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Merani is a curated guide to places in Georgia. This policy explains what personal data we handle when you use meranitech.com, the Merani app for travellers and the Merani Partner app for businesses, why we handle it, how long we keep it and what you can ask of us.
Merani is operated by Veralyon, Tbilisi, Georgia ("Merani", "we"). For anything in this policy, write to hello@meranitech.com.
The short version
- The traveller app needs no account. You don't give us your name, email or phone to use it.
- Ratings are anonymous. They are tied to a random id created on your phone, never to a person.
- Your location is used on your phone to show places near you. It is not stored in a profile.
- The website uses Google Analytics 4 only after you accept the banner. Until then it stays cookieless.
- We never sell personal data and show no advertising.
- Data is stored in the European Union (Stockholm, Sweden).
What we collect, and why
meranitech.com
Server logs. Like every website, our server records the IP address, browser type, page requested and time of each request. We use these logs to keep the site secure and to diagnose faults. They are deleted automatically after 30 days.
Contact and application forms. When you write to us or apply to have a place listed, we receive what you type: name, email address, the kind of request, and optionally a phone number, business name and message. The message is delivered to our inbox as an email through Resend, our email provider, so that we can reply. We keep the correspondence for as long as the conversation is live and up to 12 months afterwards, longer if it leads to a partner agreement.
Analytics. We use Google Analytics 4 to understand which pages are read and whether the download links and forms work. It is loaded with Google's Consent Mode: until you accept the banner, Google receives only cookieless, aggregated pings and sets no cookies. If you accept, Google sets its _ga cookies (kept for up to 2 years) so that return visits can be counted. Your choice is stored in your browser under the key merani.analytics-consent; to change it, clear the site's data in your browser and the banner appears again. We do not put names, emails or phone numbers into analytics events.
The Merani app (travellers)
No account. The app does not ask you to register. We do not know your name, email address or phone number.
Install id. On first launch the app generates a random identifier and stores it on your phone. It is sent with your ratings, with requests that check whether you already rated a place, and with usage events, so that one phone counts once. It is not linked to any account and we cannot trace it back to you. Deleting the app (or clearing its data) deletes the id; a reinstall gets a new one.
Location. With your permission, the app reads your position to sort places by distance and to show what is near you. The coordinates are used on the phone and sent to our server only as part of the "nearby" request; they appear in our short-lived server logs together with the request's IP address and are deleted with those logs after 30 days. We do not build a location history. You can withdraw the permission at any time in your phone's settings; the app then shows places without distances.
Ratings. A rating is one to five stars, optional tags and an optional short note. Stars, tags and notes are shown publicly on the place's page without any name. A rating can be changed for 30 days after it is made, then it is locked. It is tied to the install id only.
Usage events. When you open a place, ask for directions, call it, save it, share it or open its website, the app records the action, the place, the time and the install id. Every night these events are summed into per-place daily counts (views, directions, calls, saves, shares, website taps) that we show the business. Raw events are kept for 12 months; the daily counts are kept without any identifier.
Saved places and language. Your saved places and language choice stay on your phone. They are not sent to us.
Booking requests. If you ask a place for a table, ticket, tour or room through the app, you give the name, phone number or email address and any note that the business needs to answer you, plus the date and party size. We pass this to the business and keep a copy so that both sides can see the status. Requests are kept for 12 months after the requested date.
The Merani Partner app (businesses)
Account. Staff of a listed business sign in with an email address and password. We store the email, first and last name, phone number, optional nationality, the date the account was created, and which organisation the account belongs to and in what role. Sign-in tokens are kept in the phone's secure storage and can be removed by signing out.
Listing content. What you submit about your place (name, address, coordinates, opening hours, contacts, photos, answers to the category's questions, offerings) is published once our team has reviewed it. Edits that go through review are kept with the account that proposed them and the staff member who decided, for as long as the listing exists.
Audits and bookings. Trust audits of your place, their photos and outcomes, and the booking requests sent to you are visible to your organisation's accounts.
Statistics shown in the app are daily aggregates; they contain no data about individual travellers.
Everyone
Security and abuse prevention. We may use the data above to detect and stop abuse, for example a flood of fake ratings from one source.
Error monitoring. If a crash or server error occurs we may record technical details about it (the request, the stack trace, the app version). Personal data is not deliberately sent to error monitoring.
Legal bases
Where the law asks for a legal basis, ours are:
- Performance of a contract — partner accounts and listings, booking requests, answering your messages.
- Legitimate interests — server logs and security, anonymous ratings and usage statistics, improving the service. We have weighed these against your interests and kept the data minimal and, where possible, anonymous.
- Consent — analytics cookies on the website, the location permission in the app. You can withdraw consent at any time as described above.
- Legal obligations — accounting and tax records for partner agreements.
Who else sees data
We share personal data only with providers who process it for us under contract, and only as much as the job needs:
- Amazon Web Services (Stockholm, Sweden) — servers that run the website and API, and stored photos.
- Supabase (European Union region) — the database.
- Resend — delivery of contact-form emails and transactional emails.
- Google — Google Analytics 4 on the website, only after you accept the banner. Google processes this data under its own terms; some processing may take place in the United States under the EU–US Data Privacy Framework and standard contractual clauses.
- Apple and Google — the app stores through which you install the apps handle downloads, updates and crash reports under their own policies.
- The business you contact — a booking request goes to that business so it can answer you; nothing else about you is shared with businesses.
- Authorities — when the law requires it.
We do not sell personal data and we do not share it with advertising networks.
How long we keep data
- Server logs (IP address, request) — 30 days.
- Contact-form correspondence — up to 12 months after the last message.
- Ratings (anonymous) — while the place is listed; a rating can be edited for 30 days.
- Raw usage events (install id) — 12 months, then only daily totals without identifiers.
- Booking requests — 12 months after the requested date.
- Partner accounts and listings — while the agreement lasts, then as required for accounting (up to 6 years).
- Analytics cookies (with consent) — up to 2 years, set by Google.
Your rights
Under the Law of Georgia on Personal Data Protection and, if you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, the GDPR, you can ask us to:
- tell you what personal data we hold about you and give you a copy;
- correct it or delete it;
- restrict or object to a use of it, including any use based on legitimate interests;
- hand it over in a portable format where it was processed on the basis of consent or a contract;
- withdraw consent you gave earlier, without affecting what was done before.
Write to hello@meranitech.com. We answer within one month. Because traveller ratings are tied only to a random install id, we cannot find them by your name; if you want a note removed, tell us the place and what the note says, and we will remove it.
If you are unhappy with our answer you can complain to the Personal Data Protection Service of Georgia (personaldata.ge) or, in the EEA or UK, to your local data protection authority.
Children
Merani is not aimed at children under 16 and we do not knowingly collect their personal data. If you believe a child has given us data, write to us and we will delete it.
Security
All traffic between your device and our servers is encrypted (HTTPS). Partner passwords are stored hashed, sign-in tokens live in the phone's secure storage, and access to production systems is limited to the people who run them.
Changes to this policy
When this policy changes we update the date at the top. For a change that affects what we collect or how we use it, we also say so in the apps or on the site before it takes effect.
Contact
Merani · Veralyon · Tbilisi, Georgia · hello@meranitech.com