What data HelpAlive collects, redacts and keeps

HelpAlive collects usage events from your users’ browsers the whole time its script runs in your app, and more only when a user uses the chat or an assist. This page lists the data HelpAlive collects about your users, what it does with it, and how long it keeps it. It is for the admins, privacy teams and security reviewers who need to describe HelpAlive in their own privacy notice.

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Data collection at a glance

• The script collects no screenshots, screen or session recordings, keystroke timing, screen size or cookies.
• Before usage events are saved, our servers scan them and replace personal data, such as names, email addresses and card numbers, with a tag. The scan is automatic and can miss some.
• Apart from password, card, one-time-code, file-upload and hidden fields, the page the agent reads is not redacted, because it is what the agent needs to see to help.
• Usage events are kept for 12 months. Chat and assist text is kept for your setting, 1 year by default.
• HelpAlive’s servers, database and backups run in US East (Virginia).

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What the script collects

The script records usage events the whole time it runs in your app. Chat and assists send more, only when the user uses them. Not collected: screenshots, screen or session recordings, keystroke timing, screen size, and cookies. The script doesn’t read the user’s IP address, though our servers and network provider see it, as every web server does. In the browser: the script sets no cookies. It keeps ids, unsent events, the running assist’s position, a copy of the widget’s settings and the current chat’s id in your site’s browser storage. Signing out with reset() clears the chat entries.

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What is stripped from page addresses

Before a page address leaves the browser in a usage event, the script removes:

• tokens of every kind, keys, secrets, passwords and one-time codes;
• signatures, including cloud-storage signatures;
• session ids, user ids and email addresses;
• everything after the #.

This applies to usage events only. The page the agent reads keeps its full address.

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What the agent sees

When a user opens the chat, asks a question or runs an assist, the agent reads the page as structured text, never as a picture. It sees:

• the page’s title, headings and visible text, such as banners and notices;
• each button, link and field, with its label, role and state;
• the values in fields, as shown, except password, card, one-time-code, file-upload and hidden fields, and any field holding a card number. For those it sees only whether the field is filled;
• the full page address, the browser’s time zone and local date.

It also gets the user’s message and recent turns, and recent activity on this visit. It gets the role, plan and display name you send in identify(), and the matching passages from your docs. The email field you send in identify() is never sent to the model. Anything else is: if you pass an email as displayName, or an email shows on the page or in a chat, the agent sees it. Apart from those fields, the page the agent reads is not redacted. A code typed into a field your page doesn’t mark as a one-time code (autocomplete="one-time-code") is included. This is deliberate, because it is what the agent needs to see to help. See How the AI uses your data.

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What is redacted, and what is not

Before usage events are saved, our servers scan them and replace personal data with a tag, such as <PERSON>. The scan looks for names of people, email addresses, phone numbers, IP addresses, card numbers and US social security numbers, in English only. It covers page titles, element text and labels, form names, typed field values and on-screen error text. These are not redacted:

• chat messages and answers;
• assist data, and the page the agent reads;
• ids, the profile you send in identify() (name and email are stored as given), custom track() events and the seen-elements list;
• our server logs.

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Our server logs

Our server logs can hold your users’ chat questions and the page text assists read, but never values typed into fields. They also hold your team’s email addresses at sign-in and when invites are sent. Logs are kept for 30 days. Deleting a user doesn’t reach these log copies; they age out.

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How long we keep it

HelpAlive’s servers, database and backups run in US East (Virginia). Each customer’s data is kept logically separate, and every request is limited to that customer’s own data.

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Set how long chat and assist text is kept

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Stop tracking or delete data

On Settings → Privacy Management, find the person under People or the company under Tenants:

• Stop tracking means that their new usage events are dropped as they arrive. Resume tracking starts again.
• Delete their data deletes their usage data and their chat and assist text. The rest is made anonymous, so your counts stay. The reason you give is kept in History.

Deletions reach the database within a minute, and a second pass 15 minutes later removes anything that was still on its way. Log copies age out within 30 days, and backups within about a month. To delete your whole workspace when you leave, email support@helpalive.com.

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Things to tell your users

• Your team can read their chats. Everyone on your team can read chat transcripts on Audience.
• There is no consent mode. Once the script loads and identify() runs, usage events are recorded. To wait for consent, load the script only after the user accepts. See Consent.
• Browser privacy signals aren’t read. Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control don’t change what the script does.

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Privacy policy and terms

These pages explain how HelpAlive handles data in practice. The legal terms are in our Privacy policy and Terms of use.

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