BirdTRX is a bird-watching field journal built to be private by design. Your journal lives on your phone. We operate no servers, run no analytics, show no advertising, and cannot see your data. This policy explains exactly what information the app handles, where it goes, and the choices you have.
Journal content you create. Diary text, tags, photos, videos and audio recordings (voice notes and bird-song recordings) are stored locally on your device. They are never uploaded to us — we have no servers to upload them to.
Location. With your permission, the app records a precise GPS position for each sighting, so your journal and eBird checklists are accurate. Location is stored within your entries on your device. You can deny location permission and set locations manually instead.
Weather and place names. The app captures the current weather and a human-readable place name alongside entries, using your coordinates (see “Services the app contacts” below).
Google account details. If you enable Google Drive backup, Google Sign-In shares your account email address (and name) with the app so it can label the connected account. This stays on your device. We never receive it.
Payment information. Subscriptions are processed entirely by Google Play. We never see your payment details.
The app talks directly from your phone to these services, only to deliver the feature described. None of them is permitted to use your data for their own advertising or unrelated purposes on our behalf.
| Service | What is sent | Why |
|---|---|---|
| eBird API (Cornell Lab of Ornithology) | Your approximate coordinates; species searched | Nearby hotspots, notable sightings, and recent species reports |
| Open-Meteo | Your coordinates | Weather captured with entries |
| OpenStreetMap / Nominatim | Your coordinates | Converting coordinates to a place name; map tiles in the location picker |
| Wikipedia / Wikimedia Commons and iNaturalist | Species names | Species descriptions and openly licensed species photos |
| Google Drive (only if you enable backup) | Your journal entries and media, to your own Google Drive | Backup and restore. See “Google Drive backup” below |
| Google Play | Subscription status queries | Managing your Premium subscription |
Bird-song identification runs entirely on your device using the BirdNET model. Your bird recordings are never uploaded for identification. (The model itself is downloaded once from a content delivery network when you first set up the feature.)
Like any internet request, these services technically receive your device's IP address when contacted.
Drive backup is optional and off by default. If you enable it, the app copies your entries and media to a visible “BirdTRX Backups” folder in your own Google Drive, using Google's narrow drive.file permission — meaning BirdTRX can only access files it created, never the rest of your Drive. You can disconnect Drive at any time in Settings, and you can delete the backup folder from your Drive whenever you wish.
BirdTRX's use of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.
No advertising. No analytics or tracking SDKs. No selling or sharing of personal data. No profiling. No data collection beyond what's described above — because there is nowhere for it to go: we don't operate servers.
Your data stays on your device until you delete it. You can delete individual entries in the app; uninstalling the app removes all locally stored data. If you used Drive backup, the backup remains in your own Google Drive under your control until you delete it or disconnect. Because we hold no copies of your data, there is nothing for us to delete on our side.
BirdTRX is suitable for general audiences, including young birdwatchers. We collect no personal data on our own systems from anyone, of any age. If you are a parent with questions about a child's use of the app, contact us at gora.pastimes@gmail.com.
If you are in the UK, EU or another region with data-protection laws (such as UK GDPR), you have rights including access, correction, deletion and portability of your personal data. In BirdTRX these rights are largely in your own hands — your data is on your device, exportable at any time (Settings → Export), and deletable by you. For anything else, contact us at gora.pastimes@gmail.com. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) in the UK.
Each permission is requested only when the relevant feature is first used, and the app works (with reduced features) if you decline.
If the app's data practices change, we will update this policy and the effective date above, and note significant changes in the app's release notes.