Privacy Policy

Location

With your permission, VarioBud uses your device's location (GPS) to show your position on the map, draw your flight trail, estimate wind, and track distance and time from launch. Location is processed on your device to power these features. We do not collect, store on our servers, or share your location history.

The relevant iOS permission is “Your location is used to show your position on the map when no vario is connected.”

Your flights

Recorded flights (GPS track, altitudes, times) are stored on your device and included in your normal device backup. They are never uploaded to us — we have no servers. You can export any flight as a standard IGC file and share it wherever you choose, and you can delete flights at any time in the app.

Live tracking (optional, off by default)

If you enable LiveTrack24 live tracking in Settings, VarioBud streams your position during flight — latitude, longitude, altitude, speed and course — to livetrack24.com, together with your LiveTrack24 username and glider name, so people you choose can follow your flight in real time. This is the one feature that sends your precise location off your device, and it only runs while you have it switched on and a flight is active.

• Your LiveTrack24 password is stored in the iOS Keychain and sent only to LiveTrack24 to sign in, over HTTPS.
• Positions queue on your device when you have no coverage and are uploaded when coverage returns.
• Turn it off in Settings at any time; nothing is sent when it's off.
• LiveTrack24 is an independent service with its own privacy terms; your tracks there are governed by your LiveTrack24 account.

Bluetooth

VarioBud uses Bluetooth solely to connect to your variometer and read its sensor data (vertical speed, altitude, pressure, temperature, battery and GPS sentences). It does not scan for or track other Bluetooth devices for any other purpose.

The relevant iOS permission is “VarioBud needs Bluetooth access to connect to your variometer and display sensor data.”

Camera

VarioBud uses the camera only when you choose to scan a task's QR code — from a competition task board, or shared by a planning site such as flyxc. The code is read on your device; no photo or video is taken, stored or sent anywhere. The app asks for camera access the first time you tap Scan, and never before.

The relevant iOS permission is “VarioBud uses the camera only to read a task QR code, such as one on a competition task board or shared from flyxc. No photo is taken or stored.”

Tasks you import

A task you import — by QR code, link, photo or file — is read and stored on your device, and included in your normal device backup. Links are decoded by the app itself; VarioBud does not visit them or tell anyone you opened them. When you download a task for offline use, the countries its turnpoints lie in are looked up as described under Apple below. You can clear a task at any time in the app.

Third-party services

To display maps and flight-relevant overlays, VarioBud contacts the following services. These requests may include your approximate coordinates or map tile references so the correct data can be returned. No account, login or personal identity is required or sent.

• Mapbox — map tiles and rendering. The Mapbox SDK also collects its own anonymized usage and diagnostics data as described in its privacy policy.
• thermal.kk7.ch — thermal probability overlays by M. von Känel (data licensed CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).
• Terrain elevation tiles (AWS Open Data) — used to calculate your height above terrain. VarioBud requests map tiles, each covering about five kilometres, not your position: a tile reference says which square of the map is needed, not where you are within it. Tiles you have downloaded are stored on your device and used offline, so no request is made at all while flying in an area you have already prepared.
• Airspace data sources — openAIP worldwide, and luftrom.info for Norway. Airspace works offline once downloaded.
• Apple — to tell which country's airspace applies, VarioBud asks the iOS geocoding service which country a point lies in: your position, and the turnpoints of a task when you download it. These coordinates go to Apple, under Apple's privacy policy. Answers are kept on your device for areas tens of kilometres across, and the area you are in is checked again at most once each time VarioBud starts.

Each of these providers operates under its own privacy policy. VarioBud is not affiliated with them, and sends them no personal identity — only the coordinates or tile references needed to return the right data.

What we don't do

• No VarioBud account or sign-in. (Optional live tracking uses your own LiveTrack24 account.)
• No analytics, tracking or advertising SDKs.
• No selling, renting or sharing of your data.
• No servers of our own — your settings and flight history live on your device.

Changes

If this policy changes, we'll update this page and revise the “Last updated” date above. Material changes will be reflected here before they take effect.

Contact

Questions about privacy or your data? Email gustav@variobud.com and we'll be happy to help.