1. Information we collect
- 1.1 Anonymous instance ID: when the extension first runs, it generates a random instance ID in your browser and stores it locally. It contains no personal information and is used to grant and record free credit, to meter guest usage per instance, and for basic abuse prevention.
- 1.2 Card number and balance: the 24-character card number generated when a top-up succeeds, together with that card’s balance and usage. The card number is stored in plain text on our server — deliberately: it cannot be recovered by yourself, and plain-text storage is the only way we can recover it for you manually when you contact us with payment proof. We do not use the card number for any other purpose.
- 1.3 Region information: we resolve your IP address into a country/region, state/province, city and time zone and store that, to understand where our users are and to spot abnormal access. The IP address itself is used only in memory for that one lookup and is discarded immediately — it is not written to a database, not cached and not logged; rate limiting and abuse prevention use a salted hash of the IP (which cannot be reversed). Please note: when you top up, we record which browser instance the card was on at the time, and that instance is linked to the region information above, so we are able to associate a card with an approximate location at country/state/city level. We do not use this to identify you personally and we do not share it.
- 1.4 Top-up orders: order number, amount, currency, payment channel, order status, and the transaction number returned by the payment channel. We never see or store your bank card number, WeChat account, payment password or other payment credentials — payment is handled entirely by the payment channel.
- 1.5 Usage data: your translation volume (amount of text processed) and the corresponding charges, aggregated per day and attributed to a card or an instance, used to show your bill, deduct your balance and account for costs.
- 1.6 Preferences: target language, the select-to-translate trigger, subtitle display mode and similar settings. These are stored only in your own browser and are not uploaded.
- 1.7 Contact form information: the text you submit via “Contact”, any optional contact details, and any screenshots you choose to upload.
- 1.8 Email address (optional): only if you tick “Email me a receipt” when topping up do we keep the address with that order and send one receipt email after payment (order number, amount, time, payment method, card number and balance); it is deleted right after sending and kept for at most 24 hours; addresses on unpaid orders are deleted when the order expires.
- 1.9 Translation content: we do not store your source text or translations — see Section 3.
- 1.10 Error diagnostics and anonymous usage statistics: when the extension encounters an error, we collect the error message, stack trace, extension version, and the domain and path of the page where it occurred (without query parameters), solely to locate and fix defects. We also record feature-usage events (for example “a page was translated” or “selection translation was used”) and an installation profile (operating system type, interface language, target language, shortcut and similar setting values) to improve the product. These statistics use a separate, randomly generated statistics ID that is not linked to your instance ID, never contains the full card number (top-up events carry at most its last 4 characters), and contains neither the addresses you visit nor any page content. This website also records anonymous visit statistics (page path, referring page, browser language and time zone, time on page); the visitor ID is a random value stored in your browser and contains no personal information.
2. How information is used
- Provide and maintain the translation service, and meter and bill usage per card or per instance
- Process top-ups and grant free credit, and, at your request, verify and handle refunds and card-number recovery
- Respond to feedback you submit via the contact form
- Understand where our users are and how features are used, to improve the product
- Keep the service secure and detect and prevent abuse
3. Handling of translation content
The text you ask to translate is streamed through our server to a third-party large-model service outside mainland China (model providers such as OpenAI, called via the OpenRouter platform), and the result is returned to your browser extension. We do not store your source text or translations, and we do not use them to train models; translation content is used only to complete that one translation. We also maintain a shared translation library to lower the cost of repeated translations: every translation in it comes from public web pages we captured ourselves and never from any user’s translation requests. When you translate a full page, we count translation demand per page address (domain and path) to decide which pages are worth pre-translating; for same-day de-duplication we also store one record derived from a salted hash of “date + your instance or card”, kept for at most 3 days, not linkable across days, and not reversible to your identity.
4. Third-party services
To provide the full service we interact with the following third parties, only as far as necessary: OpenRouter and the model providers it connects to (such as OpenAI) (translation engine — the text you ask to translate is sent to them as needed; their servers are located outside mainland China); WeChat Pay (via YunGouOS) and Creem (payment channels, handling CNY and USD top-ups respectively and refunds to the original method); Tencent Cloud SES (sending the receipt email only when you ask for one); and ip-api.com (resolving an IP address into a region, see 1.3). Each of these services has its own privacy policy, which we recommend you review as well.
5. Data storage and security
We take reasonable technical measures to protect your data: our server stores only the necessary information listed above; client IP addresses are never written to a database or logs; card-number verification is rate-limited to prevent credential stuffing; and uploaded images are type-checked. Please note that the card number is the sole credential for using a balance — guard it as you would a password. Transmission and storage over the internet can never be completely secure, and we cannot provide an absolute guarantee.
6. Your rights
You may contact us at any time to request that we:
- Provide the information we hold related to your card or browser instance
- Delete the data related to your card or instance (except where laws require otherwise); after deletion the card’s balance can no longer be used, so please use it up or request a refund first
- Correct inaccurate information, or recover your card number manually against payment proof if you have lost it
Please contact us at the email address in Section 9. Because we have no account system, we may need your card number or payment proof to verify that the request is yours.
7. Protection of minors
Our service is intended for users with full legal capacity. If you are a minor, please use this service under the guidance of a guardian.
8. Policy updates
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The updated version will be posted on this page, and the effective date at the top will be revised.
9. Contact us
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at support@ahatranslate.com.