Terms of Use

1. These terms

These Terms of Use (“Terms”) are an agreement between you and Federica Benacquista, an individual developer based in Italy (“we”, “us”), for the use of the FollowLens app for iPhone and iPad (the “app”), of the optional in‑app upgrade FollowLens Pro (“Pro”) and of the website followlens.web.app (the “website”), together the “Service”.

By downloading, installing or using the Service, or by buying Pro, you accept these Terms. If you do not accept them, do not use the Service. If you got the app from the App Store, Apple’s standard licence also applies (see section 19). Our Privacy Policy explains how personal data is handled and is part of these Terms for your information.

If you use the Service as a consumer, nothing in these Terms limits the rights that consumer protection law in your country gives you and that cannot be waived by contract.

2. What FollowLens does

FollowLens is a tool that reads the files of the personal data export that Instagram provides to its users (through “Download your information” / “Export your information”) and turns them into lists and statistics: for example accounts you follow that do not follow you back, mutual follows, changes between exports, and counts of messages and activity. It reads the export as a ZIP archive, as a folder, or as the individual JSON or HTML files it contains.

• All analysis happens on your device. We do not receive your export.
• FollowLens never asks for, stores or uses your Instagram password, session, cookies or access tokens: not optionally and not through a built‑in browser. It does not connect to your Instagram account, does not collect information from Instagram automatically, and never performs actions (follow, unfollow, like, comment, message, block) on your behalf. Any action you decide to take, you take yourself in Instagram.
• The website offers a one‑time analysis in your browser. The app keeps your analyses on your device and compares new exports with earlier ones.

3. Not affiliated with Instagram or Meta

FollowLens is an independent application. It is not sponsored, associated, approved, endorsed, administered or in any way affiliated with Instagram, Threads or Meta Platforms, Inc., or any of their affiliates.

Instagram and Threads are trademarks of Instagram, LLC and Meta Platforms, Inc. All other trademarks belong to their owners. We use the names “Instagram” and “Threads” only for identification and descriptive purposes, to tell you which files FollowLens can read, and not to suggest any partnership. FollowLens does not use Instagram’s logos.

Meta has no responsibility for FollowLens and provides no support for it. Please do not contact Instagram about FollowLens, or us about Instagram: we cannot help with your Instagram account, the export process, or any decision Instagram makes.

4. Who can use FollowLens

You may use the Service only if you are at least 13 years old (the minimum age for Instagram) and can lawfully agree to these Terms, or have your parent’s or guardian’s permission where the law of your country requires it. To buy Pro you must also be allowed to make purchases with your Apple Account, under Apple’s rules. FollowLens is rated 13+ on the App Store and is not directed at children. The Service is meant for personal, non‑commercial use.

5. Your Instagram account

• You obtain your export directly from Instagram, under Instagram’s terms. You are responsible for complying with Instagram’s Terms of Use and policies in your use of Instagram, including when you request and download your export.
• Because FollowLens never logs in to Instagram and never acts on your account, it cannot cause your account to be restricted, suspended or banned. Any decision Instagram takes about your account, about the export feature, or about the format and content of exports is Instagram’s alone, and we are not responsible for it.
• Instagram may change, limit or discontinue its export, or change its format, at any time and without notice. If that happens, parts of FollowLens, including Pro features, may stop working until we can adapt it, or permanently.
• Only import exports of your own account, or of an account you are authorised to manage. Never type your Instagram password anywhere except in Instagram itself.

6. Acceptable use

Your export contains information about other people (for example their usernames and when you interacted with them). That information is theirs as much as yours. You agree that you will not:

• use FollowLens or its results to harass, stalk, threaten, intimidate, shame, monitor or discriminate against anyone, or to publish or spread other people’s personal information without a lawful basis;
• import an export that you have no right to use, for example someone else’s export obtained without their permission;
• use the Service for commercial purposes, to build lists or databases of people, or to provide services to others, without our written permission;
• use FollowLens in any way that breaks the law, including data protection and privacy law, or that infringes anyone’s rights;
• copy, modify, distribute, sell or rent the app or the website, or try to extract their source code, except as far as the law expressly allows despite this restriction;
• get around, disable or tamper with the way Pro is unlocked or checked, or with the ads, or resell or share access to Pro other than as Apple allows;
• interfere with the Service or its security, or use it to spread malware;
• remove or hide notices about ownership, trademarks or non‑affiliation.

If you use information about other people beyond your purely personal purposes, you alone are responsible for complying with the data protection laws that apply to you.

7. Results and their limits

FollowLens counts and compares the data in your export with simple, verifiable rules and no artificial intelligence. Even so, please keep in mind:

• Results reflect the moment Instagram created your export. Anything that happened afterwards is not included.
• Results depend entirely on what your export contains. Exports can be incomplete, late, limited to a date range or to the categories you selected, or contain errors, and Instagram may change their format. FollowLens warns you when it detects these situations, but it cannot detect all of them.
• An account that “does not follow you back” or that is “no longer in your followers” may have been deactivated, deleted, renamed, restricted or blocked, or may be missing because of how Instagram prepared the export. It does not necessarily mean that someone chose to unfollow you.
• Statistics about messages and activity are counts of events recorded by Instagram; they say nothing about anyone’s intentions or feelings.

Results are provided for your information only. Before taking a decision that matters to you, for example unfollowing someone, check the facts in Instagram. We do not guarantee that the results are complete, accurate or up to date, within the limits set out in section 15.

8. Your data, reminders and backups

The app stores your analyses only on your device, and the website does not keep your export or its results. We have no copy, so we cannot restore data that is lost because you delete the app, reset or lose your device, or use “Delete all local data” (More → My data), where you can also delete a single import or a whole workspace. Keep your original export files if you may need them again. Your export contains personal information: keep it, and your device, safe.

If you allow notifications, the app schedules reminders on your device, with no server involved: after you go through its export guide, a nudge a few hours later and another two days later, before Instagram’s download window closes; and, while notifications are allowed, a weekly reminder to get a fresh export. You can turn them off at any time in your device’s notification settings for FollowLens. Reminders are a courtesy: we do not guarantee that they arrive, or arrive on time, and Instagram decides how long your export stays available.

9. The free app and ads

The app is free to download and use, and is funded by ads delivered by Google AdMob (a banner, native ad cards in lists and, occasionally, a full‑screen ad between an import and its results) as well as promotions for our other apps. Where the law requires it, the app first asks for your consent to ads through Google’s consent message; it then asks for permission to track through Apple’s App Tracking Transparency. Ads are personalised only if you agree to both; otherwise you see non‑personalised ads. You can change these choices at any time, as explained in the Privacy Policy. With FollowLens Pro the app shows no ads. Ads from third parties are their advertisers’ responsibility; seeing or tapping an ad does not mean we endorse what it promotes.

The Service contains links to services we do not control, such as Instagram, the App Store and the websites of advertisers. Their own terms and policies apply, and we are not responsible for their content or practices.

10. FollowLens Pro

FollowLens Pro is an optional upgrade, bought inside the app, that unlocks the features shown as Pro in the app and removes ads. These currently include:

• who followed and unfollowed you since your previous export, comparing exports, and browsing your past exports;
• content, messages and activity statistics;
• interaction lists such as one‑sided and quiet accounts, the lists Instagram includes in your export, Look up, and each account’s messages and interactions;
• Threads follower and following lists, and CSV reports;
• more than one Instagram account, each in its own workspace;
• no ads anywhere in the app.

The free app keeps the core analysis, including who does not follow you back. Pro is offered as:

• Monthly and Yearly: auto‑renewable subscriptions in the same subscription group, so you hold one of them at a time;
• Lifetime: a one‑time purchase, not a subscription. It gives you the Pro features as they are offered from time to time, for as long as the app is available to you, on the Apple Account you used to buy it.

There is no free trial. Prices are shown in the app, in your local currency and including any taxes Apple applies, before you confirm a purchase. Pro is tied to the Apple Account you bought it with and works on the devices where you use that account. Pro cannot be bought on the website. Where the App Store offers it, you can also unlock Pro with an offer code using “Redeem Code” in the app.

The app checks with the App Store on your device whether you hold Pro, and keeps the last answer for a short time so that Pro also works offline. If a subscription ends or a purchase is refunded or revoked, the Pro features lock again; the data already on your device is not deleted. “Restore Purchases” in the app asks the App Store again, for example on a new device.

11. Payment, renewal and cancellation

• Payment and refunds are handled by Apple. FollowLens Pro is sold through the Apple App Store. Apple processes the transaction and manages payment, billing, receipts, cancellations and refunds under its own terms, including the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions (https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/). We do not receive or store your payment details, and we have no means to cancel a purchase or to issue a refund. To request a refund or cancellation, contact Apple at reportaproblem.apple.com or through Apple Support; Apple decides on the request under its policies and the law that applies to you.
• Right of withdrawal. If the law gives you a right to withdraw from the purchase, you exercise it with Apple, as the party that processes the transaction, under Apple’s terms. Nothing in these Terms limits that right or any other right that consumer law grants you and that cannot be waived. Our own responsibility for the App working as described remains as set out in section 15, and you can always write to us for help with the App itself.
• Automatic renewal. Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each period unless you turn off automatic renewal at least 24 hours before the period ends. Apple charges the renewal to your Apple Account within the 24 hours before the period ends. You can manage or cancel a subscription at any time in your Apple Account settings; cancelling stops future renewals and you keep access until the end of the period already paid. If a free trial is offered, any unused part of it ends when you buy a subscription.
• Managing and cancelling. Your Apple Account subscription settings are in Settings → your name → Subscriptions. The app’s Pro screen has a “Manage Subscription” link that takes you there. Deleting the app does not cancel a subscription.
• What cancelling does. Cancelling stops future renewals. You keep Pro until the end of the period you have already paid for. Any refund of the rest of a period is Apple’s decision (section 12), and your statutory rights are not affected.
• Switching plans. Moving between Monthly and Yearly happens in the same subscription group and follows Apple’s rules on when the change takes effect. Buying Lifetime does not cancel a subscription you already have: to stop paying for it, cancel it as described above.
• Price changes. We may change the price of Pro. A new price never affects a purchase you have already made. For subscriptions, Apple tells you about a price change in advance and, where its rules require it, asks for your consent before the new price applies; if you do not agree, you can cancel before it takes effect.

12. Refunds

Refunds are decided by Apple, as set out in section 11; we cannot issue them ourselves. Request a refund from Apple at reportaproblem.apple.com.

When someone asks Apple for a refund, Apple may ask the developer whether the purchase was used. After you buy Pro, the app notes which Pro features you open and asks you once whether you allow us to share this with Apple (“Keep refunds fair?”). Only if you agree, the app sends which Pro features you open (at most once a day per feature), together with the App Store’s signed record of your purchase, to a FollowLens server function, so that we can answer Apple’s request with whether and how much Pro was used. Apple makes the final decision. If you say no, the notes stop, the ones already made are deleted, nothing is shared with Apple, and your refund request is handled by Apple in the usual way. You can change your choice at any time in the app (More → My data → Privacy). Exactly what is recorded, shared and kept, and for how long, is explained in section 7 of the Privacy Policy.

13. Licence and intellectual property

Subject to these Terms, we give you a personal, non‑exclusive, non‑transferable, revocable licence to use the app (and, while you hold Pro, its Pro features) on devices you own or control, as allowed by the App Store’s rules, and to use the website for your personal purposes. Buying Pro gives you a licence to use those features, not ownership of the software.

The Service, its software, design, texts, graphics and the FollowLens name and logo are owned by us or our licensors and protected by intellectual property law. Everything not expressly granted is reserved. The Inter, Fraunces and Instrument Serif typefaces are used under the SIL Open Font License; other open‑source components are used under their own licences, which prevail for those components.

Your export and your notes remain yours. We claim no rights over them, and we never receive them.

14. Changes and availability

We may improve, change, suspend or discontinue all or part of the Service, including which features are free and which are part of Pro, for example to keep up with changes to Instagram’s export, for security, or because of legal requirements. We do not promise that the Service will always be available or free of errors. Updates may be needed to keep using the app. If we make a change that significantly and negatively affects your use of the app, we will tell you in advance where reasonably possible.

If such a change significantly reduces Pro that you have paid for, you keep the rights the law gives you (for consumers in the European Union, including the right to end the contract free of charge and to a proportionate refund of the price where applicable). Otherwise, changes to the free app do not entitle you to compensation, without prejudice to your statutory rights.

15. Warranties

To the fullest extent permitted by law, the Service (the free app, Pro and the website) is provided “as is” and “as available”. We give no warranty, express or implied, including of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy of results, or non‑infringement, and we do not guarantee that the Service will be uninterrupted, error‑free or compatible with every export format.

If you are a consumer in the European Union, the United Kingdom or another country that gives you legal guarantees for digital content and services (for example under the Italian Consumer Code, Legislative Decree 206/2005), those guarantees continue to apply, including to Pro, and are not limited by this section.

16. Liability

What we are always responsible for. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or wilful misconduct, for gross negligence, or for any other liability that cannot be excluded or limited by law (for example under Article 1229 of the Italian Civil Code or applicable product liability law).

Otherwise, and to the extent permitted by law:

• we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, or for loss that was not reasonably foreseeable;
• we are not liable for loss of data stored on your device, for decisions you take based on the results, for what Instagram, Meta, Apple, Google or other third parties do (including any action on your Instagram account, changes to the export, or the handling of payments and refunds), or for your use of the Service in breach of these Terms;
• our total liability to you for all claims relating to the Service is limited to the greater of EUR 50 and the amount you paid for Pro in the 12 months before the event that gave rise to the claim.

If you are a consumer, these limitations apply only as far as the consumer law of your country allows.

17. Your responsibility

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to compensate us for reasonable losses and costs (including reasonable legal fees) resulting from claims by third parties that are caused by your intentional or negligent breach of section 6, for example if you use FollowLens to publish someone else’s personal information. This does not apply where we are responsible for the loss.

18. Ending these terms

You can stop using the Service at any time by deleting the app and leaving the website; if you have a subscription, also cancel it in your Apple Account (section 11), because deleting the app does not. We may suspend or end your licence if you seriously or repeatedly breach these Terms, or if we discontinue the Service. If we end it for any reason other than your breach, your statutory rights regarding Pro you have paid for are not affected. Sections 3, 7, 8, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 20 and 22 continue to apply after these Terms end.

19. Apple App Store

If you got the app from the Apple App Store

• Your use of the app, including Pro, is also governed by Apple’s Licensed Application End User License Agreement (the “Standard EULA”). These Terms add to the Standard EULA; if they conflict on your licence to use the app, the Standard EULA prevails for that point.
• These Terms are between you and us only, not with Apple Inc. or its subsidiaries (“Apple”). We, not Apple, are solely responsible for the app and its content.
• Your licence is limited to using the app on Apple‑branded products that you own or control, as permitted by the Usage Rules in the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions (except that the app may be accessed by other accounts associated with you through Family Sharing or volume purchasing).
• Apple has no obligation to provide maintenance or support for the app.
• If the app fails to conform to any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple, and Apple will refund the purchase price, if any. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Apple has no other warranty obligation for the app. Any other claims, losses, liabilities, damages, costs or expenses due to a failure to conform to a warranty are our responsibility, within the limits of these Terms.
• We, not Apple, are responsible for addressing any claims by you or a third party relating to the app or your possession or use of it, including product liability claims, claims that the app fails to conform to any legal or regulatory requirement, and claims under consumer protection, privacy or similar laws.
• If a third party claims that the app or your possession and use of it infringes their intellectual property rights, we, not Apple, are solely responsible for the investigation, defence, settlement and discharge of that claim.
• You confirm that you are not located in a country subject to a U.S. Government embargo or designated by the U.S. Government as a “terrorist supporting” country, and that you are not on any U.S. Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
• You must comply with applicable third‑party terms when using the app.
• Apple and its subsidiaries are third‑party beneficiaries of these Terms and, once you accept them, Apple will have the right (and will be deemed to have accepted the right) to enforce these Terms against you as a third‑party beneficiary.
• Questions, complaints or claims about the app should be sent to us at the contact details in section 23. Questions about billing and refunds go to Apple.

20. Law and disputes

These Terms are governed by Italian law. If you are a consumer, you also keep the protection of the mandatory provisions of the law of the country where you live, and you may bring proceedings in the courts of that country or in Italy, while we may bring proceedings against you only in the courts of the place where you live. If you are not a consumer, the courts of Italy have exclusive jurisdiction.

Before going to court, please write to us: most problems can be solved quickly and informally. Consumers resident in the EU may also use an alternative dispute resolution body where available; we are not obliged to take part but will consider it in good faith.

21. Changes to these terms

We may update these Terms, for example when the Service or the law changes. The date at the top shows the current version. If a change is significant, we will tell you in the app or on the website at least 15 days before it takes effect, unless the change is required sooner by law or for security. A change never affects a period of Pro you have already paid for. If you do not agree with the new Terms, you can stop using the Service and cancel any subscription before the change takes effect; continuing to use it after they take effect means you accept them.

22. General

• These Terms and the Privacy Policy, together with the Standard EULA where it applies, are the whole agreement between you and us about the Service.
• If a provision is found invalid, the rest remains in force, and the invalid provision is replaced by a valid one as close as possible to its purpose.
• If we do not enforce a right immediately, we do not waive it.
• You may not transfer your rights under these Terms. We may transfer ours to a person who takes over the Service, provided your rights are not reduced.
• These Terms are available in English and Italian. Both versions have the same value; if they differ, the one more favourable to you applies.

23. Contact

Federica Benacquista, FollowLens
Via del Lido 106, 04100 Latina (LT), Italy
Email: support@copycut.it, or the support form in the app