The short version
- Ally Lama is an AI. His replies are written by a computer, not a person, and they can sometimes be wrong.
- To reply to you, your messages are sent to our AI partners: Dify, which runs Ally Lama’s conversations, and Anthropic, whose AI model writes the replies. Dify keeps a history of your conversations on its servers for 90 days after your last message. ElevenLabs turns Ally Lama’s replies into his voice.
- We collect only what Ally Lama needs: your sign-in email, your name, your date of birth (to work out your age group), your messages, and whether you have credits or a subscription.
- Your saved chats live on your phone. You can delete them at any time.
- We never sell your data and never use it for ads. There are no ads, no analytics and no trackers in the app or on this website.
- Chats can be personal, for example about your beliefs or your health. We only process them with your clear permission, and you can change your mind.
- It’s your data. You can ask to see it, correct it or delete it. Erase your account in the app, or email support@allylama.com.
- Ally Lama is for people aged 13 and over. If you’re 13 to 17, please read the box below, ideally with a parent or carer.
- If you are in danger or thinking about hurting yourself, call 999 or Samaritans on 116 123 (free, any time). See our Safety page.
Aged 13 to 17? Here’s what you need to know
- Ally Lama is a computer program (an AI), not a person. It can get things wrong, so check important things with an adult you trust.
- What you type or say is sent to companies that help run Ally Lama (Dify, Anthropic and ElevenLabs) so it can answer you. Dify keeps a copy of your chats for 90 days after your last message.
- We send Ally Lama your name, your age group and your language, never your exact birthday.
- We never sell your information and never show you ads.
- Feelings, health and beliefs are private. We ask your permission before you chat, and you can change your mind in Settings.
- You’re in charge of your data. You can ask us what we have about you, or delete your account, at any time.
- Talk to a parent, carer or another adult you trust before you start, or if anything here doesn’t make sense.
- If you feel unsafe or are thinking about hurting yourself, call Childline free on 0800 1111, or 999 in an emergency.
1. Who we are
Ally Lama is provided by Tarun Prajapat, a sole trader based in the United Kingdom (“we”, “us”). We are the data controller for the personal data described in this policy. That means we decide how and why it is used, and we are responsible for it. We are registered with the UK data protection regulator, the Information Commission, under registration number ZC286378.
Contact us about anything in this policy at support@allylama.com, or write to us at the postal address at the end of this policy. We are a small business and are not required to appoint a Data Protection Officer, so your message comes straight to the person responsible.
This policy covers the Ally Lama app on iOS and Android and this website. It applies under the UK GDPR, the Data Protection Act 2018 and, for people in the European Union, the EU GDPR. Section 16 adds information for people in the USA.
2. What we collect, why, and our lawful basis
Data protection law says we need a “lawful basis” for each way we use your data. We rely on:
- Contract: we need the data to provide the app you asked for.
- Legitimate interests: a reasonable purpose of ours that doesn’t override your rights. The table says which interest each time.
- Consent: you’ve said yes, and you can withdraw at any time.
- Legal obligation: the law requires it.
| What | Why we use it | Lawful basis |
|---|---|---|
| Sign-in details: your email address and a unique account ID | To create and protect your account and link your credits or subscription to you. If you sign in with Apple or Google, they share your email (or an Apple private relay address) and an ID with us. | Contract |
| Your name and date of birth | You enter these when you start, and you can see them in Settings. Your date of birth stays on your device. It is used there to work out your age group, to keep Ally Lama for ages 13 and over, and to turn on the protections for 13 to 17-year-olds (section 10). Your name and email are also saved in our database (your “onboarding record”) so our account emails can greet you by name. | Contract; legitimate interests (keeping Ally Lama for ages 13 and over and protecting teenagers) |
| Name, age group and app language sent with each message | So Ally Lama can call you by your name, reply in your language and use a tone that suits your age. Since app version 2.0.3 the AI receives an age group (for example “16–17” or “25–34”), never your exact age or birthday. | Contract |
| Your messages to Ally Lama | Sent through our server to Dify and Anthropic to write Ally Lama’s reply. Dify keeps the conversation history, for 90 days after your last message in that conversation, so Ally Lama can follow the conversation. Your saved chats are kept on your device. If you carry on an older chat after Dify’s copy has been deleted, the app sends a short recap of your recent messages from your phone so Ally Lama keeps the context. | Contract, plus your explicit consent for personal topics (section 3) |
| Ally Lama’s spoken replies | The text of Ally Lama’s reply is sent to ElevenLabs to create his voice. Replies and spoken greetings can include your name. The audio is cached in our cloud storage in London so the same line plays quickly next time. The cache is keyed to the text of the line, not to your account. | Contract |
| Voice input (the microphone) | Only when you tap the mic. Your phone’s built-in speech recognition (Apple or Google) turns your speech into text. Where your device supports it, this happens on the device; otherwise Apple or Google may process the audio under their own privacy policies. We receive only the text, never a recording. | Contract (and your device permission) |
| Your consent record | When you agree to how your messages are handled (section 3), we save which version you agreed to, when, your platform and app version, and (if we asked) that a parent or guardian agreed too, on your device and in our database. This lets us show that you agreed. | Legal obligation (we must be able to show consent) |
| Under-18 protection record | Only for accounts of people under 18, from app version 2.0.3. We save the month your under-18 protections end (the month you turn 18), never your birthday, in our database and on your device. This keeps the protections on if you reinstall the app, move to a new phone or sign in again, and lets our server apply its under-18 safety settings. | Legitimate interests (protecting teenagers, as the Children’s Code expects) |
| Credits and subscription | We keep a credit record (your email, credits remaining and subscription status) in our database. To send the subscription reminders, we also keep your plan, store, renewal date and price, and a record of each notice we’ve sent (its type and date, not the email itself). RevenueCat keeps your subscription status linked to your account ID and receives purchase receipts from Apple or Google. Apple and Google take the payment; we never see your card details. | Contract |
| Credit record kept after you delete your account | So the free messages can’t be claimed again and again by deleting and re-creating accounts (section 8). | Legitimate interests (preventing abuse of the free messages) |
| App settings | The app style you choose (Interactive or Classic) is saved to our database so it follows you to a new phone. | Contract |
| Account emails | Resend sends our service emails using your name and email: email verification, password reset, welcome, new sign-in alerts (with the device type and sign-in method), subscription confirmation and account-deleted confirmation. When the UK’s new subscription rules take effect (and possibly sooner), it will also send subscription renewal reminders, cooling-off notices and end-of-subscription confirmations (see our Terms). We don’t send marketing emails. | Contract; legitimate interests (keeping your account secure) for sign-in alerts; legal obligation for subscription notices once the rules apply |
| Daily wisdom notifications | These are scheduled on your device by the app. We don’t collect a push token or any other data to send them. You can turn them off in the app or in your phone’s settings. | No personal data is collected |
| Crisis safety check | Our server automatically checks each message, as it passes through, for signs of suicide or self-harm so that helplines can be shown (section 12). We don’t store your message for this. A technical log notes that the check was triggered, without your message. | Legitimate interests (protecting our users) and vital interests; your explicit consent for health information |
| Reports | If you use “Report” on one of Ally Lama’s replies, we receive the reply, the message it answered, the reason and any note you add, your account ID, the conversation ID, and your app version, platform and language. We use them to review the reply and keep Ally Lama safe. | Legitimate interests (keeping the service safe and fixing harmful replies) |
| Technical and security logs | Our hosting providers record technical details such as IP address, device and app version, time and errors. We also keep short-lived counters linked to your account ID to enforce fair-use limits. To stop misuse of the read-aloud voice, our server also keeps one-way check codes made from Ally Lama’s replies to you (never the text itself) for 24 hours. We use these to keep the service running, prevent abuse and enforce limits. We don’t log the content of your messages. | Legitimate interests (security, reliability and preventing abuse) |
| App integrity check (from app version 2.0.3) | The app asks Apple (App Attest) or Google (Play Integrity) to confirm that requests to our server come from the genuine Ally Lama app on a genuine device. Google Firebase App Check turns that into a short-lived token that our server checks. It contains no personal details and isn’t used to identify you or for anything else. | Legitimate interests (security and preventing abuse) |
| Support emails | If you email us, we receive what you send and use it to help you. | Legitimate interests (helping you); contract where it’s about your account |
| Legal requests | If the law requires us to keep or share information, for example after a valid request from a court or the police. | Legal obligation |
What you have to give us
You don’t have to give us any information. But without a sign-in, your name, your date of birth, your consent and your messages, Ally Lama can’t work. Using the microphone is optional.
What we don’t collect
- No location, contacts, photos or files.
- No advertising IDs, no analytics and no crash-reporting tools.
- No voice recordings (we receive only the text of what you say).
- No payment card details (Apple and Google handle payments).
3. Personal topics (special category data)
People talk to Ally Lama about what matters to them. Your messages may reveal your religious or philosophical beliefs or information about your health, including mental health. The law calls this “special category data” and protects it more strongly.
We only process it with your explicit consent. From app version 2.0.3, the app asks for it before your first chat, on a screen that names our AI providers and has two boxes you tick yourself. You can withdraw consent at any time in the app’s Settings, by erasing your account, or by emailing us. Withdrawing doesn’t affect what happened before, but Ally Lama can’t reply to messages without it.
We never use these topics to advertise to you, build marketing profiles or make decisions about you.
4. How Ally Lama’s AI works
- Every reply is generated by AI. Ally Lama is not a person, and no one is writing replies to you. The app reminds you of this regularly.
- The AI providers: your message, with your name, age group and language, goes from the app to our server (hosted by Vercel), then to Dify (run by LangGenius, Inc.). Dify manages the conversation and looks up passages from a library of wisdom texts. Dify uses Anthropic’s Claude model to write the reply. ElevenLabs turns the reply into Ally Lama’s voice.
- No AI training by us. We don’t use your messages to train AI models.
- AI can be wrong. Replies may be inaccurate, incomplete or not right for you. Ally Lama offers reflection and wisdom, not medical, psychological, legal, financial or religious advice.
- Who can see conversations: we don’t routinely read your chats. We access the conversation history held by Dify only when we need to: to look into a report or a problem you’ve raised, to keep the service safe, or when the law requires it.
Automated decisions
We don’t make decisions about you that have legal or similarly significant effects using only automated means. Three things in the app happen automatically, and we want you to know about them:
- Age check. If the date of birth you enter shows you are under 13, or under 18 on a phone set to the India region (section 10), the app won’t let you continue. If you think this is a mistake, email us.
- Age group. Your age group sets Ally Lama’s tone, and for 13 to 17-year-olds it turns on extra protections (section 10).
- Crisis safety check. Messages that may be about suicide or self-harm automatically get helplines added (section 12). Nothing else happens to your account.
5. Who we share data with
We share data only with service providers that help us run Ally Lama, and only what each one needs. They act on our instructions as our “processors”, and we require each of them to protect your data to the same standard as this policy. Apple and Google are the exception: they provide sign-in, payments and speech recognition under their own privacy policies. We never sell your data.
| Provider | What they do for us | Data | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| Google Firebase and Google Cloud (Google) | Sign-in (Authentication), our database (Firestore), server functions and email triggers (Cloud Functions), the voice cache (Cloud Storage), App Check (app integrity tokens) and logs | Account ID, email, name (onboarding record), consent record, credit record, app settings, reports, fair-use counters, read-aloud check codes, cached reply audio, technical logs | Database and storage: London, UK. Cloud Functions: USA |
| Dify (LangGenius, Inc.) | Runs Ally Lama’s conversations and stores conversation history (for 90 days after your last message) | Your messages and Ally Lama’s replies, name, age group, language, account ID | USA |
| Anthropic | The AI model (Claude) that writes Ally Lama’s replies, used through Dify | Your messages and the context sent with them | USA |
| ElevenLabs | Text-to-speech: Ally Lama’s voice | The text of Ally Lama’s replies and greetings (which can include your name) | USA / EU |
| Vercel | Hosts our server (the link between the app and the AI) | Messages in transit (not stored), account ID, technical logs | Runs in London, UK; Vercel is a US company |
| RevenueCat | Manages subscription status | Account ID, purchase receipts and subscription status | USA |
| Resend | Sends our account emails | Your name and email address, and the email content | USA |
| Apple and Google | Sign in with Apple / Google, App Store and Google Play payments, and your phone’s speech recognition (their own privacy policies apply) | Sign-in and purchase details; your speech when you use the mic | USA and worldwide |
| Namecheap | Hosts this website | Website server logs (IP address, page, time, browser) | USA |
We may also share information if the law requires it, to protect someone’s life or safety, or with a buyer if Ally Lama is ever sold or transferred. A buyer would have to protect your data in the same way, and we would tell you first.
6. International transfers
Some of our providers are based in the USA or process data there. When your data leaves the UK or the European Economic Area, we make sure it is protected by an appropriate safeguard:
- the UK Extension to the EU–US Data Privacy Framework (the “UK–US data bridge”), where the provider is certified under it; or
- the UK International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses, included in our contract with the provider; and, for people in the EU, the Standard Contractual Clauses themselves.
Email us if you would like a copy of the safeguard we use for a particular provider. For people in the EU, sending data to us in the UK is covered by the European Commission’s decision that the UK protects personal data adequately.
7. How long we keep data
We keep data only for as long as we need it for the reasons in section 2, then delete it.
| Data | How long |
|---|---|
| Saved chats, name and date of birth on your device | Until you delete them, erase your account or delete the app |
| Sign-in account, app settings and consent record | Until you erase your account. The consent record is also deleted when you withdraw consent |
| Onboarding record (name and email) | Until you erase your account (section 8) |
| Under-18 protection record | In our database: until you erase your account. On your device: until you delete the app, so protections stay on even if someone signs out and creates a new account on the same phone |
| Conversation history at Dify | Conversation content processed by our AI provider (Dify) is deleted automatically 90 days after your last message in that conversation, or sooner if you delete your account. Your saved chats on your phone stay until you delete them. You can also ask us to delete it at any time. |
| Credit record (email, credits remaining, subscription status) | Kept after you erase your account, for as long as needed to stop the free messages being claimed again. It is not used for anything else |
| Subscription record at RevenueCat | While you have an account, and afterwards as needed for purchase records and disputes. Deleted when you ask us, unless we must keep it by law |
| Cached voice audio of Ally Lama’s lines | Deleted automatically after 90 days (backup copies are removed within 7 more days). Not linked to your account |
| Reports you send | As long as needed to review the report, fix the problem and keep Ally Lama safe. Ask us if you’d like a report deleted |
| Account emails at Resend | 30 days |
| Subscription details for reminders (plan, renewal date, price) | Until your subscription ends or you erase your account |
| Record of subscription notices we’ve sent (type and date) | 6 years after your subscription ends, so we can show we met our legal duties, then deleted |
| Technical and security logs (Vercel, Google) | Up to 30 days |
| Read-aloud check codes (one-way codes made from Ally Lama’s replies, not the text) | Deleted automatically after 24 hours |
| Fair-use counters | Deleted automatically soon after the time window they count |
| Website server logs (Namecheap) | Our web host, Namecheap, records standard server access logs (IP address, page requested, browser type, time) for security and operations. We have configured our hosting so these logs are not archived; they are discarded within about 24 hours of processing. |
| Support emails | As long as needed to deal with your request and any follow-up |
8. Deleting your account
In the app: go to Settings → Account → Erase My Account. This deletes your sign-in account, your app settings, consent record and under-18 protection record (if you have one), and the saved chats, name and date of birth on that device. From app version 2.0.3 it also deletes your conversation history at Dify and your onboarding record. You’ll get an email confirming it. If part of the clean-up can’t finish at the time (for example, because of a network problem), email us and we’ll complete it.
On older app versions: the erase doesn’t remove your onboarding record, and your Dify conversation history is removed by our daily clean-up rather than straight away. Email us and we’ll delete them sooner.
What we keep, and why: your credit record (email, credits remaining and subscription status), so the free messages can’t be claimed again by re-creating an account; your subscription record at RevenueCat, which we delete when you ask unless we must keep it; and any reports you sent, while we still need them for safety. Logs expire on their own (section 7).
Without the app: email support@allylama.com from your account email with the subject “Delete my account”. We’ll confirm within 30 days. Saved chats on your phone are deleted when you delete them or the app; we can’t reach them.
Deleting your account doesn’t cancel a subscription. Cancel it in your App Store or Google Play account (see our Terms).
9. Your rights
You have the right to:
- Access: get a copy of the data we hold about you.
- Rectification: have wrong or incomplete data corrected.
- Erasure: have your data deleted (see section 8 for what we keep and why).
- Restriction: ask us to pause using your data while a concern is sorted out.
- Portability: receive the data you gave us in a common, machine-readable format.
- Withdraw consent: at any time, for anything we do based on your consent. It’s as easy as giving it: just use the app’s Settings.
- Not be subject to solely automated decisions with legal or similarly significant effects (we don’t make any; see section 4).
Your right to object. You can object at any time to anything we do on the basis of legitimate interests (see the table in section 2). We will stop unless we have compelling reasons that override your interests, or we need the data for a legal claim. Email support@allylama.com with the subject “Objection”.
To use any of these rights, email support@allylama.com, ideally from your account email. It’s free. We may ask you to confirm your identity. We reply within one month; if a request is complex we may need up to two more months, and we’ll tell you if so. A parent or carer can also contact us on behalf of a child.
10. Children and teenagers
Ally Lama is for people aged 13 and over. We designed it with the UK’s Age Appropriate Design Code (the Children’s Code) in mind, because we know teenagers use it.
Under 13
Ally Lama is not for children under 13. From app version 2.0.3, if the date of birth entered shows someone is under 13, the app stops, nothing is sent to our AI partners, and the account that was just created is deleted, so we don’t keep a child’s email. If we learn that we hold data about a child under 13 in any other way, we delete it. Parents and carers: if you think your child under 13 has used Ally Lama, email support@allylama.com and we will delete their data.
Aged 13 to 17
Teenagers can use Ally Lama, and we ask them to talk to a parent or carer first. From app version 2.0.3, these protections are on for everyone aged 13 to 17, until they turn 18:
- Less data: the AI receives an age group, never an exact age or birthday. We never use your data for ads, marketing or profiling.
- Safer conversations: Ally Lama is set up to avoid romantic or sexual conversation, and crisis messages always show helplines, including Childline for under-19s.
- Breaks: regular reminders that Ally Lama is an AI, not a person, with a suggestion to take a break.
- No nudges: Daily Wisdom notifications stay off unless you turn them on, and the subscription screens never pressure you and remind you to ask a parent or guardian before buying. Purchases go through Apple or Google, where family settings like Ask to Buy or Family Link apply.
- Parent or guardian agreement: if you’re younger than the age at which you can agree to online services yourself where you live (and you’re not in India, see below), the consent screen asks you to confirm that a parent or guardian has read it with you and agrees.
- Privacy by default: no location, no tracking, no analytics, and no sharing with anyone except the providers that run the service.
- Protections can’t be switched off by changing your age: while they’re on, your date of birth can’t be changed to an earlier date in the app. If yours is wrong, email us and we’ll help.
In some countries the age at which you can agree to online services yourself is higher than 13 (in the EU it can be up to 16). If that applies to you, a parent or guardian must agree for you.
Under 18 in India
Indian law requires verified consent from a parent before a service uses the data of anyone under 18, and we can’t verify a parent yet. So, from app version 2.0.3, under-18s whose phone is set to the India region can’t use Ally Lama for now. If the date of birth entered shows someone is under 18 on such a phone, the app stops in the same way as for under-13s: nothing more is sent to our AI partners, and the account data is removed.
11. Cookies, this website and Do Not Track
- No cookies. allylama.com sets no cookies and uses no browser storage, so there is no cookie banner.
- No trackers. There are no analytics, advertising or social media trackers. Our fonts are hosted on our own server, so loading a page doesn’t contact Google or anyone else.
- Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control. We don’t track you across websites or apps, on this site or in the app, so there is nothing for these browser signals to switch off. We treat everyone as if they had sent them.
- Server logs. Like any website, our host (Namecheap) records basic technical information when you visit: your IP address, the page requested, the time and your browser type. We use it only to keep the site secure and working (legitimate interests).
- Links. The App Store, Google Play and other links take you to sites with their own privacy policies.
12. Crisis safety
If a message suggests someone may be thinking about suicide or self-harm, Ally Lama always shows helplines alongside his reply, such as 999, Samaritans (116 123), Shout (text 85258) and Childline (0800 1111) for under-19s. This is never charged or blocked by a paywall. The check happens automatically on our server as the message passes through. We don’t keep your message for it, and we don’t contact anyone on your behalf. Read our Safety & crisis protocol for details.
13. Keeping data secure
Data is encrypted in transit between the app, our server and our providers. Our database and cloud storage are private and protected by access rules, and our AI and payment keys are kept on our server, not in the app. Google encrypts data stored in Firebase. We review our setup regularly. No system is perfectly secure. If something goes wrong that puts you at risk, we will tell you and the regulator as the law requires.
14. Questions and complaints
Please contact us first. To make a data protection complaint, email support@allylama.com with the subject “Data protection complaint”, or write to us at the address below. We will:
- acknowledge your complaint within 30 days;
- look into it properly and keep you updated; and
- tell you the outcome without undue delay.
You also have the right to complain to the UK data protection regulator, the Information Commission (it replaced the Information Commissioner’s Office on 30 September 2026): ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint. You don’t have to come to us first, but we’d like the chance to put things right.
15. If you live in the EU
Our representative in the EU. We value your privacy and your rights, so we have appointed Prighter Group, with its local partners, as our privacy representative and your point of contact in the European Union (EU). Our representative under Article 27 of the EU GDPR is:
Prighter EU Rep GmbH
Schellinggasse 3/10
1010 Vienna
Austria
Prighter gives you an easy way to use your privacy rights, for example to ask for a copy of your personal data or to have it deleted. To contact us through Prighter, or to use any of your rights, visit app.prighter.com/portal/13930503572. You can also contact us directly at support@allylama.com or at the postal address below, whichever you prefer.
The EU GDPR gives you the same rights as described above. If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your data, you can also raise it with the data protection authority in the EU country where you live or work (list of EU authorities).
16. If you live in the USA
- No selling or sharing. We don’t sell your personal information, and we don’t share it for cross-context behavioural (targeted) advertising. We don’t use sensitive information to infer things about you.
- Your choices. Wherever you live, you can ask us what we hold about you, and to correct or delete it, using the routes in section 9. We won’t treat you differently for doing so.
- Consumer health data. If you live in Washington State, Nevada or another state with a consumer health data law, read our Consumer Health Data Privacy Policy.
- Children. Ally Lama is not for children under 13, and we don’t knowingly collect their personal information (section 10).
- Do Not Track. See section 11.
17. Changes to this policy
We will update this policy when our services or the law change, and change the “Last updated” date above. If we make an important change, we will tell you in the app before it takes effect. If a change needs your consent, we will ask for it; we will never treat simply carrying on using the app as consent. Email us if you’d like an earlier version.
Contact
Tarun Prajapat, sole trader (Ally Lama)
Suite RA01, 195–197 Wood Street
London E17 3NU
United Kingdom
Email: support@allylama.com
Data protection registration number: ZC286378