At OceanPulse your privacy is of most importance to us. This document sets forth the way we use and protect any information that you give to OceanPulse when you use the oceanpulseapp.com website or the OceanPulse app. OceanPulse reserves the right to change this policy from time to time by updating this page. You should check this page from time to time to ensure that you agree with the most up to date privacy policy information. If you do not agree with this Policy then you should immediately stop using OceanPulse website and delete the mobile application. We have attempted to write this information in plain English so its easy for you to understand.
If you have questions about this policy please reach out to us at hello@oceanpulseapp.com.
Distinguishing the website from the app#
It’s important to understand that OceanPulse operates a marketing website, accessible at oceanpulseapp.com, as well as a mobile application. These two services differ in what and how we collect and store information. We’ll outline privacy information for each of these services separately.
How the App Collects and Uses Data#
The OceanPulse app runs on iPhone and iPad, and on Android phones and tablets. Everything in this section applies to both, except where it says otherwise.
Your account#
- You need an account to use the app. On iPhone and iPad you sign in with Apple or Google, and on Android with Google. OceanPulse has no passwords of its own.
- When you sign in, we keep your name, your email address, and the ID that Apple or Google gives your account. If you sign in with Apple and hide your email, we get Apple’s private relay address instead.
- Each sign-in also sends the app’s version, your device’s model and system version, its language and region setting, and its time zone. We keep the latest of these with your account, to help with support and to see which devices and versions are in use.
Your location#
- The app asks to use your location while you’re using it. A track recording or a route you start keeps using it with the screen off. You can change the permission in your device’s settings at any time.
- Your device uses your position to show where you are on the chart, record your tracks, follow your routes, and find the tide stations near you.
- To show the forecast where you are (My Location, the weather on Home, and the conditions on the chart), the app sends your position to our servers, and Home’s Marine Alerts send it to find the warnings near you. We use the position to answer the request. These requests aren’t linked to your account, and we don’t save your position to it.
- When you search for a place, the app sends what you type and your position to Mapbox, so nearby places come first. While you allow location, the maps’ Mapbox software also sends Mapbox where your device is; you can turn that off on any map. See Services we use.
- To show the name of the town you’re in, the app asks your device’s own place-name service: Apple’s on iPhone and iPad, and Google’s on Android.
- Your position also leaves your device when you choose to share it: a live track (see Sharing a Live Track), a marker, route, or track you share as a link (see Sharing Web Links), and the places you pick for forecast alerts.
Markers, routes, tracks, and settings#
- Your markers, routes, tracks, saved places, vessel details, and settings are kept on your device, not on our servers.
- On iPhone and iPad they sync between your devices through your own iCloud account, under Apple’s privacy policy. We can’t see them.
- On Android they stay on the phone or tablet where you made them. They don’t sync, and they aren’t included in Android’s backup, so uninstalling OceanPulse deletes them.
- Apart from iCloud sync, they leave your device only when you share them: as a web link, a GPX file, or a share image.
Forecast alerts#
- Each forecast alert you create is stored with your account on our servers, so we can check the forecast for you while the app is closed: its name, the place it watches (a position on the map, a place name, and the place’s time zone), the conditions you chose, its schedule, and whether it notifies you by push, email, or both. We also keep the units you use, so that alerts are written in them, and the days we’ve already notified you about.
- We check your alerts against the forecast on our servers. Push notifications go to the devices where you’ve allowed them (see Notifications). Emails come from alerts@oceanpulseapp.com, sent through Amazon Simple Email Service to the email address on your account.
- An email’s View forecast link shows that alert’s name, place, conditions, and schedule to anyone who has the link. It never shows your name or email address, and it stops working when you delete the alert.
- Deleting an alert deletes it from our servers, and deleting your account deletes all your alerts.
Your boat’s photo#
- While setting up the app, you can give it a photo of your boat, and it estimates the boat’s length, draft, cruise speed, and fuel use. You can skip this step.
- The photo goes to our server, which sends it to OpenAI to make the estimate. We don’t store it, and our OpenAI account is set to zero data retention, so OpenAI processes the photo without keeping it.
Notifications#
- If you allow notifications, the app sends our servers your device’s push token, which we keep with your account so we can send you forecast alerts. Signing out removes it.
- Apple delivers notifications on iPhone and iPad. On Android, Google’s Firebase Cloud Messaging delivers them, and creates an ID for the app on your device when the app first opens.
Email#
- If you turn on email for a forecast alert, we email you when it matches. Each of those emails has a link to turn off email for that alert.
- New accounts are also signed up for news about OceanPulse by email. The app has no setting for this yet. To stop these emails, write to hello@oceanpulseapp.com.
Services we use#
These companies run parts of OceanPulse for us:
- Amazon Web Services runs our servers and database, and sends our emails.
- Apple handles Sign in with Apple, iCloud sync, notifications, and App Store payments on iPhone and iPad. Our servers also get forecasts from Apple Weather, sending it a place’s position and time zone, and nothing about you.
- Google handles Sign in with Google on both platforms, and notifications and Google Play payments on Android.
- Mapbox draws the app’s maps and finds places when you search. The app loads map tiles from Mapbox, and when you search it sends Mapbox what you type and, if you’ve allowed location, your position. Mapbox’s map software in the app also sends Mapbox how the map is used and, while you allow location, where your device is, which Mapbox uses as its privacy policy describes, for example to improve its maps. You can stop this at any time: tap the ⓘ on any map, choose Mapbox Telemetry, and choose to stop participating. Mapbox also counts how many devices use its maps each month, which is how it bills us, with an ID it makes for the app on your device.
- RevenueCat manages subscriptions. The app gives it your OceanPulse account ID, name, and email address with your purchases, so Pro unlocks and we can help with billing questions.
- OpenAI estimates your boat from its photo, as described above.
- Waterway Guide supplies the marina and anchorage details on the chart. The app sends it the corners of the part of the chart you’re looking at, the marina or anchorage you open, and what you type into the chart’s search. It doesn’t get your name or email address, and it may keep what it receives.
The services the app contacts directly (Apple, Google, Mapbox, RevenueCat, and Waterway Guide) also see your device’s IP address, as any website you visit does.
We don’t sell your information. The app shows no ads and has no analytics or advertising tools.
Contacting us from the app#
Contact Us opens your own email app with your device’s model, its system version, and the app’s version filled in, so we can help. Nothing is sent until you send the email.
Sharing Web Links#
From the app you can create a public web link to a marker, track, or route.
- Anyone with the link can view what you shared without an OceanPulse account: its title, notes, and location. For a track that includes the path you recorded, when you recorded it, and your speeds along it.
- OceanPulse never adds your name or email address to a shared link.
- Shared links do not expire.
- Shared links stay active even if you delete your OceanPulse account. Deleting your account does not turn off links you shared before.
- To turn off a link you’ve shared, including after deleting your account, email hello@oceanpulseapp.com and we’ll disable it.
Sharing a Live Track#
While you’re recording a track, you can share it as a live track: a web link that shows where you are as you go.
- While you share, the app sends your position, speed, and heading to our servers about every 10 seconds while you’re moving, and a short signal every few minutes to show you’re still in touch. Out of signal, positions wait on your device and are sent when you’re back in range.
- Anyone with the link can see, without an OceanPulse account, the track you’ve recorded since you started recording, your latest position, speed, and heading, and how long ago it was sent.
- A live track is titled with your first name, such as “Sam’s Live Track”. It never includes your email address.
- Stopping sharing, deleting the recording, signing out, or deleting your account ends the link at once, and we delete its positions from our servers shortly after.
- Saving the recording also ends sharing, but the finished track stays viewable through the link for 24 hours. After that the link ends and its positions are deleted. A live track we haven’t heard from for 60 days ends the same way.
- Following a live track doesn’t need an account, and we don’t record who follows one.
How the Website Uses Data#
- OceanPulse automatically collects analytics data that your browser sends when you visit our website. This data may contain information such as your computer’s IP address, browser type, URLs of referring pages, geographic location, time and date of your visit, and system configuration information.
- We use Google Analytics and Google Ads on the website. They set cookies or similar identifiers in your browser and send data about your visit to Google, which processes it under its own policies — see How Google uses information from sites that use its services.
- We use Google Analytics to understand how visitors find and use the website, and Google Ads to measure whether our ads lead people to download the app. When you click a download button, such as “Download on the App Store”, the website tells Google which button was clicked.
- You can manage how Google uses your data for ads in Google’s ad settings, and opt out of Google Analytics with the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.
- When you email us, we might collect the contents of your email.
- Shared web links open at app.oceanpulseapp.com, which only shows the marker, track, route, or live track that was shared. It has no accounts or sign-in.
Your Rights#
We take your right to review, understand, and remove personal data and information seriously.
- You can delete your account at any time in the app; see Delete Your Account. That deletes your account from our servers, with your forecast alerts and push tokens, and ends any live track you’re sharing.
- Deleting your account doesn’t delete your markers, routes, and tracks, because they’re on your device (and, on iPhone and iPad, in your iCloud), not on our servers. They stay there until you delete them.
- To ask what personal information we hold about you, or to have it corrected or removed, email hello@oceanpulseapp.com. We may take up to 30 days to remove your personal information from our systems.
- Web links you’ve shared stay active after your account is deleted; see Sharing Web Links.
Children’s Privacy#
OceanPulse does not knowingly collect or solicit any information from anyone under the age of 13 or knowingly allow such persons to register as Users. The Service and its content are not directed at children under the age of 13. In the event that we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13 without verification of parental consent, we will delete that information as quickly as possible. If you believe that we might have any information from or about a child under 13, please contact us at hello@oceanpulseapp.com.
Payments and Subscriptions#
When you subscribe to OceanPulse Pro, you pay through Apple’s App Store on iPhone and iPad, or through Google Play on Android. We never see your card or billing details. RevenueCat, which manages subscriptions for us, tells the app and our servers whether you’re subscribed and when your subscription renews, lapses, or is cancelled. Records of your purchases stay with Apple or Google, and with RevenueCat, even if you delete your account.