Privacy Policy
Effective October 3, 2026
Kinship is an adults-only space for building platonic, chosen-family relationships. You’re trusting us with personal things, so this page explains plainly what we collect, who can see it, and how you stay in control.
1. What we collect
- Account details: your email address and password. Passwords are stored securely by our account provider and we never see them.
- Your profile: what you choose to add: first name, age, city, state or region, country, photos, languages, a short introduction, the roles you’re looking for and can offer, and how you like to connect.
- Optional details: anything you choose to share in the optional sections, such as work and education, family life, interests and values, social media links, faith, gender, pronouns and whether you’re part of the LGBTQ+ community. You never have to fill these in.
- Activity in Kinship: connection requests, connections, favorites, blocks, reports, private messages, Kinship Circles you create or join, and circle messages.
- Basic technical information: like most websites, our hosting and database providers automatically record basic technical data (such as IP address, browser type and the time of a visit) to keep the service running and secure.
We don’t use advertising trackers, and we don’t sell your information.
2. Who can see what
- Signed-in members can see your main profile and photos so they can discover you. Visitors who aren’t signed in are shown our sample profiles instead of members, and photos are only available to signed-in members.
- Sensitive details (gender, pronouns, LGBTQ+ and faith) have their own “who can see this” setting. Gender, pronouns and LGBTQ+ start as visible only to your connections.
- Your connections only: your school, employer and social media links.
- Private messages can be read only by you and the person you’re talking with. Messaging opens only after you both accept a connection.
- Kinship Circles: circle messages can be read only by members who have joined that circle. People you invite can see who has joined before deciding. Only the circle creator can see pending invitations.
- Mutual connections: other members may see that you both know someone. You can turn this off at any time in My profile (“Show me as a mutual connection”). A connection is only ever shown when both people have this setting on.
- Favorites and blocks are private to you.
3. How we use your information
- To run Kinship: your account, profile, matching, connections, messages and circles.
- To suggest compatible people, based on the roles you’re seeking and offering, location, language and similar details you’ve shared.
- To keep members safe: reviewing reports, enforcing our Terms & Community Guidelines, and preventing abuse.
- To send account emails, such as confirming your email address or resetting your password.
4. Services we rely on
We use a small number of trusted providers to run Kinship. They process data on our behalf:
- Supabase: stores accounts, profiles, photos, connections and messages, and sends account emails.
- Netlify: hosts the website.
- Google Fonts and jsDelivr: deliver fonts and code libraries to your browser, which means your browser contacts their servers when you load Kinship.
We may also share information if required by law, or if needed to protect someone’s safety.
5. Keeping your information safe
Kinship uses encrypted connections (HTTPS), and our database has strict access rules so members can only reach information they’re allowed to see. No online service can promise perfect security, so please don’t share passwords, money or identity documents with anyone you meet here.
6. Your choices and rights
- See and change your information: edit your profile at any time in My profile → Edit profile.
- Control visibility: use the “who can see this” settings and the mutual-connection setting.
- Block and report: available on every profile and in chats.
- Delete your account: go to My profile → Delete my account. This permanently removes your profile, photos, connections, favorites, blocks, private messages and your circle memberships and circle messages. Copies may remain in our providers’ backups for a short period before they are overwritten.
7. Adults only
Kinship is only for people aged 18 and over. We don’t knowingly collect information from anyone under 18. If you believe a minor has joined, please report the profile or contact us, and we’ll remove the account.
8. Changes to this policy
If we make important changes, we’ll update the date at the top of this page and let members know inside Kinship.
9. Contact us
Questions about your privacy?