1. Scope
This Privacy Policy describes how Foster Companion (the "app"), an iOS application for foster families, and the website at fostercompanion.com (the "website") handle information. Foster Companion is operated by Cory Hoover, a sole proprietor ("Foster Companion", "we", "us").
The app and the website work very differently, and this policy treats them separately. The app keeps your records on your device. The website is a set of static informational pages with no accounts, forms, cookies, or trackers.
The short version. Foster Companion has no user accounts and no cloud database. The records you enter are stored on your iPhone. We do not collect, receive, sell, or share them. Report data leaves your device only when you choose to email it to recipients you select.
2. Who we are
Foster Companion is independently developed by Cory Hoover, sole proprietor, based in California, United States. Foster Companion is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of any government agency, county, or child-welfare or foster family agency.
For any privacy question, you can reach us at privacy@fostercompanion.com.
3. Categories of information
Information you enter in the app
The app is designed to hold caregiving records, which you enter yourself. Depending on how you use it, that can include:
- Child profile information — a name or an optional nickname, dates, and other identifying details you choose to enter, plus an optional photo.
- Health-related information — medication names, dosages, schedules, administration or completion records, allergies, and related notes, including monthly signatures or initials you record.
- Clothing records — clothing inventory items and condition, monthly clothing purchases, amounts, dates, and allotment or accrual figures based on age bracket.
- Allowance records — amounts, dates, acknowledgements of automatic payments, and related notes.
- Report records — the monthly reports you assemble, their submission status, and the recipient email addresses you enter when sending them.
This information can be sensitive, and much of it concerns children. It is stored on your device, and we do not receive it.
Information we do not handle
The app does not create an account for you, does not ask for a password, does not request access to your contacts or location, and does not include advertising or analytics software. We do not maintain a copy of your records.
4. Local storage on your device
App data is stored locally on your mobile device using the operating system's own storage for the app. There is no Foster Companion cloud database, no server-side account, and no proprietary Foster Companion backup or sync service.
Because the data is local, the security and availability of your records depend substantially on your device: your passcode or biometric lock, your operating system version, who has physical access to the phone, and your backup configuration.
5. Device backups
Data stored on your device may be included in your normal device or phone backup, depending on your device settings and the backup service you use. If your backups are stored with a third-party service — for example an operating-system backup service — that service's own terms and privacy practices govern the backup copy, not this policy.
If you do not want Foster Companion data included in a backup, review your device's backup settings. Conversely, if you rely on backups to avoid losing records, confirm that backups are actually running; we cannot restore records for you, because we never have them.
6. Reports you email
The app lets you compile and review report data and then send it by email to recipients you designate — for example a social worker, an agency address, or your own inbox. You choose the recipients, and nothing is transmitted until you send it.
Once you send an email, transmission, delivery, storage, and retention of that message are handled by your email provider and by the recipients and their providers. That is outside Foster Companion's control, and we have no visibility into it. We do not make any claim about how those third parties secure, retain, or forward what you send.
Because report contents can be sensitive, confirm addresses carefully before sending, and follow any instructions your agency or county gives about how records may be transmitted.
7. No analytics, advertising, or tracking
The app contains no analytics software development kits, no crash-reporting SDKs, no advertising networks, and no cross-app or cross-site tracking. We do not build profiles of users, and we do not sell or share personal information for advertising or any other purpose.
The website sets no cookies, includes no analytics, no advertising pixels, no third-party fonts, no embedded social widgets, and no contact form. Pages are plain HTML, CSS, and a small amount of JavaScript served from the same domain.
8. Website hosting and logs
The website is statically hosted on Cloudflare Pages. As with essentially any website, the hosting and network provider may automatically process basic technical request information in order to deliver pages and protect the service against abuse. That can include IP addresses, timestamps, requested URLs, user-agent strings, and similar request metadata, along with aggregate security and performance data.
This processing is performed by our hosting provider as part of serving the site and is governed by that provider's own privacy documentation. We do not use it to identify visitors, we do not combine it with app data (which we never receive), and we do not use it for advertising.
9. Children's privacy
Foster Companion is intended for adult caregivers. It is not directed to children, and children are not the intended users of the app or the website.
The app is nevertheless designed to hold records about children, which may include profile details, photographs, allergies, medications, clothing, allowance, and report history. Those records are entered by the adult caregiver and remain on the caregiver's device. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children, and we do not receive the information caregivers enter.
If you believe information about a child has been sent to us — for example in an email to our support address — contact privacy@fostercompanion.com and we will delete it from our mailbox.
10. Retention and deletion
We do not retain your app records, because they are never sent to us. Retention is therefore in your hands:
- Delete individual records inside the app.
- Delete the app's data, or uninstall the app, to remove records from the device, subject to how your device handles app removal.
- Remember that copies may persist in your device backups until those backups expire or are removed according to your backup settings and your backup provider's practices.
- Emails you have already sent remain with your email provider and the recipients you chose; deleting a record in the app does not recall a message you have sent.
There are no user accounts or authentication in the app at launch, so there is no account for us to delete and no account-deletion workflow. If you email us, we retain that correspondence in our mailbox only as long as needed to answer you and keep a reasonable record of support requests, and you may ask us to delete it.
11. Security and its limits
A local-first design removes several common risks: there is no central database of children's records to breach, and no account credentials to steal. It does not remove all risk.
We do not claim any particular certification, and we do not claim that the app encrypts your records beyond whatever protections your device and operating system apply. Anyone with access to an unlocked device may be able to see the records in the app. Steps that genuinely help include using a strong device passcode, enabling biometric device lock, keeping your operating system updated, not sharing your phone, and being deliberate about where reports are emailed.
No method of electronic storage or transmission is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
12. California privacy
Foster Companion is operated from California, United States, and this policy is written with California and United States law as its baseline.
California residents have rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act, including rights to know, delete, and correct personal information a business collects about them, and to opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information.
In practice, those rights have very little to operate on here. We do not collect personal information about you through the app, we do not sell or share personal information, we do not use it for cross-context behavioral advertising, and we do not use sensitive personal information for purposes requiring a limitation notice. If you contact us by email, the personal information we hold is your message and the address you sent it from. You may ask us to confirm, correct, or delete that correspondence by writing to privacy@fostercompanion.com. We will not discriminate against you for making a request.
Because we hold so little information, we may be unable to verify a request beyond matching the email address that sent it. Where that is the case, we will explain what we can and cannot do.
13. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy as the app changes — for example if a future version adds a feature that handles information differently. When we do, we will revise the effective date at the top of this page and publish the updated policy here. Material changes will be described in plain language rather than buried in edits.
This page is the authoritative version of the Foster Companion privacy policy and is the policy referenced from the app's App Store listing.
14. Contact
Questions about this policy, or about how a particular feature handles information:
Cory Hoover, sole proprietor · Foster Companion · California, United States
For help using the app, including how to remove records from your device, see the support page. The terms of use cover the rules that apply when you use Foster Companion.