Trade Translate Privacy Policy

1. Overview

Trade Translate (the “extension”) is a WhatsApp Web translation extension built for foreign-trade workflows. It also includes auxiliary features such as quick replies, contact language labels, and trade documents (quotations / trade paperwork).

This policy explains in detail how the extension collects, uses, stores, and shares user data during your use, including the categories of data, the purposes of processing, retention periods, and the specific third-party recipients. “User data” means any data obtained from you or your usage environment through the extension, including message content generated in WhatsApp Web.

The extension does not use user data for advertising, does not sell or rent user data, and does not engage in cross-site tracking unrelated to the extension’s features.

2. What data we collect and process

2.1 Chat message text (required for translation)

2.2 Translation feedback (optional, submitted by you)

If you report a poor translation, we upload: the source text, the translated text, the language direction, the translation engine used, your feedback reason and additional notes, whether the report is anonymous, an anonymous client identifier (client_id), the extension version, and the submission time.

• Recipient: our server trade.aiappworks.cn;
• Retention: 7 days, deleted automatically afterwards;
• You can tap “Undo” within 4 seconds after submitting to delete it immediately, and you can also contact us to delete it later;
• Feedback data is used only to diagnose translation quality issues.

2.3 Account information (after sign-in)

2.4 Translation usage statistics (after sign-in)

To implement the daily translation quota and usage display, the extension records daily translation counts and character counts (split between incoming and outgoing messages) locally, and synchronizes them to our server trade.aiappworks.cn when you are signed in. Only aggregate numbers (counts, characters, date) are uploaded — no message text.

2.5 Trade documents feature data (optional; uploaded to our servers)

When you use the built-in trade documents (quotations, packing lists, and similar paperwork) feature, the data you actively enter or upload is stored on our server trade.aiappworks.cn, including:

• Customer profiles: name, contact person, email, phone, address, country, bank and payment details, remarks;
• Product profiles: name, description, SKU, HS code, prices, weight/volume parameters, product images;
• Document content: headers, line items, and terms of quotations / trade documents, and generated files;
• Company settings: company name, contact details, templates, and stamps/seals.

This data is stored per workspace (tenant) and used only to provide the feature to you. You can delete it at any time within the feature, or contact us to delete your account and the related data.

2.6 Usage analytics (Google Analytics)

To understand feature usage, diagnose issues, and improve the product, the extension reports usage events through Google Analytics 4 (GA4) Measurement Protocol. Reported data includes:

• Event names and parameters: for example translation direction and batch counts, languages, character counts, chat type (private/group), contact country and currency, button/page identifiers, settings changes, extension version, and release market (Chrome / Edge). No message bodies, names, or phone numbers are included;
• An anonymous client identifier client_id (generated on first use and stored locally);
• A user_id for signed-in users (only attached after sign-in);
• Your public IP address (submitted as ip_override with each report so Google can derive approximate country/city location).

Events are queued locally (up to 200) and sent in batches every 5 minutes, when the page goes to the background, or when the extension popup is opened. We do not use this analytics to obtain your cross-site browsing history, and we do not use it for advertising.

2.7 How the public IP address is obtained

To support the geolocation described above, the extension queries the following public services for your current public IP (the result is cached locally for 24 hours):

• https://icanhazip.com (Cloudflare)
• https://api.bigdatacloud.net/data/client-ip (BigDataCloud)
• https://www.cloudflare.com/cdn-cgi/trace (Cloudflare)

These queries obtain only the IP address itself; no chat content is uploaded to them.

2.8 Information read from the WhatsApp page

To perform translation, detect languages, and render labels, the extension reads information visible on the current WhatsApp Web page, such as: message text and timestamps, chat titles, chat type (private/group), the phone number or country dial code associated with a chat, and current language settings.

• This information is used only locally: to decide whether translation is needed, to identify the contact’s country/language, to show country flags and language labels, and to generate quick replies.
• Except for the cases explicitly listed in Sections 2.1 (translation requests) and 2.6 (aggregate analytics events without identity information), this information is not uploaded.
• The extension does not read your phone contacts, does not read files on your device (unless you actively select files to upload in the trade documents feature), and does not collect your geolocation.

2.9 Data stored locally (chrome.storage.local)

The following data is stored only in the extension storage of your browser and is never uploaded to our servers:

• Language preferences, feature toggles, and interface language;
• Quick reply templates and categories (including your custom templates);
• Manual contact language overrides;
• A chat-list “title → phone number” cache (used to identify the contact’s country dial code; kept for 24 hours, up to 1,000 entries);
• The translation cache (see 2.1);
• Local translation counters, queued analytics events, and the public IP cache;
• Sign-in token and account information (after sign-in).

Clearing browser data, clearing the extension’s data in the browser’s extension management page, or uninstalling the extension deletes all of the above local data.

3. How we use the data

• Provide translation: send message text to translation providers to produce translations, and use the local cache to avoid duplicate work;
• Accounts and quotas: complete sign-in, maintain your session, enforce the daily translation limit, and display usage;
• Quality improvement: process the feedback you voluntarily submit to locate and fix translation errors;
• Product analytics and operations: understand feature usage, diagnose issues, and prioritize development;
• Provide the trade documents feature: store the business data you actively enter so it is available across devices;
• Safety and compliance: prevent abuse, protect the service, and comply with legal obligations.

We do not use user data for advertising, behaviorally targeted advertising, data sales, or analytics unrelated to the extension’s features.

4. Where data is stored and how long it is kept

4.1 Storage locations

4.2 Retention periods

For how translation providers process and retain the message text sent to them, please refer to their privacy policies listed in Section 5.

5. With whom we share data

We do not sell or rent user data and do not share it with advertisers. To provide the extension’s features, data is shared with the following recipients:

Besides the cases listed above, we disclose data only when: (a) you consent; (b) required by law, regulation, or a lawful request from a judicial or administrative authority; or (c) necessary to protect the legitimate rights of users, the publisher, or the public.

6. Your choices and rights

• Turn off automatic translation: you can disable “auto translation” in the extension settings and translate only manually, which prevents message text from being sent automatically to translation providers;
• Use without an account: the core translation features do not require sign-in; sign-in is only needed to lift the daily limit or use the trade documents feature;
• Do not submit feedback: translation feedback is entirely voluntary, and can be withdrawn within 4 seconds of submission;
• Clear local data: use the browser’s “clear browsing data” or the extension management page’s “remove data” to delete all local storage;
• Uninstall: you can uninstall the extension at any time from the browser’s extension management page;
• Access, correction, or deletion: to request access to, export of, or deletion of your account and trade documents data, email thomas.wang.86.021@gmail.com; we will respond within a reasonable period;
• Analytics data: you can use Google’s opt-out tool to limit the use of Google Analytics.

7. Data security

• All communication with our servers is encrypted via HTTPS;
• Accounts use token (JWT) authentication, and passwords are stored only as irreversible hashes;
• Multi-tenant data is isolated per workspace and is not accessed across accounts;
• Local data is stored in the browser’s extension-isolated storage area.

No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, but we take reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect your data.

8. Children’s privacy

The extension is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us at the email below and we will delete it promptly.

9. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. For material changes, we will post the latest version on this page and update the “Last updated” date, and where necessary we will surface a notice in the extension. Please review this page periodically.

10. Contact

If you have any questions, comments, or requests about this privacy policy, our data practices, or your data rights, please contact us:

• Email: thomas.wang.86.021@gmail.com
• Website: https://trade.aiappworks.cn/extension/index.html

We will respond as soon as we can after receiving your request.