Legal

Privacy Policy

Last updated: August 1, 2026

1. Introduction and scope

Lowen Library is a paid subscription reading room and full-text search engine for the published works of Alexander Lowen. The service is provided by The Alexander Lowen Foundation ("the Foundation", "we", "us", "our"). The library is at lowen.app, and the Foundation's website is at lowenfoundation.org.

This Privacy Policy explains what personal information we collect when you use Lowen Library, how we use it, who we share it with, and the choices and rights you have. For the purposes of data protection law, the Foundation is the data controller for the personal information described here.

This policy covers the Lowen Library website and service. It does not cover other websites or services that we do not operate, including the Foundation's own website, which have their own policies. By using Lowen Library, you agree to the practices described in this policy.

2. Information we collect

We collect only what we need to run the service, bill for it, and improve it. The categories below describe everything we collect.

(a) Information you provide. Your account email address. If you buy before creating an account, your account is created from the email you enter at checkout. Your full name, which is optional. Messages you send us, for example when you contact support or ask about a student or hardship rate. Your own content inside the library, including bookmarks and their optional notes, saved citations (a passage or excerpt you save, with optional notes), and the collections you create, including the names you choose for them.

If you choose "Continue with Google" to sign in, Google shares your basic profile information (such as your name and email address) with us to create or match your account. We do not receive your Google password.

(b) Payment information. Payments are processed by Stripe. When you subscribe, you enter your card details directly on Stripe's checkout page. We never see or store your card number or other raw payment data. Stripe also collects your email and card information on its own page as part of processing the payment. Our own records store only your Stripe customer ID, your Stripe subscription ID, your plan, your subscription status, the current billing period end date, and a dated history of your subscription's changes (for example when a trial started, when it became active, a plan change, a failed payment, or a cancellation), which we keep to run the service and to understand our subscription trends. To understand how Stripe handles your information, please see Stripe's privacy policy at stripe.com/privacy.

(c) Your library activity. To provide your personal reading room, we store the activity that makes it work: bookmarks, with your optional notes; reading progress, meaning the page you last read in a book; saved searches, which include the search text you chose to save; recent searches, which are your recent search text; and saved citations, including the saved excerpt, your optional notes, and the collections you create. All of this data is stored per account and protected by row-level security in our database, so you see only your own rows.

(d) Search and library-activity analytics. We record how the search feature is used, on our servers only, so we can operate and improve it. We want to be plain about this, because it includes the text you search for. Each time you run a search, we record: the search query text exactly as you typed it; the search mode and the search engine used; the number of results and the number of books matched; the response time; a per-session identifier (see section 2(e)); and your user ID. Searches that return no results are recorded too, because knowing where the library falls short tells us what to improve. Each time you open a result into the reader, we record the query, which book and page you opened, that result's rank or position, the session identifier, and your user ID.

We use this information to run and improve search, to understand what people look for and where results fall short, and to build a future "related ideas" search that finds passages by meaning. Because search text can reflect personal interests, we treat these logs as confidential, restrict access to them, use them only to operate and improve search, and never sell or share them or use them to target advertising.

Separately, we look at library activity in aggregate to understand what resonates across the readership and to curate the service. For example, we count how often each book is bookmarked and how often passages from each book are saved, so we can see which works and ideas readers return to, choose real passages for features such as the passage of the day, and decide what to improve. This aggregate analysis looks at totals across all members, never at any one person's reading room. The individual bookmarks, notes, and saved citations inside your reading room stay private to you and protected by row-level security, as described in section 2(c).

When you open a page in the reader, we record that page view on our servers: which book and page you opened, and when. We use this to measure reading activity over time, to see which books and passages readers spend time with, and to improve the library. Like the search logs, we treat these records as confidential, restrict access to them, and never sell or share them or use them to target advertising.

We also record when your account was last active (a last-seen timestamp). We use it to measure how many members are active over time and to notice accounts that may benefit from support, for example a member who has not opened the library as a renewal approaches. It is a single timestamp on your account, not a log of everything you do.

(e) Cookies and local storage. Lowen Library uses a small number of items on your device, and none of them are for advertising: an essential authentication cookie from our sign-in provider, Supabase, that keeps you signed in; a random per-session analytics identifier, stored in your browser's session storage, which is not tied to your identity and only groups the searches from a single browsing session together, clearing when the session ends; your display preferences, meaning your theme (light or dark) and your reader font size, kept in your browser's local storage, which stay on your device and are not sent to us; and a first-party acquisition item that remembers where you first arrived from (for example a link carrying a campaign tag, or a referring website) for up to 90 days, which we copy to your account if you sign up and then delete. If you never sign up, it simply expires. There are no advertising cookies and no third-party tracking cookies on Lowen Library.

(f) Technical data received through our providers. Our own application does not log your IP address, does not fingerprint your device, and does not run any third-party analytics or advertising trackers (for example, we do not use Google Analytics or anything like it). We also serve our fonts ourselves rather than from a third-party font service. However, delivering any website involves sending data across the internet, so our infrastructure providers (Vercel, Supabase, and Stripe) necessarily receive your IP address and browser user-agent as a normal part of serving the site to you, even though we do not record them ourselves.

3. How we use your information

We use the information described above to:

Provide the service, including your account, your reading room, and the library's full-text search.
Authenticate you and keep your account secure. Sign-in is handled by Supabase, and we never store your password.
Process payments and manage your subscription through Stripe, including trials, renewals, cancellations, and refunds.
Operate, improve, and curate the service using the search and library-activity analytics described in section 2(d), and build a future meaning-based search.
Send you essential service messages about your account, your subscription, billing, security, and important changes to the service or this policy.
Comply with our legal obligations and enforce our terms.

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

4. Legal bases for processing

Where data protection law such as the GDPR applies to you, we rely on the following legal bases:

Contract: to provide the service you subscribe to, including your account, your reading room, and billing through Stripe.
Legitimate interests: to secure the service, to prevent misuse, and to operate and improve search using the analytics described in section 2(d), balanced against your rights.
Consent: where we ask for it, for example if you choose "Continue with Google" for sign-in. You may withdraw consent at any time.
Legal obligation: to keep records we are required to keep, such as billing and tax records, and to respond to lawful requests.

This section applies where such law applies to you. If you have questions about data protection, you can reach us at connect@lowenfoundation.org.

5. Automated decision-making

We do not make decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects about you based solely on automated processing. The search analytics described in this policy are used to operate and improve the service, not to make automated decisions about you.

We do not sell or rent your personal data, and we do not share it with advertisers or data brokers. We share information only with the service providers (sub-processors) that make Lowen Library work, and only as needed to run the service.

Provider	Purpose
Supabase	Database and authentication hosting (stores your account and library data)
Vercel	Application hosting (serves the website)
Stripe	Payment processing (see stripe.com/privacy)
Google	Optional "Continue with Google" sign-in, only if you choose it

We may also disclose information where the law requires it, for example to comply with a valid legal process, to enforce our terms, or to protect the rights, safety, and security of our members, the public, or the Foundation.

If the Foundation is involved in a merger, acquisition, reorganization, or transfer of assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction. We will continue to protect it under this policy, and we will give notice of any change in who controls your personal data.

7. Data retention

We keep your account and library data (your email, optional name, bookmarks, reading progress, saved and recent searches, saved citations, and collections) while your account is active and for a reasonable period afterward.

When you delete your account, or ask us to delete it, we remove your personal data. Some records may be kept where we are required to keep them, for example billing and tax records, or kept in de-identified form that is no longer linked to you.

We keep search and usage analytics that are linked to your account for up to 24 months. After that, we delete them, or we remove the link to your account and keep only aggregated, de-identified statistics that are no longer personal to you. We keep those aggregated statistics to understand long-term trends and to keep improving search. Billing records held through Stripe are kept as required for financial and tax purposes.

8. Categories of personal information

This section summarizes the personal information we collect, mainly for readers with rights under California law (CCPA and CPRA) and similar frameworks. It restates, in category form, what sections 2, 3, and 6 describe in detail.

Categories of personal information we collect:

Identifiers and contact information: your email address, your optional name, and your account and user ID.
Commercial and subscription information: your plan, your subscription status, and your Stripe customer and subscription IDs (never your card number).
Internet and other electronic activity: your search queries, the search mode and engine, result and match counts, response times, which results you open and their rank, the reader pages you open and when, a last-active timestamp, where you first arrived from (such as a referring site or a campaign tag on a link), and the per-session identifier.
User-generated content: bookmarks, notes, saved searches, recent searches, saved citations and excerpts, and the collection names you choose.

Sources of this information: directly from you (for example, your account details, your messages, and your library content); from Stripe (your subscription status and Stripe IDs after payment); and from your browser and your use of the service (search analytics and the per-session identifier).

Business and commercial purposes: we use each category for the purposes listed in section 3, such as providing and securing the service, authenticating you, processing payments, operating and improving search, sending essential service messages, and complying with law.

Categories of recipients: the sub-processors listed in section 6 (Supabase, Vercel, Stripe, and Google), and others only where required by law.

We do not use your search-query text to infer sensitive characteristics about you. We do not sell or share your personal information, and we do not sell or share any sensitive personal information.

9. Your rights and choices

You can access, correct, export, or delete your account and personal data at any time by contacting us at connect@lowenfoundation.org, and we will action your request. You can cancel your subscription at any time from your account, which opens the Stripe billing portal, and you can update your name and password from your account as well.

Depending on where you live, data protection law may give you additional rights, and we honor these kinds of rights for our members:

The right to know what personal information we hold and to access a copy of it.
The right to correct inaccurate information.
The right to delete your information, subject to records we must keep by law.
The right to receive your information in a portable form.
The right to object to or restrict certain processing, and to withdraw consent where we rely on it.
For California residents and others with similar rights, the right to know, delete, and not be discriminated against for exercising these rights. We do not sell or share your personal information.
If you are in the EEA or the UK, the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection supervisory authority. We ask that you contact us first, at connect@lowenfoundation.org, so we can try to resolve your concern directly.

To exercise any of these rights, use your account or write to us at connect@lowenfoundation.org. We will respond within the time required by applicable law. We may need to verify your identity before acting on a request.

10. Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control

Because we do not track you across other sites or serve advertising, and we do not sell or share personal information, we do not need to change our practices in response to Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control signals. The essential data described in this policy is still collected to run the service.

11. Security

We take reasonable steps to protect your information. These include row-level security in our database so that each member can see only their own data, encryption in transit over HTTPS, and reliance on the security practices of our providers (Supabase, Vercel, and Stripe).

No method of transmission over the internet or method of storage is completely secure, so we cannot guarantee absolute security. Please help keep your account safe by using a strong password, keeping your login details private, and not sharing your account.

12. Children's privacy

Lowen Library is intended for adults. As stated in our Terms of Service, you must be at least the age of majority in your place of residence to use the service, and the service is not directed to children or to minors under the age of majority. In particular, the service is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone who is not eligible to use the service under our Terms. If you believe an underage person has provided us with personal information, please contact us at connect@lowenfoundation.org, and we will delete it.

13. International users and data transfers

The service is operated from the United States, and our providers may process and store data in the United States and other countries. If you use Lowen Library from outside the United States, you understand that your information will be transferred to and processed in the United States, where data protection laws may differ from those in your country. Where required, we rely on our providers' safeguards for such transfers.

14. Third-party links

Lowen Library may link to other websites, including the Foundation's website at lowenfoundation.org and to Stripe. Those sites are operated by others and have their own privacy policies. This policy does not apply to them, and we are not responsible for their practices. We encourage you to read the privacy policy of any site you visit.

15. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make a material change, we will update the "Last updated" date above and, where appropriate, give notice through the service or by email. Your continued use of Lowen Library after a change takes effect means you accept the updated policy.

16. How to contact us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or about how we handle your information, please contact us by email at connect@lowenfoundation.org. For any data protection question or to exercise your rights, this is the best address to use. You can also learn more about the Foundation at lowenfoundation.org.