Backshear Privacy Policy

Backshear is a weather-radar app. The core thing it asks you to do (type an address) is the most sensitive thing a weather app can hold, so Backshear is built to not collect it rather than to collect it responsibly. In one line: your address never leaves your phone, and we never had it to sell.

The short version

• There is no account and no sign-in. We hold no server-side identity for you.
• Your typed address is turned into a location on your device and is never uploaded.
• We use no third-party analytics or advertising SDKs: no ad networks, no attribution SDKs, no session recorders.
• We do not track you across other apps or websites, and we do not sell or share your data.
• Backshear's App Store privacy label is “Data Not Collected.”

Your address

When you type an address, Backshear resolves it to a location using your device's own geocoder. The address string does not transit our servers. Your saved home address is stored on your device, in the iOS Keychain, and is never uploaded.

To look up storms for a location, the app sends a coarse grid cell (a roughly 0.1°, about 10 km, square derived on your device) to our server. This is intentionally too coarse to identify a household: a radar gate is a few hundred meters across and a single radar covers a couple of hundred kilometers, so house-level precision is meteorologically meaningless. The grid cell is used solely to answer that request and as a shared cache key for the neighborhood; it is not stored in a form tied to you, your device, or your IP address.

Location permission

The core address flow needs no location permission. Backshear requests location access (“While Using the App”) only if you choose a feature that needs it: for example, using your current location to pick the nearest radar site or fill the address field. We explain why at the moment we ask, we never request “Always” access, and you can decline and still use the app by typing an address.

Anonymous usage counts

To understand whether features work, Backshear records a small number of anonymous, aggregate usage events (for example, that a storm was viewed). These carry no name, no account, no address, and no advertising identifier, and they are not joined to your location. They exist to count usage in aggregate, not to build a profile of you.

What we do not do

• We do not sell, rent, or share your personal data with anyone.
• We do not use your data to track you across other companies' apps or websites, and Backshear shows no App Tracking Transparency prompt because it does no tracking.
• We do not embed advertising or third-party analytics code.

Data from public sources

The storm history, warnings, and radar imagery come from public United States government data (the National Weather Service and NOAA's WSR-88D / NEXRAD network). That is public-domain weather data about storms, not data about you.

Children

Backshear is rated 4+ and is not directed at children. It does not knowingly collect any personal information from anyone, including children.

Changes

If Backshear ever adds a feature that changes what data is handled (for example, alerting that requires holding a device token, or a report that retains an address), we will update this policy and the App Store privacy label before that feature ships, and we treat such a change with the same seriousness as changing the price.

Contact

Questions about your privacy: [email protected].