Privacy Policy

1. Owner and Data Controller

“Vacation Countdown”, “the app”, “we” and “us” refer to the iPhone application published by the Owner and to the website thevacationcountdown.app. “You” means the person using the app or the website.

2. Data on your device and in your iCloud

Everything you create in the app is stored in the app’s private container on your iPhone:

• Countdown names, departure dates, chosen units, styles, colors and backgrounds;
• Destinations you search for and select, and the destination photo the app downloads for them;
• Calendar events you choose to import (title and date only);
• Reminder preferences and app settings;
• A small summary of your countdowns shared with the app’s Home Screen widget, also on your device.

We do not operate a server that receives this data.

iCloud sync

If you are signed in to iCloud and iCloud is enabled for Vacation Countdown, iOS keeps a copy of your countdowns (names, dates, units, styles, destinations, the downloaded destination photo and reminder preferences, but not the widget summary or app settings) in the private iCloud database of your Apple Account, using Apple’s CloudKit service, and syncs it to your other devices signed in to the same account. This database belongs to you: we have no access to it, no key to it and no server of our own involved. Apple processes it under Apple’s privacy policy and the iCloud terms. Data is encrypted in transit and on Apple’s servers; with Advanced Data Protection enabled, it is end-to-end encrypted.

Sync is on by default when iCloud is available. To turn it off, open the iPhone Settings app › [your name] › iCloud › Saved to iCloud (or “See All”) and switch off Vacation Countdown. The app then keeps working with the data on that device only. To remove what is stored in iCloud, delete the countdowns in the app or use Settings › [your name] › iCloud › Manage Account Storage › Vacation Countdown › Delete Data from iCloud. Without an iCloud account, nothing leaves your device.

Your data may also be included in the backups your iPhone makes on its own (iCloud Backup or a computer backup), which are governed by Apple’s policy and your iOS settings.

When you share a countdown as an image or export it as a .vacationcountdown file, that content goes only where you send it. Exported files are not encrypted and contain the countdown’s name, date, destination and style.

Deleting the app removes all of this data from that device. If iCloud sync is on, the copy in your iCloud database and on your other devices remains until you delete the countdowns or the iCloud data as described above.

3. Permissions the app may ask for

Calendar (optional)

If you use “Import from calendar”, iOS asks you to grant calendar access. The app reads event titles and dates so you can turn an event into a countdown. It never creates, edits or deletes events and never sends calendar data anywhere. You can revoke access at any time in Settings › Privacy & Security › Calendars.

Notifications (optional)

Reminders before a trip are local notifications scheduled on your device. No notification content leaves your iPhone. The only push notifications the app receives are silent ones sent by Apple’s iCloud service to tell the app that a countdown changed on another of your devices; they carry no content and never appear on screen.

The app does not request access to your location, photos, contacts, microphone or camera, and it does not ask to track you across other companies’ apps and websites.

4. Data processed by third-party services

The app connects to the following services. Each one receives only what is listed here and processes it under its own privacy policy.

Analytics and crash data are collected without any identifier that we could tie to you as a person. We have configured the App Store privacy label accordingly: crash data, performance data, product interaction and a device identifier are collected, not linked to your identity and not used for tracking.

Destination photos are Wikimedia content published under free licenses. The app shows the author and license of each photo. See the Terms of Use for how you may use them.

5. What we do not do

• We do not show ads and do not use advertising identifiers (IDFA) or the App Tracking Transparency framework.
• We do not track you across other apps or websites.
• We do not sell, rent or share personal data with third parties for their own purposes.
• We do not create accounts or profiles, and we do not use your data for automated decision-making or profiling.
• We do not send marketing emails or push notifications.

6. This website

thevacationcountdown.app is a static site. The “When do you leave?” demo on the home page runs entirely in your browser and stores nothing. The site is served by Cloudflare, Inc., whose edge servers process your IP address and request headers to deliver the pages and protect against abuse, under Cloudflare’s privacy policy.

Launch notification list

If you enter your email address in the “Notify me” form, we store the address, the time you signed up and your browser’s language in a Cloudflare data store, solely to send you a single email when the app becomes available. We do not add you to any other mailing list and never share the address. You can ask us to remove it at any time by writing to [email protected].

Analytics

The site uses Google Analytics (Google LLC) to measure how many people visit and which pages they view. Google sets cookies for this purpose and processes your IP address and browser details under Google’s privacy policy. You can block it with a content blocker or by disabling cookies for this site.

7. Legal basis and purposes

Where the GDPR or similar laws apply, we rely on:

• Performance of a contract for purchase validation and unlocking Pro (RevenueCat, App Store);
• Our legitimate interest in keeping the app stable and understanding aggregate usage (Crashlytics, Firebase Analytics), balanced by the fact that the data is anonymous and never includes your content;
• Your request when you search a destination or fetch a photo, which necessarily sends the query to Apple or Wikipedia;
• Your iCloud settings for syncing countdowns to your own iCloud database, which you control in iOS Settings;
• Your consent, given through iOS permission prompts, for calendar access and notifications, which you can withdraw at any time in Settings.
• Your request when you sign up for the launch notification on the website, which you can withdraw by emailing us.

8. Retention

• On your device: until you delete the countdown or the app.
• In your iCloud: until you delete the countdown in the app, delete the app’s data in iCloud settings, or delete your Apple Account; Apple’s retention rules apply.
• Firebase Analytics: Google retains event data for a limited period set in our Firebase project (at most 14 months for user-level data) and aggregated statistics thereafter.
• Crashlytics: Google retains crash reports for approximately 90 days.
• RevenueCat: purchase records are kept for as long as needed to honour your purchase and to comply with tax and accounting obligations.
• Email: if you write to us, we keep the conversation for as long as needed to help you and for up to two years afterwards.
• Launch notification list: until the launch email has been sent, and no later than 30 days after the app is released; earlier on request.

9. International transfers

Google, RevenueCat, the Wikimedia Foundation and Cloudflare process data in the United States and other countries. Where required, these providers rely on the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, the EU–US Data Privacy Framework or equivalent safeguards, as described in their policies linked above.

10. Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, delete or receive a copy of your personal data, to object to or restrict its processing, to withdraw consent, and to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority.

Because the app has no accounts, we hold no data that we can associate with you by name or email. In practice:

• To delete the data the app stores on a device, delete the app from that device. To delete it everywhere, delete the countdowns in the app first (this removes them from iCloud and your other devices), or remove the app’s data in Settings › [your name] › iCloud › Manage Account Storage.
• To stop diagnostics for the future, delete the app; there is no per-user switch for anonymous diagnostics.
• To request deletion of diagnostics or purchase records held by our providers, email [email protected]. Tell us the approximate install date, device model and, for purchases, the Apple receipt or order ID, so that we can locate the anonymous records. We answer within 30 days.

European Economic Area and United Kingdom: you may complain to the data protection authority of your country of residence.

Argentina: the Agencia de Acceso a la Información Pública, as the supervisory authority under Law 25.326, is competent to receive complaints from individuals whose rights are affected by a breach of personal data protection rules (Personal Data Protection Act No. 25.326, section 29 and Decree 1558/2001). Data subjects may exercise their right of access free of charge at intervals of no less than six months, unless a legitimate interest is shown.

California and other US states: we do not sell or share personal information as defined by the CCPA/CPRA and do not use it for cross-context behavioural advertising. You may contact us to exercise any right available under your state’s law; we will not discriminate against you for doing so.

Brazil: holders of personal data have the rights set out in the LGPD, which you may exercise by contacting us.

11. Children

The app is not directed at children under 13 (or the age at which a person can consent to data processing in their country). We do not knowingly collect personal data from children. If you believe a child has provided personal data to us, contact us and we will delete it.

12. Security

Data on your device is protected by iOS’s app sandbox and device encryption. Data synced through iCloud is encrypted in transit and at rest by Apple, and end-to-end encrypted if you enable Advanced Data Protection for your Apple Account. All connections from the app to the services above use HTTPS. Our providers apply their own security programs described in their policies.

13. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy when the app or the law changes. The date at the top shows the latest version. For significant changes we will also mention it in the app’s release notes. Continued use after a change means you accept the updated policy.

14. Contact

Questions about privacy: [email protected] or by post at the address above.