Privacy Policy

Scout: My Vicinity · Effective Date: February 25, 2026 · Last Updated: February 25, 2026

The short version: Scout stores your data on your device and in your personal iCloud account. We do not sell your data, build advertising profiles, or share your personal information with third parties. The only data that leaves your device is anonymous usage statistics and anonymous business popularity counts.

1. Who We Are

Scout: My Vicinity ("Scout," "we," "us," or "our") is an iOS app developed by Steven Kagey. Scout helps travelers discover their favorite businesses while traveling away from home. You can contact us at support@scoutmyvicinity.com.

2. Information Scout Collects

Information stored only on your device and iCloud:

Home of Record — the address and radius you set as your home base. This is stored locally in SwiftData and synced to your personal iCloud account via CloudKit. It is never transmitted to us.
Saved Favorites — the business names and Google Place IDs you choose to save. Stored locally and in your iCloud. Never transmitted to us.
Trip Plans — your saved road trip and flying-in searches. Stored locally and in your iCloud. Never transmitted to us.
App Preferences — settings such as notification radius, departure radius, and preferred maps app. Stored locally on your device.
Notification History — your Scout activity log. Stored locally on your device only.

Location data:

Scout requests "Always On" location permission to monitor for departure from your Home of Record and to alert you when you are near a favorite business while traveling.
Your location coordinates are used on-device to query the Google Places API. Your location is never transmitted to us or stored on our servers.
Location is accessed in the background only when you are traveling away from your Home of Record, using iOS Significant Location Change monitoring to minimize battery usage.

Anonymous data we do collect (no personal information):

Business popularity counts — when you save or unsave a business, an anonymous counter for that Google Place ID is incremented or decremented in our Firebase Firestore database. This contains only a Place ID and a number — no user identity, no location, no name.
Anonymous analytics — Firebase Analytics collects standard anonymized app usage data (screen views, feature usage, crash reports). This data cannot be linked back to you and contains no location information. You can review Google's data practices at policies.google.com/privacy.

3. How We Use Information

To detect when you have departed your Home of Record and begin scouting nearby favorites
To search for nearby locations of your favorited businesses using the Google Places API
To send you local notifications when a favorite business is near your travel route
To generate trip plans showing your favorite businesses along a driving route or near a destination city
To show community-curated category lists based on anonymized aggregate favorite counts
To improve the app through anonymized usage analytics

4. Third-Party Services

Google Places API — Scout uses the Google Places API to search for business locations near your current position. When searching, your approximate coordinates and a business name are sent to Google's servers. Google's privacy policy applies: policies.google.com/privacy.

Firebase (Google) — We use Firebase Analytics for anonymous usage statistics and Firebase Firestore to store anonymous business popularity counts. No personally identifiable information is stored in Firebase. Firebase privacy policy: firebase.google.com/support/privacy.

Apple iCloud / CloudKit — Your favorites, home of record, and trip plans are synced to your personal iCloud account via Apple CloudKit. This data is stored in your iCloud account and is governed by Apple's privacy policy: apple.com/legal/privacy. We cannot access your iCloud data.

Apple MapKit / Maps — Scout uses Apple Maps for route planning and address lookup. Apple's privacy policy governs this usage.

5. Data Sharing

We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with any third parties for marketing or advertising purposes. We do not display ads in Scout. The only data that leaves your device is:

Anonymous business popularity counts (no user identity, just Place ID + count)
Anonymous analytics events via Firebase
Google Places API queries containing approximate coordinates and business names
Your iCloud data synced to your own Apple iCloud account

6. In-App Purchases

Scout offers an optional one-time purchase for unlimited favorites via Apple's App Store. All payment processing is handled entirely by Apple. We do not receive or store any payment information.

7. Data Retention and Deletion

All personal data (favorites, home of record, trip plans, preferences) is stored on your device and in your iCloud account. You can delete this data at any time by:

Using Settings → Data & Privacy → Clear All Data within Scout
Deleting the Scout app from your iPhone (removes all local data)
Managing your iCloud data via iPhone Settings → Apple ID → iCloud → Manage Storage

Anonymous Firebase data (business popularity counts) is not linked to your identity and cannot be individually deleted, but contains no personal information.

8. Children's Privacy

Scout is not directed to children under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided personal information through Scout, please contact us and we will take appropriate steps.

9. Your Privacy Rights

You have the right to access, correct, or delete your personal data at any time using the controls described in Section 7. Since we do not collect personally identifiable information on our servers, there is no account to request deletion of. All your data is in your own hands — on your device and in your iCloud account.

10. Location Permission Details

Scout requests "Always Allow" location access to function as intended. Specifically:

When In Use — used for address search, favorites distance display, and trip planning
Always (Background) — used to detect departure from your Home of Record and to alert you when near a favorite business while traveling. Background location access is only active when you are away from your Home of Record.

You can revoke location permission at any time in iPhone Settings → Privacy & Security → Location Services → Scout. Revoking background location will prevent Scout from alerting you while traveling.

11. Changes to This Policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time. When we make material changes, we will update the "Last Updated" date at the top of this page. Continued use of Scout after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

12. Contact Us

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or Scout's data practices, please contact us:

Email: support@scoutmyvicinity.com