Privacy Policy

Tanel ("Tanel", "we", "us", or "our") operates a referral platform that helps professionals share candidate profiles and pass referrals through their network. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, when we share it, and the choices you have. It applies to trytanel.com and the Tanel app (together, the "Service").

By using the Service, you agree to the collection and use of information as described here. If you don't agree, please don't use the Service.

1. Information we collect

Account information. When you sign in, we collect your email address, and, if you use Google or LinkedIn to sign in, the name, email, and profile photo those providers share with us. A magic-link, Google, or LinkedIn sign-in that shares a verified email resolves to the same Tanel account.

Professional Profile. Your name, photo, years of experience, current company, and professional links (e.g. LinkedIn, portfolio) that you choose to add.

Resumes and files. Resume files you upload, stored with our cloud storage provider and attached to your Professional Profile.

Candidate Profiles. Information you add to a shareable listing — title, headline, summary, featured skills, preferred locations, employment preferences, expected compensation, notice period, search status, and which of your profile links and resume to include.

Referral activity. When you add, share, or introduce a candidate, we store the referral card, its status history, any owner message you attach (visible to the recipient), and any private owner notes or reminders you add (visible only to you).

Connections. A record of the people you've built a referral relationship with, created automatically from referral activity.

Communications. Notification preferences, and the content of emails we send you (e.g. magic-link sign-in emails, status updates, reminders).

Usage and device information. Basic technical information such as IP address, browser type, and session identifiers, used to keep the Service secure and working correctly.

2. How we use information

• To create and maintain your account, and to authenticate you securely.
• To operate the core features of the Service — Professional Profiles, Candidate Profiles, the Referral Inbox, Connections, and the referral chain and status pipeline.
• To generate the public candidate-profile and referral-link pages you choose to share.
• To send transactional emails — sign-in links, referral status changes, reminders you set, and freshness nudges for your Candidate Profiles.
• To detect abuse, prevent spam-forwarding, and keep the Service secure.
• To maintain the immutable event log behind a referral card's history.

We do not use your information to serve third-party advertising, and we do not sell your personal information.

3. Public profiles and referral links

Tanel is built around link-sharing: a Candidate Profile you set to "public" gets a page (/c/:slug) that anyone with the link can view without an account, so it renders correctly when pasted into WhatsApp, LinkedIn, email, or Slack. A shared referral also gets its own public link (/r/:token).

Only the fields you explicitly include on a Candidate Profile — and only the profile links you choose to show — appear on its public page. Your Professional Profile itself is never public; it's the private base your Candidate Profiles are built from. Owner notes and reminders on a referral card are private and are never shown on any public page or to anyone outside the referral chain who added them.

Because public candidate and referral pages don't require an account to view, anyone with the link — including search engines, if the link is posted publicly elsewhere — can access the information on that page. Set a Candidate Profile's visibility to private, or pause it, if you don't want it to be publicly reachable.

4. Cookies and sessions

We use a session cookie to keep you signed in after you authenticate. It's necessary for the Service to function and isn't used for advertising or cross-site tracking. It expires automatically after a period of inactivity or when you sign out.

5. How we share information

We share information only as needed to operate the Service:

• Sign-in providers — Google and LinkedIn, if you choose to sign in through them, under their own privacy policies.
• Cloud storage — a cloud object storage provider, to host uploaded resumes and profile photos.
• Email delivery — a transactional email provider, to send sign-in links and notifications.
• People you share with — the recipients of a referral you send or a public link you share see the information included on that Candidate Profile or referral card.
• Legal reasons — if required to comply with law, enforce our Terms, or protect the rights, safety, or property of Tanel or others.

We do not sell your personal information to third parties.

6. Data retention

We keep your information for as long as your account is active. Candidate Profiles that go stale automatically drop out of discovery (see the freshness prompts in the app) — this changes visibility, not deletion; your data isn't erased until you delete it or close your account. Referral events form an immutable audit trail and are retained for the life of the referral chain they belong to, so participants can see what happened. You can delete resumes, edit or remove Candidate Profiles, and request deletion of your account at any time (see below).

7. Your choices and rights

• Access and update your Professional Profile and Candidate Profiles directly in the app at any time.
• Delete resumes individually from your account.
• Control visibility of each Candidate Profile (public or private) and which fields and links it includes.
• Manage notifications from your account settings.
• Request deletion of your account and associated personal data by contacting us at the email below. We'll act on verified requests within a reasonable time, subject to any information we're required to retain by law.

8. Security

We use reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards designed to protect your information, including encrypted connections and access controls on our infrastructure and storage. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, so we can't guarantee absolute security.

9. Children's privacy

The Service is intended for working professionals and isn't directed at children. We don't knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, contact us and we'll remove it.

10. International users

We may process and store information in countries other than the one you live in. By using the Service, you understand that your information may be transferred to and processed in such countries, which may have data protection laws different from those in your own.

11. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make material changes, we'll update the effective date above and, where appropriate, notify you. Continued use of the Service after a change means you accept the updated policy.

12. Contact us

Questions about this policy or your data? Email us at hello@trytanel.com.