Bite and Bond ("we", "us") is a free cooking companion built for Durban University of Technology (DUT) students. This policy explains what personal information we collect, why, and your rights under South Africa's Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA).
What we collect
- Account details: first name, last name, username, email address, and password (stored as a salted hash, never in plain text).
- Your DUT campus and any diet style or allergy preferences you choose to save.
- Ingredients you type into the AI recipe assistant, so a recipe can be generated for you.
- Recipes generated for you are saved to your account so you can revisit them, for a limited time before they're automatically deleted.
- If you subscribe to AI recipe generation, a record of the payment (amount and status, not your card details) so we can confirm your access.
Why we collect it
- To create and secure your account, and to know it's really you when you log in.
- To personalise recipes and student deals to your campus and diet preferences.
- To send account emails, such as verifying your email address.
Who we share it with
We don't sell your information. A small number of service providers process data on our behalf, strictly to run the app:
- Google (Gemini API) — the ingredients you enter are sent to generate your recipe.
- Resend — sends account verification emails on our behalf.
- PayFast — processes your payment if you subscribe to AI recipe generation; your card details go directly to PayFast and never touch our servers. See our cancellation and refund policy.
- Neon (database) and Vercel (hosting) — store and serve the application and its data.
Cookies
We use one strictly-necessary cookie to keep you logged in, and a cookieless website analytics tool that doesn't track you individually or set a tracking cookie. See our cookie banner for details.
Your rights
Under POPIA, you can ask us to access, correct, or delete your personal information, or object to how it's used. You can also lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator of South Africa. To exercise any of these rights, contact us using the details below.