Effective 1 November 2026. SonoCare Healthcare Ltd (RC 1555036), House 3, Road 1, Eliminigwe Housing Estate, Phase 3, Elelenwo, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, is the data controller for the SonoCare app and for the sonocare.com.ng and sonocare.ng (SonoCare Clinics) websites. This policy explains what we collect, why, who we share it with and your rights under the Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023 (NDPA). Our Data Protection Officer can be reached at hello@sonocare.com.ng (please use the subject line “Data protection”).
1. What we collect
| Category | Examples | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Account | Name, phone, email, password (stored only in scrambled form), referral code; for medicine orders, your NIN (only its last four digits and an irreversible fingerprint are kept) | You |
| Health profile | Date of birth, sex, blood group, genotype, height, weight, allergies, long-term conditions, emergency contact | You |
| Family members | The same details for dependents you add | You |
| Clinical records | Symptoms, consultation notes, vital signs, diagnoses, medical reports, prescriptions, lab orders and results, referrals | You and your providers |
| Messages | Chat messages and files shared in a request | You and your providers |
| Location | Your GPS position, the address you type or choose, and any pin you drop on the map, when you book, save an address or request an ambulance | You, and your device with your permission |
| Payments | Wallet balance and transactions, payment references. Card details go to Paystack, not to us | You, Paystack |
| Insurance | HMO name, policy number and expiry | You, your HMO |
| Device | Push-notification token, app version, IP address, error logs | Your device |
| Ratings | Stars and comments you give and receive | You and providers |
| Identity photos | A photo of your face, and of each family member you book for. It is also your profile photo | You |
| Readings and photos | Vital signs you enter; heart rate measured with your phone camera (the video is analysed on your phone and never sent to us); photos of your own devices, sent to read the numbers and not kept after the reading | You, your device |
| Assistant chats | Questions you type into the SonoCare Assistant help chat, and its answers | You |
| Website messages | Name, email, phone, message and any appointment details sent through the forms on sonocare.com.ng and sonocare.ng. Messages sent through sonocare.ng go to the SonoCare Clinics team | You |
For providers, we also collect licences and their expiry dates, ID documents and NIN, qualifications, insurance details, CAC details and RC or BN numbers for facilities, Tax ID, premises details, live location while travelling for a job (see section 3), and bank details for payouts. Where BVN checks are switched on and you consent, we keep only the last four digits of your BVN, the name it returns and an irreversible fingerprint of it, never the full number.
Video and voice calls run through DefComm Meet, with Jitsi as a back-up, and are not recorded by SonoCare. The call service receives the name shown in the call (a private name, if your plan uses one), a SonoCare reference number and the sound and picture of the call, never your phone number or email address.
2. Why we use it, and on what legal basis
| Purpose | Legal basis (NDPA) |
|---|---|
| Create your account and provide the services you book | Performance of our contract with you |
| Process health information so providers can care for you | Your explicit consent, and medical purposes by professionals bound by confidentiality |
| Read the numbers on photos of your devices | Your explicit consent |
| Dispatch an ambulance to your location | Your consent, and vital interests where you cannot consent |
| Show you where your provider is and when they should arrive, and turn addresses and map pins into directions | Performance of our contracts with you and with the provider, and legitimate interests (safe, reliable visits and deliveries) |
| Take payments, hold them until you confirm, refund and pay providers | Contract; legal obligation for financial records |
| Validate HMO cover and submit claims | Your consent and contract |
| Send service messages by SMS, email, push and in-app notification | Contract |
| Answer questions in the SonoCare Assistant help chat | Contract, and legitimate interests (supporting you quickly) |
| Check that the person receiving care is the person booked for, and prevent impersonation and misuse of benefits | Performance of our contract with you, and legitimate interests |
| Verify providers’ identity, licences, insurance, Tax ID and payout account, and deduct tax where required | Contract with the provider, legal obligation, and legitimate interests (patient safety and fraud prevention) |
| Check a provider’s BVN | The provider’s consent (another verification route is available) |
| Confirm who medicines are sold to, using your NIN, and pass your prescription to the pharmacy you choose | Legal obligation (PCN Electronic Pharmacy Regulations 2026), and performance of our contract with you |
| Prevent fraud, secure accounts, keep audit logs of record access | Legitimate interests and legal obligation |
| Improve the service using aggregated, de-identified statistics | Legitimate interests |
| Reply to messages sent through our websites | Steps you ask us to take, and legitimate interests |
| Send promotions | Only with your consent; you can opt out at any time |
Where we rely on legitimate interests, we have weighed them against your rights and freedoms, and you can object (see section 7). We do not sell your personal data or use your health data for advertising.
3. Who sees your information
- Your providers. A clinician can open your health record only while they are handling an active request for you, and every opening is logged. A pharmacy sees the prescription you send it, your name and the last four digits of your NIN. The doctor who ordered your lab tests sees the results. On some plans, providers see a private name instead of yours, and you get an alert whenever your record is opened. Providers are responsible for the clinical records they keep under their own professional duties.
- Your photo is seen by the providers handling your requests (current ones, and for 30 days after) so they can check who they are caring for, and by SonoCare staff who review photos and reports of misuse. It is not used for automated facial recognition.
- Your contact details stay private. Providers never see your phone number or email address, and you never see theirs. Calls and messages go through the app, and phone numbers, email addresses and messaging links typed into chat are hidden. Riders, sample collectors and ambulance crews see your name and the address or location they need for the job. SonoCare staff can see contact details to support you.
- Location while someone is coming to you. While a nurse, doctor, sample collector, rider or ambulance crew is travelling for your request, you and any family members following it see their position on a map, with an estimated arrival time. Their location is shared only for that request and stops when they arrive (for an ambulance, at hospital handover; for a delivery, when the order is handed over). We keep only a provider’s latest position, not a history of their movements. Your own location is shared with the provider handling your request; it is not tracked continuously.
- People you choose. When you share a referral note, anyone with the link can open that note. Our public document check shows only the document type, issuer, date and the first letter of the patient’s name. When you book for a family member, you see their records and reports.
- Your HMO, for covered services, receives the details it needs to settle claims.
- Service providers working for us under written contracts, who may use the data only to provide their service to us: Paystack (payments, payouts and confirming bank account names), Prembly (checking providers’ BVN, only with their consent, and Tax ID), Termii (SMS and verification codes), Brevo (email), Google Firebase (push notifications), Hostinger (servers), DefComm Meet, provided by DefComm Solutions and Technologies Ltd, and Jitsi (calls), and Anthropic (the SonoCare Assistant help chat, and reading the numbers on photos of your devices).
- Google Maps. The app uses Google Maps Platform for maps, address suggestions, finding the street address for a map pin, and arrival-time estimates. If Google Maps is unavailable, the app shows your address without a map. When you use maps in the app, Google receives the addresses you type, map positions and your device’s IP address. Google uses this information as an independent controller under the Google Privacy Policy, not only on our instructions. On our websites, Google Maps loads only if you choose to show the clinic map.
- Authorities, where the law requires it, such as a court order, a tax authority’s lawful request or a public-health reporting duty.
4. Transfers outside Nigeria
Some of the organisations above process data outside Nigeria, including in the United States and the European Union: Google (including Firebase and Google Maps), Anthropic, Brevo, and Hostinger’s servers. We transfer personal data abroad only as sections 41 to 43 of the NDPA and the NDPC’s General Application and Implementation Directive allow. Our main safeguard is a written agreement with each recipient that binds it to protect the data to an adequate standard, keep it confidential and secure, and use it only for the agreed purpose, backed by our assessment of the risks of each transfer. Where those safeguards are not available for a particular transfer, we transfer only on another ground the NDPA allows, for example where the transfer is needed to provide a service you asked for. You can ask us for details of the safeguards we use.
5. How long we keep it
| Data | Kept for |
|---|---|
| Medical records of adults (notes, reports, prescriptions, results, medicine orders and the chat messages of each request) | 10 years after your last care through SonoCare, including after the account is closed |
| Medical records of a child | Until the child’s 25th birthday, or 10 years after their last care, whichever is later |
| Medical records of a person who has died | 10 years after their death |
| Payment and wallet records | 6 years after the end of the financial year they relate to, or longer if a tax authority requires |
| Account and profile | While your account is open, then deleted or anonymised within 90 days unless needed for the records above |
| Identity photos | While your account is open, then deleted within 90 days. Replaced photos and photos in a misuse case are kept until the case and any related claim are closed, and no longer than 6 years |
| SonoCare Assistant chats | 12 months, unless needed to deal with a complaint |
| Website messages | 2 years, unless they become part of a medical record |
| Verification codes | 10 minutes |
| Providers’ location | Only the latest position, replaced each time it updates |
| Provider verification documents (including the BVN fingerprint) | While the provider is active, then 6 years after they leave |
| Record-access audit logs | 6 years, or longer while an investigation is open |
6. How we protect it
Data travels over encrypted connections, passwords are stored as one-way hashes, and staff and providers see only what their role needs. Access to medical records is logged. If a breach puts your data at risk, we will notify the Nigeria Data Protection Commission within 72 hours of becoming aware of it, and tell you without delay where the risk to you is high.
7. Your rights
Under the NDPA you can:
- see the data we hold about you and get a copy (in Profile you can download your health record as a PDF, and all your data as a machine-readable file);
- correct inaccurate data (most of it you can edit in the app);
- ask us to delete your data, except medical and financial records we must keep by law or under section 5;
- restrict or object to some uses, including uses based on legitimate interests, and withdraw consent at any time (this does not affect care already given, and some services cannot work without it);
- receive your data in a portable format and ask us to send it to another provider;
- not be subject to a decision based only on automated processing that significantly affects you. Where we use one (for example, pausing a provider’s account automatically when their licence expires), you can ask a member of staff to review it.
Send requests to hello@sonocare.com.ng. We will reply without undue delay and within 30 days. If you are not satisfied, you can complain to the Nigeria Data Protection Commission.
8. Children and family members
SonoCare accounts are for adults. Information about a child or other dependent is provided by their parent, guardian or authorised family member, who exercises their rights on their behalf. We rely on the confirmation the person booking gives (see section 3 of the Terms of Service), and may ask for proof that they are entitled to act. Adult dependents may contact us directly to access or correct their own information.
9. Storage on your device
The app stores your sign-in session and recently viewed records on your device so it works with a weak connection. Signing out removes your session from the device. Neither the app nor our website uses advertising or tracking cookies.
10. Changes
We will tell you in the app at least 14 days before material changes to this policy take effect.
11. Contact
Data Protection Officer, SonoCare Healthcare Ltd, House 3, Road 1, Eliminigwe Housing Estate, Phase 3, Elelenwo, Port Harcourt, Rivers State · hello@sonocare.com.ng · 0703 419 9466 · 0903 714 1533