Privacy notice

Debated runs the site at debated.me. For anything about your data, email hello@debated.me.

What we collect

• Account details: your display name, and your email address if you sign in by email. If you pick a name to start without an email, your account lives only in the browser you used.
• Your worldview answers: the ten onboarding questions, and any stances on debate motions you choose to set. These reveal political, philosophical and religious views, which are special category data under UK and EU GDPR.
• Debate records: live transcripts of what you say, chat messages, the AI judge's callouts, scores and results.
• Reports and blocks you make, or that are made about you.
• Page-view totals: how many times each page is opened, and which website or campaign link a visit came from. These are plain counts, kept without cookies and without anything that identifies you.
• A scrambled record of your network address, used only to limit abuse such as repeated sign-in attempts. It cannot be turned back into the address and is deleted within two days.

Why, and our lawful basis

• Worldview answers are processed only with your explicit consent (UK GDPR Article 9(2)(a)), and only to match you with opponents who disagree with you. They are never shown to other people, used for advertising or sold.
• Transcripts and results are processed to provide the service you asked for (contract): judging, scoring and your history.
• Reports are processed to keep people safe (legitimate interests).
• Page-view totals and abuse limits help us run and protect the site (legitimate interests).

Audio and video

• Voice and video travel directly between your browser and your opponent's. As with any direct call, this means your opponent's device can see your IP address. If you would rather not share it, choose “Debate by text instead” in the lobby.
• We do not record audio or video.
• Speech is turned into text in your own browser so the AI judge can follow the debate. In Chrome and Edge this uses the browser maker's speech service (Google or Microsoft), which receives the audio to transcribe it. Only the text reaches us, and only the text is stored.

How long we keep it

• Raw quiz answers: deleted 30 days after we calculate your worldview map. The map itself is kept until you delete it or your account.
• Transcripts and results: kept for your debate history until you delete your account.
• When you delete your account, your profile, worldview, stances and friends are deleted. Debates you took part in stay in your opponent's history with your name removed.

Who processes it for us

Supabase (database and sign-in), Vercel and Railway (hosting) and Anthropic (the AI judge, which reads debate transcripts). They process data on our instructions.

Your rights

You can withdraw consent and delete your worldview data at any time from your profile, and you can delete your whole account there too. To ask for a copy of your data or to have it corrected, email hello@debated.me. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office.