Privacy Policy — Duskbox
This policy covers Duskbox: Photo Planner, the iPhone app published by Usable Utilities (“we”, “us”), and this website. It explains what the app does with your data — which is very little.
Summary
- No account, no sign-in.
- No analytics, no advertising, no tracking, no advertising identifier.
- We run no server that receives your data.
- Your moments, photos and notes stay on your device.
- Your location is used on the device. It is sent only to the services listed below, and only to get a forecast or map data for the place you are planning.
What stays on your device
Everything you create or set in Duskbox is stored only in the app’s own storage on your iPhone: saved moments and plans, the photos you attach (a resized copy, made when you attach it), notes, saved places, your camera gear, traced skylines, reminders and settings, and whether you have made the in-app purchase. So are the terrain packs, offline maps and cached forecasts the app downloads. We have no access to any of it. Deleting the app deletes it. Like any app’s data, it can be part of the device backup you make yourself (iCloud or a computer), which is between you and Apple.
Services the app contacts
To show a forecast or a map, the app talks directly to the public services below. None of them receives an account, a name, an email or a device identifier from us. Like any internet request, each one sees your IP address. Photon and Nominatim also receive a short app identifier (“Duskbox/1.0”), which their usage policies ask for.
Open-Meteo — weather
Sent: the coordinates of the place you are planning, and for the sky-colour forecast up to five more points along the sun’s direction, out to about 300 km; the dates wanted.
When: when a screen shows the weather, the sky-colour forecast or Scout for a place.
We may route these requests through a small relay of our own on Cloudflare, so the app can use a commercial Open-Meteo plan. If we do, the relay only forwards the same request and does not keep the coordinates. Open-Meteo terms and privacy
Photon (komoot) — place search
Sent: the text you type into a place search, the centre of the map you are looking at (so nearby results rank first) and your language.
When: while you search for a place. komoot privacy policy
OpenStreetMap Nominatim — place search and names
Sent: search text and the area of the map; the coordinates of a point whose name the app looks up (reverse geocoding); the OpenStreetMap ids of search results, to show their names in your language.
When: when you search, or pick a point on a map. OSMF privacy policy
OpenFreeMap — map tiles
Sent: requests for the map tiles and style of the area on screen, or of the area you choose to keep offline — which reveals that area.
When: when a map is shown or downloaded and is not already stored on the device. openfreemap.org
terrain.duskbox.app — terrain packs
Sent: a request for the pack catalogue and for the pack you choose to download (a country or region). No location.
When: when you open the terrain list or download a pack. Our storage is hosted by Cloudflare. Cloudflare privacy policy
NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center — aurora
Sent: nothing about you: a plain request for the global geomagnetic (Kp) forecast.
CelesTrak — ISS passes
Sent: nothing about you: a plain request for the International Space Station’s current orbital elements. Visible passes are computed on the device.
Only when you tap
- Directions — opens Apple Maps or Google Maps with the spot’s coordinates.
- Add to Google Calendar — opens Google’s event page in your browser with the event’s title, time and place filled in. Adding to the iPhone calendar instead stays on the device.
- Share — hands what you chose to share to the iOS share sheet; where it goes is up to you.
Permissions
iOS asks before any of these is used, and you can change them any time in Settings.
- Location (while using the app) — to compute golden hour, blue hour, sun and moon positions for where you are standing.
- Location (always) — only if you turn on “Follow me”, so your daily golden-hour alerts follow you when you travel. Computed on the device.
- Camera — the live view of the AR Sky Planner, and taking a photo to attach to a moment. Nothing is kept except a photo you choose to save.
- Photos — to attach a picture from your library to a moment. The copy stays on the device.
- Calendar (add only) — only when you tap “Add to calendar”, to add a shoot you planned. Duskbox never reads your events.
- Notifications — reminders for your moments and daily alerts, scheduled on the device. There is no push server.
In-app purchase
Duskbox’s one-time in-app purchase is handled entirely by Apple through the App Store. We never see your payment details. The app only stores, on the device, whether the purchase has been made. See Apple’s Privacy Policy.
Third-party code
The app contains no analytics, advertising or tracking SDK. If you have chosen to share analytics with app developers in iOS Settings, Apple may pass us anonymous crash reports and aggregate App Store statistics; that is Apple’s service, under Apple’s policy.
This website
duskbox.app is a static site: no cookies, no analytics, no third-party scripts or fonts. If you pick a language, the choice is remembered in your browser’s local storage and never sent anywhere. The site is served by Cloudflare, which processes IP addresses to deliver pages and protect against abuse.
Children
Duskbox does not collect personal data from anyone, children included.
Changes
If this policy changes, the new version will be posted at this address with a new date.
Contact
Questions about this policy: usableutilities@gmail.com