Terms

The rules, and what you agree to.

Spotago is a place-first photo app in beta, made by Spotago LLC. By using it you agree to the rules below. They are short because the product does most of the work: photographs come only from the in-app camera, locations are approximate unless there is a reason to be exact, and every photograph and every report is checked — by AI first, and by a person when needed.

Version 2026-10-10 — the same edition the app asks you to accept. The version in the app is the one that applies.

Community rules

What you may post

Photographs you took yourself, with the shutter in this app, at the place itself. No screenshots, no camera roll, no pictures of other people’s screens. Nothing sexual, hateful or threatening; nothing that identifies a private person without their consent; nothing that exposes where a private person lives. Every photograph is checked by AI when you post it and again shortly after; one the check finds in breach is refused or taken back down. The checks are automated and imperfect: report what they let through, and ask for a second look at what they refuse.

Zero tolerance for child sexual abuse and exploitation. Any sexual content involving a minor is removed, preserved and reported as the law requires, and ends the account. Our full standards are at spotago.com/child-safety.

Where a photograph is shown

A photograph is shown at an approximate area unless it was taken at a public place — a beach, a park, a landmark — or you pinned the exact spot yourself for a reason the app checked against the photograph. A pinned spot is not an invitation: respect private property and the people who live there. You can turn exact locations off in Settings, and blur any post of yours back to its area at any time.

Pinned spots

When you pin a spot you are saying why people should be brought to that exact place — a sale, an event, a hazard, a lost animal. Your reason is checked against the photograph before the pin goes up. A pin comes down by itself when its time is up, and at once when an account in good standing reports that it shows a person or a home; where such a report is confirmed, new pins in that area are refused for a time. Never pin a spot to expose, track or harass a person.

Collections

A collection is a list of places to photograph. Some are drawn up by AI from public map data and what it knows of an area; you can ask for one on a topic of your own, and a list drawn up for a topic and an area may be offered to the next person who asks the same, without saying who asked first. A place on a list can be wrong, closed or gone: use your own judgement, respect private property and local rules, and only go where you are allowed to be. A list is a tip, not a promise, and no place pays to be on one. A list you make is shown only to you — and, once you have finished it, to anyone you hand its share link to.

Questions and answers

From a place you can ask the people who are there a short question, and with answering switched on you can answer what is asked where you stand. Ask about the place, not about a person: a question or an answer that names, describes or could identify somebody or a vehicle is refused, and so is anything abusive. What you type is checked and rewritten into a short neutral form before anyone sees it, and both sides stay anonymous to each other. Answers come from strangers who happen to be nearby; they can be wrong, out of date or a guess, and Spotago does not check whether they are true — use your own judgement, and where your safety is concerned do not rely on one. Answer only what you can see. Using a question or an answer to harass, advertise or find a person counts against the account.

Reports and takedowns

Any signed-in account can report a post. What a report can do depends on the account behind it: a safety report from an account in good standing — one with an email and password or a Google sign-in attached — takes a post out of the feed at once, while a report from a phone-only account is recorded and weighed but changes nothing on its own. The one exception is sexual content involving a minor, which is acted on from any account, at once. Asking for a photograph of yourself or your home to come down is done in the app, from the photograph's own menu (Report → This is my home, This is me or This shows a child); from an account with an email, Google or Apple sign-in behind it the photograph comes down at once and a review confirms or restores it within minutes — by AI, and by a person when needed. The same menu is where you ask for the area around a home to be protected, two areas per account. People without the app use the takedown web page, signed in with their Spotago email and password, and it is decided the same way. If you have no Spotago account and a photograph shows you or your home, email hello@spotago.com with the link to the post. Reports made to harass count against the account that made them.

Your account and your data

You sign in with this phone. The app sends our server an identifier for the phone, kept only as a hash, and gets an account tied to it: no name, no email, and posts never show who made them — but every photograph you post belongs to that account. Attaching an email and password or a Google sign-in makes the account yours beyond this phone, and is what makes your reports count. Deleting your account removes your photographs and everything the account holds.

Each photograph and the text on it is sent to OpenAI to be described and checked against these rules; OpenAI states it may keep what it receives for up to 30 days to monitor abuse, and does not use it to train its models. There is no way to post without this check. The topic you give a collection, and the questions and answers you type, go to OpenAI the same way, to be read and rewritten; the map data a collection is drawn from comes from OpenStreetMap services, which are told the area asked about, never who asked. Where you stand while browsing only chooses what you see; your position is not stored, only the general region you are in. We keep the usage counts needed to run the service, the hashed phone identifier that limits accounts per phone, and nothing that tracks you across other apps. The full account of what is collected is in the privacy policy. You must be 18 or older to use Spotago.

Enforcement

Breaking these rules has consequences that scale with the harm: a refused or removed post, a paused ability to report, a suspended account, or a terminated account and a blocked phone for the worst of it. Sexual content involving minors ends the account on the first confirmed instance, and is preserved and reported to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and to law enforcement where the law requires. If you think a decision about your post or account is wrong, ask for a second look from My Posts in the app, or email hello@spotago.com.

The beta

Things will break and things will be missing. Tell us — every problem report is read — and bring somebody. We may change these rules as the product grows; the version in the app is the one that applies, and a change big enough to matter asks for a fresh acceptance there.