.
• Messages and emails: for as long as needed to deal with them.
• Payment records: kept by Paddle for as long as tax law requires.

7. Your rights

You may ask for a copy of your personal data, its correction, its deletion, the restriction of its use, a copy in a portable format, or object to its use based on our legitimate interests. Write to support@atollmaker.com or use the contact form. Requests are free and are answered within one month.

Users in Brazil have the rights in art. 18 of the LGPD, set out in the Portuguese version of this notice.

8. Complaints

You can complain to us first, at the same address; we acknowledge a complaint within 30 days and tell you the outcome. You may also complain to the United Kingdom’s data protection regulator (ico.org.uk), to the data protection authority of the EU country where you live, or, in Brazil, to the national data protection authority (ANPD).

9. Children

Atoll Maker is intended for adults and is not offered to anyone under 18.

10. Changes to this notice

This notice is updated when the service changes, with the date at the top. A change that affects how your data is used is notified to account holders by email.