Privacy Policy

1. Information the app collects and how it is used

The OpenTrailPaper app asks for a small number of system permissions. Each is used only to make the app and head unit work, and you can change or revoke any of them at any time in your phone's system settings.

Location

With your permission, the app uses your location while you are using it. It is used to:

• show your position on the map while you plan a route or pick a map area;
• send a rough starting position to the head unit so its GPS locks on faster;
• act as a backup position for the device when it cannot see the sky.

On Android, if you leave the app while your head unit is recording a ride, the app keeps sending your position to the device over Bluetooth through a service that shows a visible, persistent notification; it stops when the ride stops or you dismiss it. On Android versions before 12, the system also requires the location permission to scan for Bluetooth devices — it is not used to determine your location there.

Your location is processed on your phone and sent over Bluetooth to your own head unit. It is not sent to us, and we have no servers that could receive it.

Bluetooth

With your permission, the app uses Bluetooth to talk to your OpenTrailPaper head unit and to your cycling sensors (heart rate, power, cadence). Everything between the phone and the device travels over this direct Bluetooth link: routes, offline map tiles, settings, firmware updates and recorded rides. Bluetooth is not used to identify you, to track your location in the background, or for advertising.

Camera (Android)

The Android app asks for the camera only when you choose to scan a QR code that invites you to a mesh radio channel, and only while that screen is open. Frames are processed on your phone to read the code and are never stored or uploaded. The permission is optional — an invite link can be pasted instead.

Rides, routes and maps

Rides recorded by the head unit are written to its SD card as standard .fit files. When you pull a ride onto your phone, it is stored locally in the app. Routes you plan and offline map tiles you build are likewise stored on your phone and on the device's SD card. None of it is uploaded anywhere by us.

2. Information sharing

We do not sell, rent or share your personal information. We do not operate servers that collect it.

Some features do need to reach the internet, and those requests go directly from your phone to the third party concerned. We do not receive a copy. Specifically:

• Apple Maps (MapKit) — iPhone app. The map you see while planning, the destination search, and turn-by-turn route calculation are provided by Apple. Apple receives the search terms and the coordinates involved, handled under Apple's privacy policy.
• CARTO basemap tiles — Android app. The map you see while planning is drawn from CARTO's OpenStreetMap tile service, which receives the coordinates of the map areas you look at.
• Nominatim (OpenStreetMap) — Android app. Destination search sends your typed query, along with your current position so nearby results rank first, to the public Nominatim geocoding service.
• OSRM — Android app. Turn-by-turn route calculation sends the start and destination coordinates to the public OSRM routing service.
• OpenStreetMap / Overpass API. When you build an offline map, the app downloads map data for the area you selected from a public Overpass API server. That server receives the geographic bounds you chose.
• Open-Meteo elevation API. When a route or offline map needs elevations, the app requests them for the coordinates involved from Open-Meteo.
• GitHub Releases. Checking for firmware updates fetches the project's public release list from GitHub. The request carries nothing about you beyond what any web request does (your IP address), under GitHub's privacy statement.

These services see only what is needed to answer the request. They do not receive an account, a name, or a device identifier from us, because the app does not have any.

Mesh radio. If you choose to join a mesh channel, your head unit broadcasts your position and messages over its LoRa radio to the other members of that channel, encrypted with the channel's shared key. This is radio-to-radio between the channel's own devices, not a service of ours — leave the channel and the broadcasting stops.

3. Analytics, tracking and advertising

There are none. The app contains no analytics SDK, no crash-reporting service, no advertising identifiers and no third-party trackers. We do not build a profile of you and there is nothing to opt out of.

4. Social logins

Social login is not available in the app. There are no accounts of any kind.

5. In-app purchases

The app contains no in-app purchases and no subscriptions. It does not handle payment information.

6. Children's personal information

The app is not directed at children and the minimum age is 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child's information has somehow reached us, contact us and we will remove it promptly.

7. Data retention

We do not store your personal information, so there is nothing for us to retain. Data lives in two places you control: your phone and your head unit's SD card. Deleting the app removes the data it stored on your phone; formatting or deleting files from the SD card removes it from the device.

8. Data protection

Our main protection is not collecting things in the first place. Data stays on hardware you own, and the phone-to-device link is a direct Bluetooth connection rather than a trip through the internet. Data stored on your phone is protected by your phone's operating system and passcode. No method of storage or transmission is perfectly secure, but there is no central store of user data to breach.

9. This website

opentrailpaper.com is a static site hosted on GitHub Pages. We do not run analytics on it and we set no tracking cookies. A few things are worth knowing:

• GitHub serves the site and may keep standard server logs, including IP addresses, under GitHub's privacy statement.
• Fonts are loaded from Google Fonts and the Leaflet map library from the jsDelivr CDN; those providers receive your IP address as part of serving the files.
• The map tools load map imagery from OpenStreetMap tile servers and map data from the Overpass API, which receive the map areas you look at.
• Flashing firmware from the browser happens locally over USB using the Web Serial API. Your firmware, maps and files are not uploaded to us.

10. Your choices

You can revoke the location, Bluetooth or camera permission at any time in your phone's settings (Settings → OpenTrailPaper on iPhone, Settings → Apps → OpenTrailPaper → Permissions on Android); the related features simply stop working. You can delete recorded rides and routes from within the app, and you can delete the app to remove its local data entirely.

11. Open source

OpenTrailPaper is open source. If you would rather verify these claims than take our word for them, the complete source for the app, the firmware and this website is at github.com/RaemondBW/OpenTrailPaper.

12. Changes to this policy

If this policy changes, the updated version will be posted on this page with a new "last updated" date, and the change will be recorded in the project's commit history.

13. Accessibility

We aim to meet WCAG 2.1 AA on this site. If you hit something that does not work with assistive technology, please tell us and we will fix it.

14. Contact

Questions about this policy, or about privacy in OpenTrailPaper generally, can go to GitHub Issues.