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PealCast Beta

Privacy Policy

Last updated: August 22, 2026

This Privacy Policy explains how Smart Talk, LLC, operating the PealCast service ("PealCast," "we," "us," or "our"), collects, uses, discloses, and protects information. It is provided by Smart Talk, LLC for the PealCast platform. If you are a church using PealCast, you remain responsible for your own compliance obligations toward your members — including obtaining consent to message them and holding any required licenses (such as a CCLI streaming or worship license). This document is provided for transparency and is not legal advice.

Our roles: controller and processor

PealCast plays two distinct roles. For information about the churches and church staff who hold PealCast accounts, we act as a controller. For information about a church's members and viewers — the people who watch a church's live streams and connect through PealCast — we act as a processor and service provider on behalf of the church, which is the controller of that member data. We handle member data only to provide the service to the church and at the church's direction, not for our own independent purposes.

Information we collect

Church-customer account data (we are the controller)

  • Account and contact details for the church and its staff — name, church name, email, phone number, and role.
  • Billing information necessary to administer a subscription (processed by our payment processor; see below).
  • Configuration and usage details about how the church uses PealCast.

Member and viewer data (we are a processor for the church)

When a church's members or viewers connect through PealCast, we collect and process the following on the church's behalf:

  • Names provided at a church's "get connected" prompt.
  • Phone numbers — a verified mobile number, collected specifically so the church can send go-live notifications and communicate with the member.
  • Email addresses, where provided.
  • Watch data and analytics — which services a person watched, for how long, and how often.
  • Limited technical data (such as device and browser information) needed to deliver the video stream and measure watch time.

Phone numbers are collected for go-live notifications

A member's mobile phone number is collected specifically so the church can notify them when a live stream begins and can follow up with them pastorally. Providing a phone number is voluntary and is not a condition of watching. Members opt in to text messaging, and every text program honors the opt-out instructions described in our SMS & Messaging Terms.

How we use information

  • Send go-live notifications when a church's stream begins.
  • Measure per-person watch statistics so the church can see who watched and for how long.
  • Build the weekly Shepherd's Report — lists of new watchers to welcome and drifting watchers to check on.
  • Sync data to the church's Planning Center (or other church management system) at the church's direction.
  • Provide, secure, support, and improve the PealCast service and administer billing.
  • Comply with legal obligations and enforce our terms.

We do not sell your data or share opted-in numbers

We do not sell, rent, or share opted-in phone numbers with third parties for their own marketing purposes. Mobile opt-in information is never shared with third parties. We do not sell personal information. Member data is used only to provide the PealCast service to the church that collected it.

Consent basis

Members choose to connect with a church and to opt in to notifications through a voluntary "get connected" prompt — never a hidden or forced enrollment. Text-message consent is obtained at opt-in and is not a condition of any purchase. The church, as controller, is responsible for the lawfulness of the consent it obtains from its members, and PealCast provides the tools to record and honor that consent.

Planning Center and other church-management integrations

At a church's direction, PealCast writes per-person watch statistics and follow-up data to the church's Planning Center account (and, as they become available, to other church management systems such as Breeze, CCB, and Rock). PealCast connects using the church's own authorization and acts as a data processor in this relationship — we move data into the church's system so the church can shepherd its people. The church controls that destination system and its own retention and access policies there. Data written to a church's church-management system is thereafter governed by that system's and the church's own policies.

Google and YouTube integrations

PealCast offers two optional connections to a church's own Google account. Both are off until a church deliberately turns them on, both are connected by a church signing in to Google and approving the access on Google's own consent screen, and either can be disconnected at any time. Neither is required to use PealCast, and neither is offered to a church's members or viewers — only to the church staff who administer the account.

PealCast uses YouTube API Services

When a church chooses to send its service to its own YouTube channel as well as to PealCast, PealCast uses YouTube API Services to set that up on the church's behalf. By connecting a YouTube channel, the church is also agreeing to the YouTube Terms of Service, and Google's handling of the information it receives is described in the Google Privacy Policy.

PealCast asks for one YouTube permission — https://www.googleapis.com/auth/youtube — because managing a church's live broadcast requires it, and Google offers no narrower permission that can do the job. With it, and only for the channel the church selects, PealCast:

  • Lists the YouTube channels on the account — their names and ids — so the church can pick which one to stream to, and so we can tell the church when a channel is not enabled for live streaming.
  • Creates the live broadcast and its stream for each service, and reads back the ingest address and stream key, so nobody has to fetch them from YouTube Studio every Sunday.
  • Sets the title, description, scheduled start, thumbnail and privacy the church chose in PealCast, starts the broadcast when the church's encoder is actually sending, and ends it when the service is over.
  • Lists the church's playlists and adds the finished video to a playlist, when the church has asked us to keep its services in a series.
  • Reads back statistics for that channel and for the videos PealCast created — such as view, like and subscriber totals — to show them to the church inside PealCast.

That is the whole of it. PealCast does not read, download or moderate the rest of a church's YouTube library, does not touch comments, does not access anyone's viewing history or subscriptions, and does not use YouTube data to build profiles, to advertise, or for any purpose other than running the church's own simulcast and reporting on it to that church. We never share a church's YouTube data with another church, and we do not sell it.

Google Drive as a connected service

Separately, a church can ask PealCast to auto-archive its finished service recordings to its own Google Drive. That connection uses one narrow permission — https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive.file — which covers only the files PealCast itself creates in that Drive. It does not, and technically cannot, read the rest of the church's Google Drive.

How this information is stored

When a church connects Google or YouTube, we store the resulting authorization tokens encrypted at rest in our database, so PealCast can act for the church at service time without asking someone to sign in again every week. Alongside them we keep only what is needed to run the integration: the selected channel's id and name, the ids and watch links of the broadcasts PealCast created, the playlist chosen, and a record of whether the last attempt succeeded or failed. Access is limited to the people and systems that operate the service.

How to revoke access

A church can disconnect YouTube or Google Drive at any time from inside PealCast, which retires the stored connection and stops us using it. Independently of us, the Google account holder can revoke PealCast's access at Google's own security settings page — https://myaccount.google.com/permissions — and can also ask us to delete the data we hold, by writing to support@pealcast.io. Retired records are purged in the ordinary course, as described under Data retention below. Revoking access stops future simulcasts to that channel; it does not affect the church's own PealCast stream.

Limited Use

PealCast's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs to any other app will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

Data retention

We retain church-account data for as long as the account is active and as needed to provide the service, meet legal and accounting obligations, and resolve disputes. We retain member data on the church's behalf for as long as the church maintains its account and directs us to keep it. Records are soft-deleted and then purged in the ordinary course; a church or member may request deletion as described below. Some records may be retained where required by law.

Your privacy rights (CCPA and similar laws)

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or port your personal information, and to opt out of certain processing. Because we process member data on behalf of churches, requests about member data may be directed to the church or to us, and we will assist the church in responding. Subject to applicable law, you may:

  • Access the personal information we hold about you.
  • Request deletion of your personal information.
  • Opt out of messaging at any time (reply STOP to any text), and opt out of any sale or sharing (note: we do not sell personal information).

To exercise these rights, email us at support@pealcast.io. We will not discriminate against you for exercising your privacy rights.

Cookies and analytics on this website

On our marketing website we use cookies and similar technologies to understand how visitors use the site and to improve it. These include Google Analytics (traffic and usage measurement), Microsoft Clarity (aggregate usage and session insights), and Bugsnag (error monitoring so we can fix problems). You can control cookies through your browser settings. These marketing-site analytics are separate from the per-person watch statistics we collect for churches inside the product — and they are also separate from the Google and YouTube account connections described above, which are a church's own opt-in integrations rather than anything measured on this website.

Data security

We use administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards designed to protect information, including encryption in transit. No method of transmission or storage is perfectly secure, but we work to protect your information and to limit access to those who need it to operate the service.

Children's privacy

PealCast is intended for use by churches and adults acting on their behalf. It is not directed to children, and we do not knowingly collect personal information directly from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided us personal information, contact us and we will take appropriate steps to delete it.

Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we do, we will revise the "Last updated" date above and, for material changes, provide additional notice where appropriate. Your continued use of PealCast after an update means you accept the revised policy.

Contact us

Questions about this policy or your data? Contact Smart Talk, LLC: