Your trust matters as much as the memories we preserve. This page explains clearly how we use and protect your personal data.
Last updated: August 2026
1. Who we are (Data Controller)
This policy applies to amaralfilms.com, owned by Caio Willian Ferreira Amaral, trading as Amaral Films & Photos, based in Almeirim, Santarém district, Portugal. We are the controller of personal data collected through this website.
When you complete a contact or proposal form, we collect the information you choose to provide:
The couple’s names
Email address and/or telephone number
Wedding date, country, city or region, and venue
Collection of interest and any message you send us
If you begin completing a form and leave before submitting it, we may record information already entered, such as your name, email address or telephone number, solely so that we can respond to you. You may object to this processing at any time; see section 8.
Information collected automatically
First-party Wedding Guide analytics — only with consent. These record a limited set of events, such as completing the check-up or opening a topic, without storing free-text answers, names, email addresses, telephone numbers or postal addresses.
Google Analytics 4 — only with analytics consent. It measures visited pages, language, content type and commercial interactions without sending names, contact details, messages, addresses, free-text planner content or the couples’ names from galleries. The Google tag associated with the property may send limited technical signals, without advertising cookies, to linked Google services. Advertising storage, user data for advertising, advertising personalisation and Google Signals are disabled.
Marketing cookies (Meta Pixel) — only with separate consent. These help us measure and improve our advertising.
Technical data — IP address and server logs generated automatically for security and the reliable operation of the website.
Information entered in the Wedding Planner
The planner can be used without an account. In that case, answers remain in the local storage of the browser being used. PDF files and backups are generated on that device.
If you choose to create an account, we collect your email address, telephone number, a securely hashed password and the information you choose to enter in the plan. This may include names, dates, locations, supplier contacts, budget, guests, schedule, tasks and notes. Passwords are never stored as readable text. Temporary hashed tokens are used for email verification and password recovery. This information is necessary to authenticate the account and synchronise the planner between devices.
If you select “Calculate route”, only the two addresses for that route are sent to the public Nominatim/OpenStreetMap and OSRM services to obtain coordinates, distance and an estimated journey time. This is optional: you may enter the values manually and should not submit confidential information.
Messages sent through WhatsApp, Instagram or Facebook Messenger
When you start a conversation with Amaral Films & Photos through these channels, we may process your name or profile identifier, telephone number, message content, attachments, date and time, and the history needed to understand the enquiry and maintain continuity.
When automated support is enabled, an artificial intelligence assistant may analyse the conversation context and prepare or send a reply. Automatically sent replies are clearly identified as coming from AI, and you may request a person by writing “human”. When AI prepares a draft that is reviewed, amended where necessary and approved by a person, the interaction is human support assisted by AI.
Voice messages may be transcribed locally on an Amaral computer to make it possible to respond. The temporary file is deleted after transcription and is not used by Amaral for biometric identification, emotion recognition or model training.
3. How we use your information
To respond to an enquiry or proposal request and continue the conversation.
To manage our relationship and provide photography and film services if you choose to proceed.
With your consent, to measure performance and improve our advertising on Meta.
With analytics consent, to understand which pages, languages and parts of the Wedding Guide are used, assess website performance and improve the experience.
To maintain the security and correct operation of the website.
To create and authenticate an optional Wedding Planner account, save changes and make the plan available on signed-in devices.
To understand and respond to conversations you start through WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger, including transcribing voice messages, retrieving the context of that conversation and referring sensitive matters to a person.
To improve consistency of support using internal examples of our communication style, with contact details, links and addresses removed before they are provided to an AI service.
4. Legal bases under Article 6 of the GDPR
Steps taken before entering into a contract — to respond and prepare a possible service at your request.
Consent — for Google Analytics and first-party Wedding Guide analytics and, separately, marketing cookies such as Meta Pixel. You may withdraw consent at any time.
Performance of the requested service — when you create an account and ask us to store and synchronise the planner.
Legitimate interests — for website security and to respond to a conversation initiated by you.
Pre-contractual steps and legitimate interests — to organise, transcribe and answer messages you send us and maintain continuity, always with the right to request a person.
5. Who we share information with
We do not sell personal data. We share it only with service providers that help us operate the website and business:
Meta Platforms, Inc. (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger) — when you accept marketing cookies or contact us through one of these channels.
OpenAI — to analyse the strictly necessary context and prepare a support response. API inputs and outputs are not used to train models by default unless the controller expressly opts in, and the application requests that no application history be created. Temporary security and abuse-prevention logs may exist under the provider’s terms. Whenever technically possible, voice messages are transcribed locally.
Google Ireland Limited / Google LLC — for Google Analytics and limited consent-mode measurement signals sent to linked Google services, only with analytics consent, and when you play an embedded YouTube video or the website loads its typefaces.
Website hosting (dominios.pt) — where the website and enquiries are stored on servers in the European Union.
OpenStreetMap/Nominatim and OSRM — only when you voluntarily request a route calculation in the planner.
International transfers: Meta and Google may process information outside the European Economic Area, including in the United States. These transfers are covered by legal safeguards such as the EU-US Data Privacy Framework and the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses.
6. How long we keep information
Contact and proposal enquiries — for the duration of the conversation and then for up to 24 months, unless the relationship continues or the law requires a different period.
Marketing cookies — according to the periods set by Meta; you may delete them in your browser at any time.
Technical logs — for short periods and only for security.
First-party Wedding Guide analytics — for up to 180 days, without free-text content entered in the planner.
Google Analytics — measurement cookies for up to 13 months; event and report data follow the retention configured in the property and can be removed through Google’s controls.
Wedding Planner account and plan — for as long as the account is maintained. You may export the information and immediately delete the account and plan from the tool’s account area.
Support conversations, transcripts and summaries — for up to 24 months, unless they are needed during a contractual relationship, to meet a legal obligation or to resolve an ongoing enquiry. Temporary audio files are deleted after transcription.
7. Cookies
We use three categories:
Essential — required for the website to work, including the secure session for an optional planner account. These do not require consent.
Analytics — optional, for Google Analytics and limited first-party Wedding Guide events. It excludes free text and contact details and is activated only after consent.
Marketing (Meta Pixel) — optional and separate from analytics. This is activated only after consent.
You can review or change your cookie choices at any time:
8. Your rights
Under the GDPR, you have the right to:
Access your personal data and understand how it is processed;
Correct inaccurate or outdated information;
Request erasure of your personal data, also known as the right to be forgotten;
Restrict or object to certain processing;
Request data portability;
Withdraw consent at any time, without affecting processing already carried out.
9. Artificial intelligence support and human control
The assistant is a support tool. It does not confirm availability, reserve dates, interpret contracts, negotiate prices or decide on payments, cancellations, refunds or complaints. These matters are referred to Caio or the team.
We do not make decisions based solely on automated processing that produce legal or similarly significant effects. You may request an explanation, correction or human intervention at any time.
10. Complaints
If you believe your information has not been processed correctly, you may lodge a complaint with Portugal’s supervisory authority, the Comissão Nacional de Proteção de Dados (CNPD), at www.cnpd.pt.
11. Security
The website uses an encrypted HTTPS connection, and we take reasonable measures to protect personal data from unauthorised access. For planner accounts, passwords and tokens are protected by strong hashes, verification and recovery links expire, essential session cookies are restricted to server access, and information is stored in a private database outside the public website directory. Synchronisation detects conflicts between devices before replacing versions. The messaging assistant runs on an Amaral-controlled computer, stores credentials in the macOS Keychain, validates Meta webhook signatures and supports local deletion of all data associated with a conversation. No system is completely invulnerable; we recommend using a unique password and periodically exporting a copy of the plan.
12. Children
Our services are intended for adults. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children under 16.
13. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy when necessary. The date of the latest update appears at the top of this page.
