Privacy Policy

Last updated: September 23, 2026

Montage Engine is a hosted service operated by akineticzen LLC ("we", "us"), a company registered in Massachusetts, United States. It is a studio for making slideshow-carousel content, in which each account gets its own private workspace, and — with your consent — it sends finished carousels to the TikTok and Instagram accounts you connect and shows you how those posts perform. This page describes what we store, why, who processes it on our behalf, and how you get it out.

We are responsible for deciding how your personal information is processed. If you don't agree with what's here, please don't use the Service. Questions: support@montageengine.com.

What we store

• Account: your login identity (managed by Clerk — we store their user id, not your password) and your workspace records.
• Content you make: projects, ideas, scripts, deck definitions, themes, rendered slide images, and the images in your workspace library — both files you upload and photos you save from Pexels.
• TikTok data (only if you connect an account): OAuth tokens (encrypted at rest), your public profile basics (display name, username, avatar), public metadata of your posts, and public engagement counters (views, likes, comments, shares) sampled over time. This powers the drafts and analytics features only. Details in TikTok below.
• Instagram data (only if you connect a professional account): an access token (encrypted at rest), your profile basics, the list of your posts, and their insights sampled over time. This powers publishing and analytics only. Details in Instagram below.
• OpenRouter key (only if you connect one): the runtime key from OpenRouter's consent flow, encrypted at rest, used solely to run the AI steps you trigger. You can revoke it here or on openrouter.ai at any time.
• Billing: your subscription state. Card details live with Stripe — we never see them.
• Usage & product analytics: monthly counters for the fair-use caps, and product analytics (PostHog) to understand what's working.
• Collected automatically: standard server and diagnostic data — IP address, browser and device type, timestamps, pages and features used, and error reports. We use this to keep the Service secure and working, not to profile you. We don't collect precise location; country may be inferred from your IP as part of ordinary logging.

What we don't do

We don't sell your data, share it with advertisers, or train models on your content. We never put anything on a social account you didn't ask us to: on TikTok we only deliver drafts to your inbox, and nothing goes public until you post it inside TikTok; on Instagram a carousel goes live only because you pressed Publish now on it, or scheduled it for a time you picked.

TikTok

This applies only if you connect a TikTok account on the Social page, and only to the account you connect.

• What we read: your profile basics (display name, username, avatar) and account counts (followers, following, likes, videos); the list of your own posts with their public metadata; and each post's public engagement counters (views, likes, comments, shares), sampled over time so we can chart them.
• What we write: the carousels you send from a deck's Send tab, delivered to your TikTok inbox as drafts — right away, or at a time you scheduled. We never post directly: you add the sound and post it from the TikTok app.
• How long we keep it: tokens until you disconnect the account (or TikTok revokes them); profile, post and engagement data for as long as the account stays connected to your workspace.
• Deleting it: press Disconnect on the Social page. That revokes our tokens with TikTok and deletes the account's posts, engagement history and imports straight away; anything still scheduled to it is not sent. Removing Montage Engine from your TikTok app settings also ends our access. Deleting your workspace does all of this too.
• On your instruction only: we act on a TikTok account only because you connected it and pressed a button that sends, or scheduled a send. Nothing is sent on its own.

Instagram

This applies only if you connect an Instagram professional (business or creator) account on the Social page, through Instagram's own sign-in, and only to the account you connect. We use Instagram's API with Instagram Login (Meta Platforms), with three permissions: basic profile access, content publishing, and insights.

• What we read: your profile basics (username, name, profile picture, and follower, following and post counts); the list of your posts (their type, link, time, and the text Instagram shows with them); and insights — per-post numbers such as views, reach, likes, comments, saves and shares, and your account's daily reach, views, interactions and follower changes — sampled over time so we can chart them for you.
• What we write: only the carousels you ask us to publish, from a deck's Send tab — now, when you press Publish now, or at the time you scheduled. Instagram has no draft step, so a published carousel is live on your profile. If you choose it, we add alt text written from each slide. We don't comment, like, follow, message, or change anything else on your account.
• How long we keep it: the access token until you disconnect the account (or it expires, or you remove our access in Instagram); your profile, post list and insights snapshots for as long as the account stays connected to your workspace, which is what lets us show your performance beyond the window Instagram itself keeps.
• Deleting it: press Disconnect on the Social page. That deletes the token, the account's posts and every insights snapshot straight away, and cancels anything scheduled to it. You can also remove Montage Engine in Instagram (Settings → Website permissions → Apps and websites): Meta then sends us a data deletion request, we delete the same data from every workspace the account was connected to, and Instagram shows you a confirmation code. Check its status at https://app.montageengine.com/api/instagram/deletion/status?code= followed by your code, or email support@montageengine.com with it. Deleting your workspace does all of this too.
• On your instruction only: we act on an Instagram account only because you connected it and pressed Publish now or scheduled a publish on a deck's Send tab. Scheduled publishes run only at the time you picked, and you can cancel them before then. Nothing is published on its own.
• Kept separate: each workspace's Instagram data is visible only in that workspace. We use it only to publish what you asked for and to show you your own insights — never for advertising, never sold or shared, and never combined with other people's data.

Processors

These services process data on our behalf to run the product:

OpenRouter is not our processor — you connect your own OpenRouter account directly, under their terms, and the AI prompts derived from your content are sent to the models you choose there.

Why we're allowed to process it

We only process your information when there's a valid reason to. Depending on the data, that's because it's necessary to perform our contract with you (running your workspace, rendering slides, billing), because you gave consent (connecting TikTok, Instagram or OpenRouter, optional analytics), because of our legitimate interests in keeping the Service secure and improving it, or because we have a legal obligation (tax and accounting records). You can withdraw consent at any time; that doesn't affect processing already carried out.

Cookies and tracking

We use only what the product needs: essential cookies for sign-in and session security (via Clerk), and PostHog for product analytics. We don't use advertising, targeting, or social media cookies, we don't display ads, and we don't share data for targeted advertising. Most browsers let you block or clear cookies, though blocking the essential ones will break sign-in.

There's no finalized standard for Do-Not-Track browser signals, so we don't currently respond to them. If one is adopted, we'll update this page.

Where your data lives

We're a US company and the Service is hosted in the United States — servers and database on Hetzner, with Cloudflare providing networking and object storage. If you use Montage Engine from outside the US, your information is transferred to and processed in the United States, which may not offer the same data protection as your home country.

If you're in the EEA, UK, or Switzerland, we rely on the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses (and the UK addendum) for those transfers, and we contract with our processors to protect data handled on our behalf. Copies can be provided on request.

How long we keep it

We keep your information for as long as you have an account. If you cancel, the workspace stays viewable and exportable for 30 days and is then permanently deleted. If you delete your account, removal is immediate. We may keep limited billing and tax records longer where the law requires it, and backup copies may persist briefly until they rotate out.

Keeping it safe

Credentials that could act on your behalf — TikTok and Instagram tokens, your OpenRouter key — are encrypted at rest. We use reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect everything else. No internet transmission or storage system is ever 100% secure, so we can't guarantee it absolutely, but we treat this seriously and design to limit what a breach could expose.

Minors

The Service is for people 18 and over. We don't knowingly collect information from anyone under 18. If we learn we have, we'll delete the account and the data. If you believe a minor has given us information, email support@montageengine.com.

Your rights

Wherever you live, you can use the Export and Delete buttons in Settings to get a full copy of your data or remove it entirely — no request form, no waiting on us.

Depending on your location you may also have the right to access your personal information, correct inaccuracies, request deletion, obtain a portable copy, restrict or object to processing, withdraw consent, and not be subject to solely automated decisions with legal effect. We don't sell personal information, we don't share it for targeted advertising, and we don't use it for profiling.

This applies if you're in the EEA, UK, Switzerland, or Canada, and if you're a resident of a US state with a comprehensive privacy law — including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Virginia. To exercise any of it, email support@montageengine.com. We may need to verify your identity first, and we'll respond within the time your law allows. If we decline, you can appeal by replying to us, and you can complain to your state attorney general or, in the EEA/UK, your data protection authority.

Changes to this policy

We'll update this page as the product and the law change, and revise the date at the top. Material changes get announced in the app or by email before they take effect.

Export and deletion

Settings has both buttons. Export downloads a zip of every record and every rendered slide the workspace owns. Delete permanently removes the workspace: content, rendered files, the TikTok connection (tokens revoked with TikTok and all TikTok data deleted), the Instagram connection (token and all Instagram data deleted), your subscription (canceled), and your login. Disconnecting just one account on the Social page does that account's part on its own. If you cancel your subscription instead, the workspace stays viewable and exportable for 30 days, then it is deleted the same way.

Contact

Privacy questions, requests, or complaints: