Privacy Policy

This policy explains what we collect, why we collect it, how long we keep it, and how to make us delete it. We have tried to write it in plain language rather than legal padding. If anything here is unclear, email us and we will explain it properly.

1. Who is responsible for your data

Network Coffee is a service operated by Geek Falcon Coding and Machine Learning Co. L.L.C, a limited liability company licensed in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (commercial licence no. 1109170, Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism). In this policy, "we" and "us" mean that company. We are the data controller for the information described here.

For anything about your data, contact us through this website and mark your message for our data team.

2. What we collect

When you apply

The application form asks for:

• Your name and email address. Required — we cannot introduce you to anyone without them.
• Your role and company, and a LinkedIn URL. Optional. They help us judge who you should meet.
• The emirate you are in, and what you want out of a meeting. Required — this is what we match on.
• A free-text note about who would be useful to meet. Optional. Please do not put confidential or sensitive information in it.

Alongside that, our server records:

• A one-way salted hash of your IP address — not the address itself. We use it only to stop the same connection flooding the form. We cannot reverse it back into an IP address.
• Your browser's user-agent string and the time you applied, for the same abuse-prevention purpose.

When you become a member

Membership adds your matching preferences, a profile photo, your meeting history, and billing records. We never see or store your full card number. Card details go directly to a regulated payment processor; we keep only what they return to us, such as the last four digits, the card brand, and whether a payment or refund succeeded.

What we never ask for

We do not ask for your Emirates ID number, passport, visa status, salary, or bank details, and you should not send them to us. If you email us something we did not ask for, we will delete it.

3. Check-in selfies and biometric data

Confirming a meeting happened is the core of how Network Coffee stays reliable, and it works by comparing a selfie taken at the table against your profile photo. A facial comparison is biometric data, which is treated as sensitive personal data under UAE law, so it gets stricter handling than anything else we hold:

• We ask for your explicit consent first, separately from accepting these policies. You can refuse, and you can withdraw consent later.
• It is used for one purpose only — confirming that you and your match both attended, so both deposits can be refunded.
• It is deleted within 14 days of the meeting, automatically. Once a meeting is verified and the deposits are returned, we no longer need it.
• It is never shown to other members, never published, and never attached to your public profile.
• It is never used to train or improve any model, ours or anyone else's, and we do not sell or licence it.
• We do not run face recognition against any other database, and we do not use it to identify you anywhere except against your own profile photo.

The comparison itself may be performed by a specialist verification provider acting on our instructions. They may only process the image to return a match result, must delete it on the same schedule, and may not use it for their own purposes.

4. Why we are allowed to use it

Under the UAE Personal Data Protection Law (Federal Decree-Law No. 45 of 2021), we rely on these grounds:

Your consent

For submitting an application, and separately and explicitly for the check-in selfie. You can withdraw either at any time.

Performing our contract with you

For matching you, arranging meetings, taking and refunding deposits, and billing your membership.

Our legitimate interests

For keeping the service safe and usable — rate limiting, blocking fake applications, and investigating reports of misconduct.

Legal obligation

For keeping accounting and tax records that UAE law requires us to retain.

5. Who else sees it

We do not sell your data, rent it, or share it for anyone else's advertising. It reaches only:

• The member you are matched with — and only your first name, role, and the reason we matched you. Your email is not handed over; you decide what to share at the table.
• Our infrastructure provider (Cloudflare), which hosts the site and the database.
• Our payment processor, which handles deposits and membership billing under its own privacy terms.
• Our verification provider, for the single facial comparison described above.
• Our email provider, to actually send you your match.
• Authorities or advisers, where we are legally required to disclose something, or need advice on a dispute. We will tell you unless we are prohibited from doing so.

Each provider gets the minimum it needs to do its job, and none of them may use your data for their own ends.

6. Where it is stored

Our site and database run on Cloudflare's network, which means your data may be processed on servers outside the UAE. Where that happens, we rely on the transfer safeguards the PDPL allows, including contractual protections with our providers. If you want to know which region your records sit in, ask us.

7. How long we keep it

Check-in selfies

Deleted within 14 days of the meeting.

Applications we decline, or that go nowhere

Deleted within 12 months, unless you ask us to delete them sooner.

Member accounts

Kept while your membership is active, then deleted within 12 months of you leaving.

Abuse-prevention records (hashed IP, user agent)

Deleted within 12 months.

Payment and accounting records

Kept for 5 years, because UAE tax and commercial law requires it. This is the one category we cannot delete on request.

Records of a serious conduct report

Kept as long as needed to keep other members safe, and to defend ourselves if the decision is challenged.

8. Your rights

You can ask us to:

• Show you what we hold about you.
• Correct anything wrong or out of date.
• Delete your data, subject to the accounting records noted above.
• Stop or restrict a particular use of it.
• Hand it over in a portable, machine-readable format.
• Withdraw consent — including consent for the selfie check-in — without losing your membership.
• Object to processing we base on our legitimate interests.

Contact us through this website and we will respond within 30 days. There is no charge. We may ask you to confirm your identity first, so we do not hand your data to someone pretending to be you. If you are not satisfied with how we handled it, you can complain to the UAE Data Office.

9. Cookies and analytics

This website currently sets no cookies at all. There is no analytics, no advertising pixel, no session tracking, and no third-party script following you around. That is also why you have not been shown a cookie banner — there is nothing to consent to.

If we later add analytics or a member login that needs cookies, we will update this policy and ask for your consent where the law requires it, before setting anything.

10. Security

The whole site is served over HTTPS. Form submissions are validated on our server, not just in your browser, and every database query is parameterised. We store a hash of your IP rather than the address itself. Access to member data is limited to the people who need it to run the service.

No system is perfect. If we ever suffer a breach that puts your data at risk, we will notify you and the UAE Data Office as the law requires, and tell you plainly what happened.

11. Age

Network Coffee is for adults. You must be 18 or over to apply. We do not knowingly collect data about children, and we will delete it if we discover we have.

12. Changes

If we change this policy we will update the date at the top. For anything that materially affects your rights — a new category of data, a new purpose, a longer retention period — we will email members before it takes effect, and ask again for consent where consent is the basis we rely on.

13. Contact

Requests can be sent through the form on this website.

Geek Falcon Coding and Machine Learning Co. L.L.C, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Commercial licence no. 1109170.