Billy Privacy Policy

1. Overview

Billy is a Discord voice bot developed by Techlm77. Billy provides text-to-speech, custom voices, soundboard playback, music playback, playlists, safety controls, usage limits, and premium features through Ko-fi.

Billy processes information needed to provide its features, operate the bot, manage server configuration, prevent abuse, manage premium access, diagnose problems, and keep the service working.

Billy does not sell personal information.

2. Who Runs Billy

Billy is operated by Techlm77. For privacy questions, data removal requests, or concerns about Billy, contact Techlm77 using the contact options at the bottom of this policy.

Billy is hosted from the United Kingdom. Because Billy is operated from the UK, this policy is written with UK data protection law in mind, including the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.

3. Information Billy Collects or Processes

Billy can collect or process the following types of information:

• Discord user IDs, server IDs, channel IDs, message IDs, and voice channel IDs.
• Server configuration, including the configured TTS channel and voice channel.
• User voice preferences, selected voices, preferred TTS engine, and preferred Kokoro voice.
• Daily TTS usage counts, quota notices, queue state, and entitlement state.
• Safety mode settings and allowed user IDs for servers that enable Billy safety controls.
• Music playlist names, playlist descriptions, track lists, playback modes, and timestamps.
• Soundboard and music attachment metadata, including filename, attachment ID, message ID, channel ID, uploader ID, file size, content type, creation time, and Discord attachment URL where needed to resolve or stream the attachment.
• Ko-fi membership data, tier, status, supporter name, email address, event ID, and update time when provided through Ko-fi webhook events.
• Operational logs, errors, crash information, server count, shard count, processing times, character counts, and diagnostic information.

4. How Billy Uses Information

Billy uses information to:

• Connect to the correct Discord voice channel.
• Bind TTS to the correct Discord text channel.
• Generate and play TTS audio.
• Remember user voice preferences and server settings.
• Manage free usage limits, queue limits, premium features, and entitlement checks.
• Enable soundboard, music, and playlist features.
• Process Ko-fi premium memberships, tips, renewals, cancellations, and duplicate webhook checks.
• Apply server safety allow-list settings and other moderation-related controls.
• Post Billy's server count and shard count to Top.gg when configured.
• Debug crashes, errors, voice connection issues, media sync issues, and service problems.
• Prevent abuse, protect Billy's systems, and keep the service reliable.

5. Lawful Basis for Processing

Billy relies on different lawful bases depending on the context:

6. Messages and Text-to-Speech

Billy reads messages in the configured TTS channel when Billy is active in a server, connected to voice, and the message is sent by a user who is allowed to use Billy. Message content can be processed to generate TTS audio.

Billy is not designed to store normal TTS message text in persistent data files. However, message content can be temporarily processed in memory, passed through TTS/audio libraries, and converted into temporary audio files for playback.

Billy can sanitize message content before TTS processing. This can include replacing URLs, mentions, channel tags, role tags, custom emoji, long numbers, repeated characters, formatting symbols, and stickers with safer spoken text.

Generated temporary audio files can be deleted after playback or during cleanup. Users should not send sensitive information to Billy or into channels configured for Billy TTS.

7. TTS Engines and Model Processing

Billy currently uses third-party TTS engines and model weights, including Kokoro and Chatterbox Turbo, to generate speech from text. These projects are provided by their respective authors and are not owned by, endorsed by, or affiliated with Techlm77 unless explicitly stated by those projects.

Chatterbox Turbo is published by Resemble AI and is listed as MIT-licensed. Kokoro / Kokoro-82M is published by Hexgrad and is described as using Apache-licensed model weights, with the Kokoro repository providing the Apache License, Version 2.0.

When Billy runs these engines locally or on Billy's own hosting, normal TTS message text is processed by Billy's hosted environment rather than sent to a public Chatterbox or Kokoro web API. However, text, voice settings, voice samples, and generated audio can still be processed in memory, by local model code, by audio libraries, and by the hosting environment needed to operate Billy.

If Billy later uses an external hosted inference provider for TTS generation, this policy should be updated to describe that provider before or when that change is made.

8. Soundboard and Music

Billy can scan configured Discord text channels for supported audio attachments when soundboard or music features are used and Billy has permission to access those channels.

Billy can store attachment metadata, including names, IDs, channel IDs, message IDs, uploader IDs, file sizes, content types, creation times, and Discord attachment URLs where needed to resolve or stream the attachment later, so soundboard and music features can find the correct Discord attachment.

Billy is designed to stream supported soundboard and music attachments from Discord's content servers for playback rather than permanently storing local copies of those audio files on Billy's hardware. During playback, audio data can still be temporarily processed in memory, by FFmpeg/audio libraries, and by Billy's hosting environment.

If the original Discord message or attachment is deleted, Billy's stream-only media features can stop being able to play that audio after the media index is refreshed or when Discord no longer makes the attachment available.

Server owners and users are responsible for ensuring audio files they make available to Billy are lawful, appropriate, and permitted for their intended use.

9. Ko-fi and Premium Access

Billy can process Ko-fi webhook events to manage premium memberships, tips, renewals, cancellations, tiers, entitlement state, Supreme slots, and supporter announcements.

Ko-fi webhook data can include supporter name, email address, tier name, membership status, event ID, payment-related status, and Discord identity information where the supporter provides it.

Payment details, billing, refunds, subscriptions, and payment processing are handled by Ko-fi. Ko-fi processes information under its own terms and privacy policy.

10. Logs and Diagnostics

Billy can create operational logs for debugging and service reliability. Logs can include technical information such as errors, guild/server IDs, channel IDs, user IDs, queue state, engine type, selected voice names, processing time, character counts, server count, shard count, and crash diagnostics.

Billy is not designed to log full normal TTS message text for routine operation, but logs and errors may include technical context needed to diagnose problems.

11. Third Parties and Sharing

Billy can interact with third-party services including:

• Discord, for bot functionality, messages, voice channels, slash commands, and attachments.
• Ko-fi, for premium memberships, tips, supporter data, and webhook events.
• Top.gg, for posting Billy's server count and shard count when configured.
• Text-to-speech, audio, hosting, logging, and infrastructure libraries or services used to operate Billy.

These third-party services can process information according to their own terms and privacy policies. Some third-party services can process information outside the UK. Where required, Billy relies on appropriate safeguards, adequacy arrangements, or the third party's own lawful transfer mechanisms for international processing.

Billy does not sell personal information. Billy can share or disclose information where needed to operate the service, comply with legal obligations, handle abuse, protect users, resolve disputes, or respond to lawful requests.

12. Data Retention

Billy keeps configuration, entitlement, usage, playlist, safety, and media index data for as long as needed to provide Billy's features, manage premium access, prevent abuse, resolve disputes, and maintain service stability.

Temporary generated TTS or mixed-audio files can be deleted after playback or during automated cleanup. Soundboard and music attachments are designed to be streamed from Discord rather than permanently cached as local audio files on Billy's hardware.

Ko-fi event IDs and related entitlement records can be kept to prevent duplicate webhook processing, prove entitlement history, handle cancellations, and resolve billing or access issues.

If a specific retention period is not listed, Billy uses criteria such as whether the data is still needed for bot functionality, account/support handling, security, legal compliance, abuse prevention, or service reliability.

13. Security

Reasonable technical and organisational steps are taken to protect Billy's stored data and configuration. However, no online service can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

Server owners should only give Billy access to channels and content they are comfortable with Billy processing. Users should avoid submitting sensitive information to Billy.

14. Your Choices and Rights

Server owners and moderators can remove Billy from their server at any time. They can also control which channels Billy can access through Discord permissions and Billy's server settings.

Users can stop using Billy commands, avoid submitting text or audio for Billy to process, and manage premium membership through Ko-fi.

Under UK data protection law, you may have rights to request access, correction, deletion, restriction, objection, portability, and information about how your personal data is used. These rights are not absolute and depend on the circumstances.

To make a privacy request, contact Techlm77 using the contact options below. You can also complain to the UK Information Commissioner's Office if you are unhappy with how your personal data is handled.

15. Children

Billy is intended for use within Discord servers and is subject to Discord's age requirements. Billy is not intended to knowingly collect information from anyone who is not allowed to use Discord.

Server owners and moderators are responsible for ensuring their server and Billy usage are appropriate for their community.

16. Changes to This Policy

This Privacy Policy can be updated from time to time. Continued use of Billy after changes means you accept the updated policy.

17. Contact

For privacy questions, support, data removal requests, or concerns, contact Techlm77 by email, through the Ko-fi page, or through Billy support channels.