Privacy policy

Onești City is an independent project. It is not the official website or app of the town of Onești and does not represent Onești City Hall or any other public institution. Official information is published on onesti.ro.

This page explains what data about you Onești City processes: the onesti.city website, the Onești City apps for iPhone and Android, Onești City Radio, and Emma, the radio's assistant on WhatsApp (+40 753 470 029). The Romanian version is the reference text.

1. Who is responsible for your data

The data controller is the company behind Onești City:

Company

QRITON TECHNOLOGIES S.R.L.

Tax ID (CUI)

53194382

Trade Register no.

J2025100973003

Registered office

Mun. Onești, B-dul Oituz bl. 13, sc. A, parter, ap. 11, jud. Bacău, Romania

Email

onesti@qriton.com

For any question or request about your data, write to onesti@qriton.com. We reply within one month at the latest, usually within 1–2 working days.

2. What data we process

When you read, listen or watch the camera

• Like any server, the servers of the website, the radio and the camera see your IP address, your browser or app and phone type, the page requested and the time. The service cannot work without them, and we need them to stop attacks. From these logs we only produce statistics with totals: how many visitors and listeners we have and, roughly, from which towns.
• We use no advertising or analytics cookies and no tracking tools (Google Analytics, the Facebook pixel or others).
• The website keeps in your browser only preferences (theme, volume, the pop-ups you closed), a random ID for votes, likes and the survey, what you liked and, if you entered the contest, your name and phone number so you don't have to type them again. You can delete them in your browser settings.
• The apps do not ask for your location, contacts or microphone and contain no advertising, analytics or crash-reporting software. The camera and photo library are used only when you choose to attach a photo.

Messages, dedications and photos for the radio

• We keep the display name you choose, the text and, where relevant, the photo. You can use a first name or a nickname.
• Once approved, they appear on onesti.city/mesaje and may be read on air. Approved photos may also appear in the weekly collage on our Facebook page, with your first name.
• A message read on air in the evening may also appear the next day in a short clip on our Facebook page (“Aseară la radio”, last night on the radio): the presenter's voice reading it, your first name and place, and an excerpt of the message.
• We automatically remove hidden data from photos (for example where they were taken), resize them and add the Onești City logo.
• We do not keep the IP address with messages; we only use it on the spot to limit how many messages can be sent.

City reports

• We keep the name, description, category, the place you describe and up to 4 photos. Email and phone are optional, stay private and are used only to ask you for details.
• After review, the report appears on onesti.city for transparency. We do not send it to the City Hall or any other institution, and it does not replace the official channels on onesti.ro. The “Marked as solved” status is set by the Onești City team, not by the City Hall.
• In an emergency, call 112.

Votes, likes, survey, reports of content and the anonymous ID

• When installed, the app creates an anonymous ID: a random string with no link to your name, number or any account. The website does the same in your browser. In the app you can see and reset it under About.
• We use it to count one vote per person in the Top 10, to remember what you liked with ❤️, what you answered to “O întrebare pentru tine” (our short survey) and what you reported, and to limit abuse.
• On the server we keep it as a cryptographic fingerprint with a secret key. For the survey we keep the ID itself, with your answer and, if you write one, a short text.
• For votes, likes, the survey and reports of content, we keep the IP address only as a cryptographic fingerprint, to stop mass voting from one connection.
• When you report something, we keep the reason, your optional note and the ID fingerprint.
• Every new message and city report gets an author key: a cryptographic fingerprint, with a secret key, of the app's anonymous ID, of the browser's or, on WhatsApp, of the number. Its first 16 characters appear publicly next to the post (in the app and in the website's data), so that you can hide, on your phone, everything a given author writes.
• The key is the same for every post from the same phone (or the same browser), for messages and city reports alike. Anyone who reads the public data can see that two posts come from the same phone, even if one is signed with your name and the other is not. If you reset the ID under About, later posts get a different key.
• If an author publishes abusive content, we can block them: we keep their fingerprint and the reason, and new posts from them are no longer accepted.

The “Codul zilei” contest

• On the website you give us your name and phone number; on WhatsApp we use your display name and number. Only people aged 18 or over may take part, under the official rules (in Romanian).
• We keep the phone number only for winners, to call them about the prize. For everyone else we keep only a cryptographic fingerprint of the number, to apply the entry limits.
• For entries made on the website we also keep the IP address, as evidence in case of fraud.
• Winners are announced on the website and on air with their first name and the initial of their last name.

The venue guide and small ads

• When you propose a venue or correct its opening hours, the venue's details (name, address, hours, the venue's phone) appear in the guide after review. Your own contact, if you leave one (on WhatsApp, your number), is not public. We also keep the IP address, as evidence in case of abuse.
• For small ads, the title, text, name and contact you write become public after approval, so that interested people can reach you.

News and City Hall documents

• News items are headlines and short excerpts from the press, with a link to the publication that wrote them. Summaries of the documents the City Hall publishes on onesti.ro are written automatically (OpenAI).
• We do not take documents that concern private individuals, such as marriage notices or offers to sell land. If a summary or a headline concerns you and you want it removed, write to us.

Emma on WhatsApp

• Emma, the radio's assistant, is an artificial intelligence program (OpenAI), not a person. To answer you, your messages are sent to OpenAI. The conversation history Emma uses to follow the thread is kept only in the program's memory, not on disk, and Emma uses it for at most 2 hours after the last message; messages also appear in the channel's technical log.
• We see your WhatsApp number and name, as in any chat. We only keep your preferences (whether you asked for STOP or for the morning message, ZILNIC) and the fact that you wrote to us, so that we do not send you the welcome message twice.
• Voice notes (up to 30 seconds) are transcribed automatically (OpenAI). We keep your voice only if you reply “DA” (yes) within 10 minutes, and we broadcast it only after the team approves it.
• Dedications, greetings and photos sent for the radio appear on onesti.city/mesaje with your WhatsApp name, never your number. Text messages that pass the automatic check may be published immediately; the team can remove them at any time. Photos are checked automatically (OpenAI) and always approved by a person.
• If you request a song, the presenter may say your WhatsApp name. Top 10 votes sent on WhatsApp are linked only to a cryptographic fingerprint of your number.
• STOP stops all messages from us; STOP ZILNIC stops only the morning message.

Facebook

• On our Facebook page (facebook.com/onestiul) we publish posts, short clips with images from the webcam, the “Aseară la radio” clip and the weekly collage of approved photos.
• Comments on our posts (profile name and text) are collected automatically as messages for the radio: they go through the same checks, may appear on onesti.city/mesaje and may be read on air. The page answers some comments automatically, with a text written by AI.
• There is no Facebook login on the website or in the apps, and we receive no other data from your profile.

The webcam

• The camera in the centre of Onești streams live images of public space, without sound. Its purpose is to show the town and the weather, not people.
• We keep frames from the stream: the image on the website, the short clips on Facebook and the image that an AI program (OpenAI) describes every few minutes, so that the radio presenters know what the weather and light are like outside.
• If you appear in a published image and want it removed, write to us.

Android app testers

• If you sign up on onesti.city/telefon, we keep your email (usually your Gmail address) and, optionally, your name, to add you to the app's test on Google Play. Your email therefore also reaches Google.

When you email us

• We keep your address and what you write, in order to reply.
• The team receives email notifications about what needs approval (messages, city reports, proposals), including contact details left with city reports.

3. The radio and artificial intelligence

• Onești City Radio is an automated radio station. Its presenters (Marius, Ana, Paul and Emma) are AI-generated voices (ElevenLabs), and their lines are written with AI (OpenAI).
• When an approved message is read on air, its text and display name are sent to OpenAI, so that the presenter can introduce it, and to ElevenLabs, so that it can be spoken.
• The radio is streamed live on the internet: whatever has been broadcast can be heard and recorded by anyone listening and cannot be taken back.
• The AI only filters, sorts and writes short versions. It does not take decisions with significant effects on you on its own.
• While you listen, our streaming server (AzuraCast) sees your IP address, your player or app and how long you listen. We use this to run the radio and to know how many listeners we have.

4. Who else receives data

We do not sell data and do not give it to anyone for advertising. We work with these providers, each only for its own part:

• Exoscale (Switzerland): the servers of the website and of the online radio, in data centres in Switzerland.
• Microsoft Azure (data centre in Sweden): a standby server for the radio.
• OpenAI (USA): automatic checks of texts and photos, voice-note transcription, Emma, the presenters' lines, summaries, replies on Facebook and descriptions of webcam images. Under OpenAI's API terms, this data is not used to train its models.
• ElevenLabs (USA): the presenters' voices; it receives the text that is read on air.
• Meta: Facebook (our page) and WhatsApp (chats with Emma), each also under its own privacy policy.
• Apple and Google: the app stores; Google also for testing the Android app.
• Our email providers (Apple iCloud Mail, Microsoft 365): messages to us and internal notifications.
• jsDelivr: the webcam page loads its video player from there, so it sees your IP address, like any server.

The radio software and Emma run on our own equipment in the European Union. Switzerland has a level of data protection recognised by the European Union. For providers in the USA, transfers rely on the safeguards required by the GDPR: the EU–US Data Privacy Framework or standard contractual clauses.

Weather (OpenWeatherMap, Open-Meteo, meteoalarm.org), venues (OpenStreetMap), news and summaries (local press, onesti.ro) are fetched by our server without sending any data about you.

We disclose data to public authorities only when the law requires it.

5. Legal bases

• Your consent (GDPR Art. 6(1)(a)): publishing your messages, photos and city reports on the website, on air and on Facebook, checking them automatically with AI, broadcasting your voice, the morning message and signing up as a tester. You can withdraw it at any time, for the future.
• The contest rules (Art. 6(1)(b)): taking part and receiving prizes.
• Legal obligations (Art. 6(1)(c)): records of prizes and requests from public authorities.
• Our legitimate interest (Art. 6(1)(f)): security and abuse prevention, moderation, technical logs and statistics with totals, collecting public comments on our Facebook posts, and the webcam. You can object at any time.

6. How long we keep data

The table says what we do today. Where it says “until we delete them”, there is no automatic deletion yet: the data is not public and we delete it whenever you ask. When we introduce an automatic deletion, we will put its period here.

Data	How long
What we publish: messages, photos, city reports, venues	As long as they are published. We remove them when you ask.
Pending messages, with their photos	Deleted automatically after 14 days (if hidden after a report, 14 days from the hiding)
Rejected messages, with their photos	Until we delete them
Rejected city reports, with their photos	Deleted automatically after 7 days
Pending city reports, with their photos	Deleted automatically after 14 days (if hidden after a report, 14 days from the hiding)
Facebook comments collected as messages	Same as messages above. The comment text also stays in our record of collected comments, so that we do not collect it twice, until we delete it.
Email and phone left with city reports; your contact left with venue proposals	Until we delete them; the published text stays
IP address with venue proposals	Until we delete the proposal
Small ads	On the website for 30 days after you send them; after that they are no longer shown, but we keep them until we delete them
Reports of content	Deleted automatically after 90 days
Blocking of an author (fingerprint and reason)	Until we lift the block
Contest: name and IP address of entries that do not win	30 days
Contest: winners (name, phone, prize)	As long as the law requires for prize records
Votes, likes, survey answers (random IDs and fingerprints)	Until we delete them
Conversation history with Emma	Only in the program's memory, not on disk; Emma uses it for at most 2 hours after the last message
WhatsApp number, preferences (STOP, ZILNIC) and the fact that you wrote to us	Until you ask us to delete them
Your voice, after “DA”	Deleted automatically 5 minutes after broadcast, or after 24 hours if not broadcast. If the program restarts in between, it stays until we delete it.
Webcam frames	Until we delete them; published clips stay on Facebook
The “Aseară la radio” clip: the presenter's voice reading the message, first name, place and the message	On Facebook, as long as the clip is published; on our side, until we delete them
Android tester emails	Until the app is publicly released on Google Play, or until you ask us to delete them
Technical logs of the servers and of the WhatsApp channel	Until we delete them
Internal email notifications (items to approve)	Until we delete them
Your emails to us	As long as needed to handle the request

7. Your rights

You can ask to know what data we hold about you and to receive a copy, to have it corrected or deleted, to restrict or stop its processing, and to receive it in a format that is easy to move elsewhere. You can withdraw your consent at any time.

Make your request on onesti.city/stergere-date or at onesti@qriton.com. There are no accounts, so tell us what you sent and how we can find it: the name you used, the approximate date and, from the app, your anonymous ID. We reply within one month at the latest.

If you are not satisfied, you can complain to the Romanian data protection authority (ANSPDCP), dataprotection.ro, or to the authority in your EU country.

8. Minimum age

You must be at least 16 to send us messages, photos or city reports, and at least 18 to enter the contest. If we learn that we received data from someone under 16, we delete it.

9. How we protect data

• All connections are encrypted (HTTPS).
• Only the Onești City team has access to the data.
• Your email address and phone number are never shown publicly, except the contact you write in a small ad.
• Where possible, we keep cryptographic fingerprints instead of the data itself (IP, phone, ID).
• If a security incident affects you, we notify ANSPDCP and, where required, you.

10. Changes

When we change something important, we update the date at the top and announce it on the website. If the change concerns the consent you gave in the app, we ask for it again.

See also our terms of use (in Romanian), about us and the contest rules.