Projects / GPS Genius

Privacy policy

This Privacy Policy applies to GPS Genius, an Android GNSS diagnostics app published on Google Play as dev.glippi.gpsgenius.

GPS Genius is published by the developer account shown on GPS Genius’s Google Play listing. For privacy questions, use the developer contact email shown in the Developer contact section of GPS Genius’s Google Play listing.

The related Terms of Service cover the licence, purchases, and the limits of what this app’s readings can be relied on for.

Summary

  • GPS Genius does not require an account.
  • GPS Genius does not operate its own backend server. There is no service to which your data could be sent.
  • GPS Genius contains no ads, no advertising SDK, no analytics SDK, no crash-reporting SDK, and no remote configuration.
  • GPS Genius does not sell or share personal data.
  • Your location is read only while the app is open and in the foreground, is displayed on your device, and is never transmitted anywhere.
  • Position data is written to storage only when you choose to save a place or a session, and only to the app’s own private storage on your device.
  • The only third parties involved are Google Play Billing, when you buy the unlock or leave a tip, and Android’s own assisted-GNSS service, when you tap one of the A-GPS actions.

Permissions the app requests, and why

Location

GPS Genius declares ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION and ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION. Reading your device’s GNSS receiver is the entire purpose of the app: these permissions are what allow it to show your position, fix quality, satellite status, and per-signal measurements.

Three limits apply, and they are enforced by the app’s manifest rather than by policy alone:

  • GPS Genius declares no ACCESS_BACKGROUND_LOCATION permission, so Android will not give it your location when the app is not in use.
  • GPS Genius runs no foreground service. There is no mechanism by which it could keep a location session alive behind another app.
  • The session suspends itself when the app leaves the foreground and resumes when you return.

Location data read from the receiver is held in memory to render the current screen. It is not transmitted, and it is not written to storage unless you save a record yourself.

Internet

GPS Genius declares INTERNET for exactly two purposes, both of which you start yourself:

  • Assisted GNSS. When you tap “Inject time” or “Download PSDS” in the A-GPS assist tool, the app asks Android’s own location service to fetch assistance data. The request is made by the Android platform, not by the app, and it goes to the assistance servers your device is configured to use, normally Google’s. GPS Genius sends no data of its own with it.
  • Google Play Billing. When you open the unlock screen, buy the unlock, leave a tip, or restore purchases, the app talks to Google Play’s billing service.

No other network request is made. There is no telemetry, no crash upload, no update check, no map tile download, no geocoding, and no address lookup.

Location extra commands

GPS Genius declares ACCESS_LOCATION_EXTRA_COMMANDS. This permission does not grant access to any additional data. It is what allows the A-GPS assist tool to send the inject-time, download-PSDS, and delete-aiding-data commands to the receiver on your device, and it does nothing until you tap one of those actions.

Sensors

The compass and the device-heading mode of the sky plot read your device’s rotation-vector sensor, which does not require a permission. Sensor readings are used to rotate a display and are never stored or transmitted. The sensor is registered only while a screen that shows heading is visible.

Information processed on your device

Live GNSS session

While a session is running, GPS Genius holds a snapshot in memory containing your position, accuracy estimates, altitude, speed, bearing, dilution of precision, timing values, and per-satellite and per-signal measurements. This snapshot is replaced as new measurements arrive and is discarded when the session ends. Nothing about it leaves your device.

Saved places and sessions

When you choose to save a place (Simple mode) or capture a session (Pro mode), GPS Genius writes one record to a private directory inside its own app storage. Both modes read and write the same records; the two names describe two ways of displaying them.

A saved record can contain:

  • a name you chose, and the start, stop, and duration timestamps
  • position samples — latitude, longitude, altitude, accuracy, speed, bearing, observation time, and provider name
  • fix count, time to first fix, and best accuracy
  • dilution of precision and mean-sea-level altitude
  • satellite and signal counts, and per-satellite status such as identifier, constellation, signal strength, elevation, azimuth, carrier frequency, and ephemeris and almanac flags
  • the receiver capabilities observed during that session

These records are stored in the app’s private storage, which Android’s app sandbox makes readable only by GPS Genius. They are not uploaded anywhere. You can rename or delete any record in the app, and uninstalling GPS Genius removes all of them.

App settings

GPS Genius stores your preferences locally using Proto DataStore: mode (Simple or Pro), theme, dynamic colour, distance and speed units, coordinate format, signal sort order and constellation filter, true-north preference, keep-screen-on, update interval, minimum distance, the full-GNSS-measurements toggle, onboarding state, and whether the Pro-mode nudge has been dismissed.

These settings contain display and behaviour choices only. No position data is stored in settings.

Ground truth in the accuracy test

A reference position you type into the accuracy test is held in memory for the duration of the app process and is deliberately never written to storage. Closing the app discards it.

Purchase state

If you buy the unlock, GPS Genius stores a small local record that an entitlement exists, so the unlocked features keep working offline. This record contains no payment details.

Android backup and device transfer

GPS Genius explicitly excludes saved places and sessions and the purchase record from Android cloud backup and from device-to-device transfer. Your saved position data does not leave your phone even through a Google account backup.

App settings are not excluded, so depending on your Android version and device settings they may be included in a system backup. As described above, settings contain no position data.

Information sent off your device

Assisted GNSS (A-GPS)

The A-GPS assist tool has three actions, all manual: inject the current time, download predicted satellite orbits (PSDS), and delete existing aiding data. The first two ask Android’s location service to contact its assistance servers, which speeds up the next fix.

GPS Genius does not construct that request, does not choose its destination, and does not attach your position, saved records, settings, or purchase information to it. As with any network request made by your device, the receiving server may observe technical metadata such as your IP address and the time of the request. That processing is governed by the policies of the assistance provider your device uses, normally the Google Privacy Policy.

These actions never run automatically. If you never tap them, GPS Genius makes no network request at all outside of billing.

Google Play Billing

GPS Genius offers a one-time unlock (gpsgenius.unlock) and an optional tip (gpsgenius.tip). Both are processed by Google Play. Google Play is the seller; the developer never sees or receives your payment card details, bank details, billing address, name, email address, or Google account.

Through the Google Play Billing library, GPS Genius may receive the limited purchase information it needs to grant and restore the unlock:

  • the product identifier that was purchased
  • purchase state
  • the purchase token and acknowledgement status needed to complete or restore the purchase
  • the localised price of the products, so the app can display it

This information is used only to unlock, acknowledge, and restore features on your device. It is not sent to any developer-operated server, because there is none. Google’s processing of your payment, purchase, device, and account information is governed by Google’s own policies and terms.

Files you export, and links you open

GPX, CSV, NMEA, backup archives, and PDF health reports are written to a location you pick through Android’s document picker. Once written they are ordinary files under your control, and the app does not read them again. If you then share one, the destination app or service handles it under its own privacy policy.

The same applies when you tap “Open map”, share your coordinates, or open an external link: the app hands a standard Android intent to whichever app you choose, and that app’s own policy governs what happens next.

Information GPS Genius does not collect

GPS Genius does not operate user accounts and does not collect, store, or transmit any of the following to developer-operated services:

  • name, email address, or phone number
  • contacts, calendar, messages, photos, videos, or audio
  • your position, saved places, or saved sessions
  • payment card or bank details
  • advertising identifiers, device fingerprints, or any identifier used for tracking
  • analytics events, usage statistics, performance traces, or crash reports
  • installed-app lists, files, or documents outside the app’s own storage

Data sharing

GPS Genius does not sell personal data and does not share personal data for advertising or analytics.

Information is processed by third parties only where a feature you invoke requires it:

  • Android’s location service and its assistance provider, when you run an A-GPS action
  • Google Play and Google Play Billing, when you view, purchase, acknowledge, or restore the unlock or the tip
  • Android or Google backup and device-transfer services, if enabled in your device settings, for app settings only
  • the app you choose when you export a file, share coordinates, open a map, or follow an external link

Data retention and deletion

There is no server-side copy of anything, so there is nothing for the developer to retain or delete. Data on your device stays there until you remove it.

You can remove local GPS Genius data by:

  • deleting individual saved places or sessions in the app
  • clearing GPS Genius storage in Android system settings
  • uninstalling GPS Genius, which deletes its private storage entirely

Files you exported to your own storage are yours; deleting the app does not delete them, and you can remove them like any other file.

Purchase records are also held by Google Play and in your Google account purchase history. Those are controlled by Google, and you can manage purchases, refunds, and history through Google Play and your Google account settings.

GPS Genius does not offer account deletion because it does not create or manage accounts.

Your choices

  • You can use GPS Genius without an account and without ever purchasing anything.
  • You can decline or revoke the location permission in Android settings at any time. The app will explain what it cannot do and will keep working for everything that does not need a fix.
  • You can end a live session from the app, and it ends automatically whenever the app leaves the foreground.
  • You can choose never to save a place or a session, in which case no position data is ever written to storage.
  • You can choose never to run an A-GPS action, in which case the app makes no network request other than billing.
  • You can clear all local data at any time from Android system settings.

Security

Local data is kept in the app’s private storage, protected by Android’s app sandbox, and the position records within it are excluded from cloud backup and device transfer. Google Play Billing uses Google’s own secure purchase flow. The A-GPS request is made by the Android platform over its own secured channel.

No method of storage or transmission is perfectly secure. GPS Genius reduces that risk structurally rather than by promise: it has no server, no account, no third-party SDK other than Google Play Billing, and almost nothing to transmit in the first place.

Children’s privacy

GPS Genius is a technical diagnostics tool. It is not designed for or directed to children under 13, and it collects no personal data from anyone, including children.

International users

Because no personal data is collected, transmitted to, or processed by the developer, there is no international transfer of your data by GPS Genius, and no developer-held record about you to access, correct, port, or erase. Rights you hold under the GDPR, the UK GDPR, the CCPA, or comparable laws remain available to you; a request under them will be answered honestly, which in practice means confirming that no such data exists.

Data you send to Google by purchasing through Google Play, or by running an A-GPS action, is handled by Google under its own policies and your rights against Google are exercised with Google.

Changes to this policy

This Privacy Policy may be updated if GPS Genius’s features or data practices change. The effective date at the top of this page will be updated when that happens, and material changes will also be noted in the app’s Google Play release notes. This page remains available at its published address.

Google Play Data safety summary

For transparency, these are the answers this app supports on the Play Console Data safety form. If the app’s behaviour ever changes, this policy and that form are updated together.

  • Does the app collect or share any of the required user data types? No.
  • Location. Not collected and not shared. It is read on device, displayed on device, and stored on device only when the user saves a record.
  • Personal info, financial info, health, messages, photos, audio, files, contacts, calendar. Not collected and not shared.
  • App activity, app info and performance, device or other identifiers. Not collected and not shared. There is no analytics or crash-reporting SDK in the app.
  • Purchase history. Handled by Google Play as the seller; not collected by the app for its own purposes.
  • Is all user data encrypted in transit? Not applicable — the app transmits no user data.
  • Can users request that data be deleted? Not applicable to server data, as none exists. On-device data is deleted in the app, by clearing app storage, or by uninstalling.