This is an English translation provided for convenience. The legally binding version is the German Datenschutzerklärung.

Thank you for your interest in our website and in our app Pilots Atlas. Everything about the app is collected in section VI. Protecting your personal data is important to us. Below we explain in detail how we handle your data in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

I. Controller

The controller within the meaning of the GDPR is:

absoluteZero multimedia GmbH Ginkgoring 26, 63533 Mainhausen, Germany Phone: +49 (0)6182 84929660 Email: info@absolutezero.de

For questions about data protection, please write to the address above marked "Datenschutz" (data protection), or to our email address.

II. Provision of the website and server log files

When you visit our website, the browser on your device automatically sends information to our website's server. This information is stored temporarily in a so-called log file. The following information is collected without any action on your part and stored until it is automatically deleted:

IP address of the requesting computer,
date and time of access,
name and URL of the file retrieved,
website from which access is made (referrer URL),
the browser used and, where applicable, your computer's operating system and the name of your access provider.

This processing serves to deliver the website and to ensure its stability and security. The legal basis is Art. 6 (1) (f) GDPR (legitimate interest). Log file data is deleted after seven days at the latest; storage beyond that is possible, in which case IP addresses are anonymised. The data is not combined with other personal data.

Our website is hosted by STRATO AG (Pascalstraße 10, 10587 Berlin, Germany). A data processing agreement pursuant to Art. 28 GDPR has been concluded with the hosting provider.

III. Cookies and web analytics

Technically necessary cookies are used solely to provide the functions of the website, on the basis of Art. 6 (1) (f) GDPR. Cookies for analytics purposes are set only after your express consent. You can set your browser to inform you when cookies are set and to allow cookies only in individual cases, or to exclude them altogether.

Google Analytics 4

This website uses Google Analytics 4, a web analytics service of Google Ireland Limited (Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland).

Consent is a prerequisite. Google Analytics is not loaded before you have expressly agreed via the notice banner. Before you consent, no cookie is set, no script is loaded from Google and no connection to Google is made. The legal basis is your consent under Art. 6 (1) (a) GDPR and § 25 (1) TDDDG.

Once you have consented, Google processes on our behalf in particular: truncated IP address, pages visited, time spent, referrer URL, approximate location at country/region level, and device and browser information. IP anonymisation is enabled; your IP address is truncated before any storage. We additionally record whether an order was started or completed and whether a click to the Apple App Store took place — in each case without reference to your person.

Purpose: measuring reach and evaluating advertising campaigns, so that we direct our advertising budget to where it actually works.

Transfer to third countries: A transfer to the USA cannot be ruled out. Google LLC is certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework; standard contractual clauses pursuant to Art. 46 (2) (c) GDPR are also in place. There is a risk that US authorities may access the data.

Storage period: Event data is deleted automatically after 14 months.

Withdrawal: You can withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future — via the "Privacy settings" link in the footer of every page. Withdrawing is as easy as giving consent and takes effect immediately.

More information: Google's privacy policy.

IV. Contact form and contact by email

If you contact us via the contact form or by email, the data you provide (name, email address, subject, message) as well as your IP address and the time of transmission are stored and processed in order to handle your enquiry.

The legal basis is your consent under Art. 6 (1) (a) GDPR and, where the enquiry relates to entering into or performing a contract, Art. 6 (1) (b) GDPR. The data is not passed on to third parties. It is deleted as soon as it is no longer needed for the purpose for which it was collected, i.e. when your enquiry has been fully dealt with and no statutory retention obligations prevent deletion. You can withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future.

V. Orders and payment processing via PayPal

To process orders for our printed atlases and maps we use the payment service provider PayPal (PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. et Cie, S.C.A., 22-24 Boulevard Royal, L-2449 Luxembourg). We store the contents of your cart and the delivery country chosen there only locally in your browser (local storage), so the cart survives moving between pages; this information is transmitted to PayPal only when you start the payment. It is strictly necessary for the cart you asked for (§ 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG). When you select "Pay with PayPal" (on the German pages: „Mit PayPal bezahlen") in the cart, you are forwarded to PayPal's website; we transmit the items, the shipping costs and the chosen delivery country. The payment and delivery details you enter there (e.g. name, address, email address, payment information) are collected and processed directly by PayPal; we receive from PayPal the order and delivery data required to fulfil the contract.

The legal basis is Art. 6 (1) (b) GDPR (performance of a contract). PayPal's privacy statement also applies: https://www.paypal.com/de/webapps/mpp/ua/privacy-full.

VI. The Pilots Atlas app

This section applies to the Pilots Atlas app on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch. Most features work without an account and directly on your device. Data leaves the device only in the cases described below.

1. Data on your device

What you create in the app — favourites, notes, markers, positions, routes and trips, aircraft with loading and checklist details, recorded flights, logbook entries and photos you place on the map — is at first stored only on your device. The app keeps its settings in step between your devices through your iCloud account (Apple); Apple is responsible for this, and we do not receive that data.

Location: The app uses your location on the device to show your position on the map, record flights and give alerts (for example when you approach an airspace or before dark). With the "Always" permission it also records in the background. Location data reaches us or third parties only in the cases of numbers 2 (synced flights), 3, 4 (shared flights), 6 and 11.

2. Account, sign-in and sync

You can sign in with Sign in with Apple, with your Google account, or with an email address and password. We use Firebase Authentication from Google Ireland Limited (Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland) for this. We store a user ID, your email address and — where the provider supplies it — your name. For some features (Follow Me, Community, AI Copilot, licence checks) the app automatically creates an anonymous account when needed, consisting only of a random ID.

When you are signed in with a real account, the app syncs your favourites, notes, markers, positions, range circles, rulers, trips, aircraft (including loading, checklists and flight plan details), the photos attached to your map items and your map settings through Google Firebase (Cloud Firestore and Cloud Storage), so they are available on all your devices. Recorded flights and the logbook are synced only if you switch that on in the app.

The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (providing the features you use). The data is kept until you delete it or delete your account (number 13).

3. Map, weather and aviation data from the internet

When online, the app loads maps, weather, NOTAMs, airspace and traffic data. For technical reasons the servers involved receive your IP address and the map area, position or station requested — but not your user ID. They are:

our own servers at STRATO AG (Otto-Ostrowski-Straße 7, 10249 Berlin, Germany) and IONOS SE (Elgendorfer Straße 57, 56410 Montabaur, Germany) for maps, map downloads, NOTAMs and aviation data;
Mapbox Inc. (USA) for drawing the map. The Mapbox SDK also sends anonymised usage and telemetry data, including location, to Mapbox; you can switch this off through the info symbol (ⓘ) on the map;
weather services: aviationweather.gov (NOAA, USA) for METAR/TAF and other aviation weather, Open-Meteo (open-meteo.com) for forecasts at a position, and NASA/NOAA for weather and satellite imagery;
traffic data (ADS-B): the community networks adsb.lol, adsb.fi, ADSB One and airplanes.live receive the visible map area; planespotters.net receives an aircraft's identifier when you open it and a photo is shown.

The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; for the Mapbox telemetry, our legitimate interest in a working map (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR).

Traffic receivers: If you connect the app to an ADS-B or FLARM receiver on your local network or over Bluetooth, its data stays on your device.

4. Follow Me, shared flights and landing messages

With Follow Me you follow aircraft by their registration. Our servers record their flights from publicly broadcast ADS-B signals collected by the community network adsb.lol. For this we store which aircraft you follow, your notification settings and — if you mark flights or trip groups as your own — that link. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; for recording publicly broadcast flight data, our legitimate interest and that of our users in following flights (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR).

Shared flights: If you create a share link for a recorded flight, we store the flight (route, times, figures) and show it on a web page and in the App Clip to anyone who has the link — until you revoke the share in the app. If you include the link in your landing messages, that page also shows the airfield and time of your landing.

Landing messages: When the app detects a landing, it proposes a message to the contacts you chose for this. You send the message yourself, through Messages or Mail; it does not pass through our servers. For each contact the app keeps only the name and one phone number or email address, on your device.

Overdue alert ("If I'm overdue"): Before departure you can choose up to five of your contacts with an email address, to be told if you do not arrive in time. For this we store on our servers (Google Firebase) the name your contacts know you by, the departure and destination airfields (with the destination's position), the expected arrival time, the grace period, and your contacts' names and email addresses. If the app detects no landing at the destination by the end of the grace period and you do not tap "I'm fine", we send each contact one email saying you are overdue; if you check in afterwards, they get an all-clear. The emails do not contain your current position. They are sent through the mail server of STRATO AG. The overdue alert is not a flight plan and does not replace search and rescue. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR for your data and, for your contacts' data, our and your legitimate interest in informing the people close to you in an emergency (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR); please tell your contacts that you have added them. We delete each alert, including your contacts' addresses, automatically 30 days after the expected arrival, or earlier if you delete your account (number 13).

5. Community

In the Community area (Settings › Support), your chosen display name, your posts, comments and votes are visible to other users; your email address is never shown. We also store reports you make and your notification settings. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR. If you delete your account, your posts and comments are anonymised, because others have replied to them.

6. AI Copilot

If the AI Copilot is available to you and you use it, your questions and the data the Copilot uses to answer them (for example your position, weather or route data) are sent through our server at Google Cloud (Belgium) to the Gemini API of Google Ireland Limited. We count requests per account to enforce usage limits. For voice input, Apple's speech recognition converts your recording to text. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.

7. Analytics, crash reports and performance

The app uses Google Analytics for Firebase to understand which features are used. It collects usage events, a random installation ID, device and app information and approximate region. Your device's advertising ID is not collected, and the consents for advertising purposes are permanently set to "denied" in the app. You can switch analytics off in the iOS Settings app under Pilots Atlas › Allow Google Analytics.

Firebase Crashlytics sends a crash report after a crash, with the device model, iOS version, app state and your user ID; Firebase Performance Monitoring measures loading times and network requests.

If the app was installed from an Apple Ads advertisement, it asks Apple once for the campaign, ad group and keyword IDs (Apple AdServices) and passes them to Google Analytics and RevenueCat (number 8). These contain no identifier that works across apps or devices.

The legal basis is our legitimate interest in a stable app and in evaluating our advertising (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR).

8. Purchases and licences

Purchases and subscriptions are handled by Apple; we do not receive payment details. So that your purchases apply on all your devices and accounts, the app sends your user ID and the purchase information (product, price, dates, Apple transaction ID) to RevenueCat Inc. (USA). If you have a licence key, we check it on our servers — where needed, using your email address. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; we keep purchase records for the statutory retention periods (Art. 6(1)(c) GDPR).

9. Push notifications

If you allow notifications, we store your device's push token (Firebase Cloud Messaging) with your user ID, to send you notifications for the features you have switched on (for example Follow Me or Community). We send advertising only with your separate consent (number 10).

10. Offers by email and push notification

In the Pilots Atlas app you can agree, under Settings › License & Store › Offers & News, to hear about offers and product news (such as the Black Friday sale) by email, by push notification, or both. Without that consent you receive no advertising; allowing notifications in iOS is not consent to advertising.

Email (double opt-in): When you enter your email address, we first send only a confirmation email. You receive offer emails only after you confirm the link in it. If you do not confirm within 30 days, the request and the address are deleted automatically. For this we store your email address, your app account ID, the wording and version of the consent you gave, the time you signed up and confirmed, the app version, and which campaign emails were sent to your address (as a checksum of the address). This lets us prove your consent and avoid sending twice. Every email has an unsubscribe link, and you can also unsubscribe in the app at any time. When you unsubscribe we delete the address and keep only a one-way checksum (hash), so it is not emailed again by mistake, and a count of the confirmation emails sent to it, which prevents abuse. The emails are sent through the mail server of our host STRATO AG (Otto-Ostrowski-Straße 7, 10249 Berlin, Germany).

Push notifications: If you agree, we note this on your app's device registration (the Firebase Cloud Messaging push token), together with the time of your answer, the device's time zone, the app version and the kind of licence you hold (none, trial, subscription, lifetime), so that, for example, Lifetime owners are not sent purchase offers. You can turn this off at any time in the app under Settings › License & Store › Offers & News.

The legal basis is your consent under Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR and Section 7(2) no. 2 of the German Act against Unfair Competition (UWG); keeping the record of your consent is based on Art. 6(1)(c) and (f) GDPR (the duty to prove consent under Art. 7(1) GDPR). Withdrawing your consent takes effect for the future. The data is stored in Google Firebase (Google Ireland Limited, Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland); the database is located in the USA. Google LLC is certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, and standard contractual clauses under Art. 46(2)(c) GDPR apply in addition. We use your email address for nothing else and do not pass it on.

11. Feedback and support

If you write to us from the app — under Settings › Support ("Send Debug Information") or through "Feedback" in Captain's Corner — a prepared email to us opens. It contains diagnostic details (device, iOS and app version, settings, the state of maps and downloads, and the last GPS position) so we can trace a fault. You see the whole message before you send it and can remove details; we receive nothing unless you send it. Section IV applies to its processing.

12. Permissions on your device

The app asks for a permission only when you use a feature that needs it. Camera and photos: to place photos on the map and save flight videos. Contacts: you pick individual contacts for landing messages or the overdue alert; the app reads only those contacts, not your address book (number 4). Microphone and speech recognition: only for voice input to the AI Copilot. Bluetooth and local network: for traffic receivers (number 3). Apple Watch: the Watch app starts a workout session (HealthKit) so flight recording keeps running in the background. It reads no health data and saves no workouts.

13. Deleting your account and data

You can delete your account in the app under Settings › Account › Delete Account & Data. We then delete the related data on our servers automatically — synced items, photos, flights, logbook, Follow Me settings, overdue alerts and device registrations — usually within two days; community posts are anonymised (number 5). You remove the data on your device by deleting the app. Purchase records we must keep by law are kept until the retention period ends. You can also request deletion by email to info@absolutezero.de, or write to us in the app under Settings › Support › Flight Support & Questions.

14. Service providers and transfers to third countries

Google (Firebase, Google Cloud), STRATO and IONOS process data on our behalf (Art. 28 GDPR). The Firebase database is located in the USA. We base transfers to the USA — to Google, Mapbox and RevenueCat — on the EU-US Data Privacy Framework where the recipient is certified under it, and in addition on standard contractual clauses under Art. 46(2)(c) GDPR. There is a risk that US authorities may access the data. The weather and traffic services in number 3 receive only the details named there, to answer your request.

VII. SSL/TLS encryption

For security reasons and to protect the transmission of confidential content, this website uses SSL/TLS encryption. You can recognise an encrypted connection by "https://" in your browser's address bar.

VIII. Rights of the data subject

Under the GDPR you have the following rights:

access to the personal data we process about you (Art. 15 GDPR),
rectification of inaccurate data or completion of your data (Art. 16 GDPR),
erasure of your data stored by us (Art. 17 GDPR),
restriction of processing (Art. 18 GDPR),
data portability in a structured, commonly used format (Art. 20 GDPR),
withdrawal of consent given, with effect for the future (Art. 7 (3) GDPR),
complaint to a supervisory authority (Art. 77 GDPR).

To exercise your rights, a message to the contact details given in section I is sufficient.

IX. Right to object

Where we process your personal data on the basis of legitimate interests pursuant to Art. 6 (1) (f) GDPR, you have the right to object to this processing at any time on grounds relating to your particular situation.

X. Changes to this privacy policy

We reserve the right to amend this privacy policy so that it always meets current legal requirements or to reflect changes to our services. The current version then applies to your next visit.

Privacy policy