Summary
BookHoot is a private family reading service for children and their parents or guardians. A grown-up creates and owns the account. BookHoot synchronizes the family's reading data through BookHoot-managed services so the account can be restored and used on another signed-in device.
BookHoot does not use third-party advertising, third-party analytics, tracking SDKs, public child profiles, chat, public leaderboards, or public social sharing.
Information We Collect
BookHoot collects and stores the minimum family-account information needed to provide the service:
- Parent email address, account identifier, and display name.
- Child nickname, age, reading level, avatar, and theme preferences.
- Book approval settings, blocked books, reading goals, and game limits.
- Bookshelves, ratings, private reviews, moods, book wishes, and suggestions.
- Reading minutes and page progress, streaks, quiz scores, challenges, points, gems, and rewards.
- Consent timestamp, consent method, privacy-notice version, security events, and parent-request audit records.
The app keeps an on-device cache for speed and offline access. The four-digit parent PIN and recovery answer remain on the device and are not included in the synchronized child state.
BookHoot does not ask for or intentionally collect a child's legal name, date of birth, email address, phone number, school, home address, photo, voice recording, precise location, or public username.
How Information Is Used
Family information is used to authenticate the parent, synchronize the private family account, show reading progress, maintain bookshelves, recommend age-fit books, generate book quizzes, apply parent approval rules, let parents review child-created content, operate reading goals and rewards, provide support, and protect the service.
Children's Privacy
Children do not create independent accounts. A parent or legal guardian creates the family account, verifies the account email, reviews the direct privacy notice, consents to the private child profile, and controls the child's settings. Parent controls and external links are protected by an additional grown-up gate.
Parents and guardians should use a nickname rather than a legal name and should avoid entering direct contact information or other sensitive child details into free-text fields.
Parent Rights and Controls
Parents can use Grown-Up Controls to review child activity, approve, hide, or delete reviews, approve or decline book wishes, block books, change approval rules and reading goals, export family data, reset child activity, delete the synchronized family account, and revoke consent.
You can also contact us at privacy@bookhoot.app for privacy questions or help with data choices.
Retention
BookHoot retains family reading data while the parent account is active and only as long as reasonably necessary to provide the service, maintain security, resolve support issues, and meet legal obligations. A parent may delete the synchronized family account from Grown-Up Controls. Active account records are removed through that process; limited security, audit, and backup records may remain for a restricted period when reasonably necessary before being deleted or de-identified.
Security
BookHoot uses verified parent authentication, encrypted HTTPS connections, AWS encryption at rest with KMS-managed keys, authorization checks that scope every child record to its parent account, audit records for sensitive actions, and a device-only parent PIN for grown-up controls.
No system can be guaranteed perfectly secure. If you believe there is a privacy or security issue, contact privacy@bookhoot.app.
Changes to This Policy
We may update this policy as BookHoot changes. The latest version will be posted at this URL with a new effective date. Material privacy changes will be reflected in the app and App Store privacy information when required.
Contact
Privacy contact: privacy@bookhoot.app
Support contact: support@bookhoot.app
Operator: BookHoot, United States.