Ip Stap BruggePrivacy policy
In short: the Ip Stap Brugge app has no account and no server of its own, and does not track you. What you record in the app stays on your device. Your location is only used while you use the app and is never stored. The map is built into the app. This website only keeps cookieless, aggregated visitor statistics via Cloudflare Web Analytics.
Who is responsible?
The Ip Stap Brugge app and this website are made by Dries Deboosere (Belgium). For privacy questions, email hello@ipstap.be.
What data does the app use?
Your location
When you use “I’m here” or “My location”, the app asks for permission to use your location – only while the app is open, never in the background. Your location is used to show nearby places and distances. It is not stored, is not included in an export and is never sent anywhere by the app. You can also use the app without location.
Android itself determines your position. On most devices it uses the location service of Google Play services for this. Android may then show Google’s location accuracy prompt. If you turn it on, Google also uses Wi-Fi, mobile networks and your device’s sensors to determine your position, and processes data for this under its own privacy policy. This is a setting of your device, not of the app: you can decline it or turn it off later in Android settings → Location. If you decline, the app may sometimes not find your position. The app only receives the position from Android.
On iPhone and iPad, iOS determines your position with Apple’s Location Services, and Apple processes data for this under its own privacy policy. You manage the permission in Settings → Privacy & Security → Location Services → Ip Stap. There too, the app only receives the position.
What you record yourself
Visits (date, rating, note), your list, places you add yourself, markings such as “possibly closed” and your settings are stored only on your device. We never see this data and keep no copy of it. It stays until you delete it or uninstall the app.
Export and import
In Settings → Data you can export your data to a file: your visits, your list, your own places and your markings – not your location and not your settings. With Import you restore such a file later, for example on a new device. You choose where you keep the file and with whom or which app you share it (for example your cloud storage); we never receive it. Your notes are readable in it, so keep it safe. What another app or service does with the file is covered by its own terms.
What the app does not do
- No account or registration.
- No analytics, no crash reporting, no ads.
- No selling or sharing of data.
Network connections
The app itself connects to only one server: ipstap.be, and only when you tap “Update places” in Settings. It then downloads the latest list of places and the boundaries of the districts of Bruges. Nothing about you or your use of the app is sent. Like any website, our hosting provider Cloudflare sees your IP address and the time (see “This website”).
The map is built into the app: an extract of Bruges, made with Protomaps from OpenStreetMap data. Viewing the map downloads or sends nothing, and no map service sees where you look. The list of places at installation is built in as well, so the app works without internet.
When you open another app yourself
Some buttons open another app. What you do or send there is up to you; the terms of that app or service apply.
- Route opens Google Maps (or your browser) with the location of the place as destination. Google then sees that destination, as with any route you request in Google Maps.
- Share opens your device’s share sheet with the name, address and a Google Maps link of the place – never your visits, ratings or notes. You choose the recipient.
- Fix it in OpenStreetMap opens the edit page of that place on openstreetmap.org in your browser.
- Give feedback or report a problem opens your email app with a message to hello@ipstap.be, including the version of the app and of Android or iOS. You decide whether to send it.
- Privacy policy and the links to OpenStreetMap open in your browser.
Google Play and App Store
You install and update the app through Google Play. Google processes data for this under its own privacy policy. In the Google Play Console we only see aggregated statistics, such as the number of installs and – if you allow sharing diagnostic data in Android – the number of crashes, without knowing who you are.
On iPhone and iPad you install the app through the App Store or, during a test, through TestFlight. Apple processes data for this under its own privacy policy. In App Store Connect we only see aggregated statistics and – if you allow sharing with developers – crash reports, without knowing who you are.
If you test the app
If you take part in a test of the app (a closed test on Google Play or a test through TestFlight), we only use your email address to give you access to the test and to contact you about it. Feedback you send (by email, Google Play or TestFlight) is used to improve the app and, without your name or email address, to show Google or Apple what we did with it. Legal basis: your consent by taking part; you can stop at any time by emailing hello@ipstap.be. We remove your email address from the tester list no later than three months after the test ends.
This website
Cloudflare hosts the website and the list of places for the app, and keeps technical logs (such as IP address and time) to provide and secure the service. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in offering the website and the updates securely.
To see how the website is used, we keep cookieless, aggregated visitor statistics via Cloudflare Web Analytics. For this, every page loads a small script from Cloudflare. We only see totals: the number of page views and visits per page, the referring website, the country, the type of browser, operating system and device, and page load times. No cookies or localStorage are used, you are not recognised or followed across visits or websites (no fingerprinting) and we see no IP addresses or individual visitors. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in improving the website. Because nothing is stored on your device, there is no cookie banner. Updates from the app are not counted.
Cloudflare is a US company. Data may therefore be processed outside the European Union; this is based on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework and the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses. More information in Cloudflare’s privacy policy.
Apart from that, the website uses no other scripts, no external fonts and no ads.
Emails to us
If you email hello@ipstap.be, we use your email address and message only to reply to you and to improve the app. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in answering your question. We do not keep emails longer than necessary and pass them on to no one.
Your rights
Because your data is on your device, you are fully in control: viewing, editing, exporting or deleting is done in the app. To erase everything, see Delete your data. For data we do hold (for example an email you sent us), you can exercise your rights under the GDPR via hello@ipstap.be: access, rectification, erasure, restriction, objection and portability. You can also lodge a complaint with the Belgian Data Protection Authority.
Children
The app is not directed at children.
Changes
If this policy changes, we update the date at the top. For important changes, we also mention it in the app’s release notes.