Phase 8: Security, Privacy, and Judgment Traps · 25 min · Any vibe coding tool

Privacy and User Data

When users give you their data, they trust you. Honor that trust or lose it forever.

Hiring signal: What changes when you use this: you understand privacy responsibilities — which means you handle user data ethically.

What you will learn

Practice data minimization — collect only what you need
Distinguish safe-to-store data from sensitive data
Understand when user consent is required
Know the basics of data deletion and the right to be forgotten
Understand when you need a privacy policy

Your Mission

Review your app's data practices: minimization, classification, consent, deletion, and privacy policy. Output: privacy_review.md.

You need: An app that collects user data.

Time: 30 minutes.

Step 1: Learn the Privacy Principles (5 min)

Privacy is trust
Privacy isn't just about compliance — it's about trust. Users who feel their data is respected are more likely to use your app, recommend it, and stay. For small apps, the basics go a long way: collect only what you need, be transparent, let users delete their data, and have a simple privacy policy.

Key principles:

Data minimization: Collect only what you need. Every field is a liability.
Safe vs. sensitive: Email/username = safe. Passwords/payment/health/government IDs = sensitive.
Consent: Get explicit consent for non-essential data collection.
Deletion: Users have the right to be forgotten (GDPR, CCPA).
Privacy policy: Required if you collect personal data.

Unlock the full lesson

You've read the first 2 sections. The rest of this lesson covers Step 2: Audit Your Data Collection (5 min), Data Collection Audit, Step 3: Apply Data Minimization (5 min), Data Minimization, Step 4: Check Consent (3 min), Consent Check, Step 5: Implement Data Deletion (5 min), Data Deletion Process, Step 6: Write a Privacy Policy (7 min), Privacy Policy, Step 7: Add Privacy Policy to App (5 min), Privacy Policy Link, You're Done — plus a hands-on lab, quiz, and project artifact.

Create a free account to unlock Phase 0 and Phase 1 of every course — no credit card.