🐟 Gillscan

Gillscan Privacy Policy

Effective date: May 31, 2026

Gillscan ("Gillscan", "we", "us", or "our") is an AI photo fish-identification app that can also check local fishing regulations for a catch. This Privacy Policy explains exactly what data the app handles, why, where it goes, and the choices you have. It is written to describe what the app actually does — nothing more.

Gillscan is published by an individual developer based in the United States. The app is available worldwide on the Apple App Store and Google Play. If you use the app, this policy applies to you.

1. The short version

2. What we collect, how, and why

2.1 Fish photos (camera and photo library)

To identify a fish, you take a photo with your camera or pick an existing one from your photo library. The app asks for camera and photo-library permission only for this purpose. The selected photo is sent to our backend, which forwards it to a third-party vision AI provider that returns the likely species.

The app does not browse, scan, or upload any other photos in your library — only the image you explicitly submit for identification.

2.2 Location and date (regulations check)

To tell you the size, bag, and season rules that may apply where you are fishing, the app sends your GPS latitude and longitude together with the current date to our backend. This is used transiently to look up the applicable local regulations and is not used to track you or to build a profile.

2.3 Subscription status (purchases)

Gillscan offers a free tier (5 regulation checks per month) and an unlimited Premium subscription. Subscriptions are sold and billed by the Apple App Store or Google Play and managed through RevenueCat. We do not see or process your payment card or billing details — those stay with Apple, Google, and their payment systems. RevenueCat processes your subscription and purchase information (including an anonymous app-user identifier and store transaction data) to manage entitlements; we use it to confirm whether Premium is active so the app can unlock the right features.

2.4 Data stored only on your device

The following information is stored locally on your device (in app storage / SharedPreferences) and is never uploaded to us:

This data stays on your device until you delete it (see Section 7), uninstall the app, or clear the app's storage.

3. We do not collect accounts, emails, or analytics

4. Third parties we share data with (sub-processors)

To make the app work, limited data is shared with the service providers below. Each receives only what is needed for its function. These providers process data under their own terms and data processing agreements; we select providers that offer appropriate protections.

Connecting to our backend and these providers necessarily transmits your device's IP address and standard request metadata (such as timestamps and request logs), which Cloudflare and the AI providers may log under their own policies.

AI photo sharing. Identifying a fish requires sending your photo to a third-party AI provider, and the photo is sent only when you choose to identify a fish. If you do not use the identification feature, no photo leaves your device. We make this disclosure before identification so you can decide whether to use the feature.

5. International data transfers

Gillscan is operated from the United States, and our AI and infrastructure providers (Anthropic, OpenAI, Cloudflare) are based in or operate from the United States. If you use the app from the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, or elsewhere, the photo you submit for identification is transferred to the United States for transient processing.

Where required, these transfers are protected by appropriate safeguards, such as the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses (and the UK International Data Transfer Addendum), and/or the EU-US Data Privacy Framework where the provider is certified. These safeguards are set out in our providers' published data processing agreements.

6. Data retention

7. Your choices and controls

8. Your rights under the GDPR / UK GDPR (EEA and UK users)

If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, the following applies.

Controller. The data controller is the individual developer who publishes Gillscan. You can reach us at [email protected]. We have not appointed a Data Protection Officer, as one is not required at our scale; the contact above handles all privacy requests.

Why we are allowed to process your data (lawful bases, Art. 6):

We do not intentionally process special-category data. A photo of a fish is not biometric data about you. Precise location is personal data but is not a special category; it is used only to perform the regulations lookup. If a photo you submit incidentally contains other people or identifying details, that content is processed only transiently for identification and is not used to identify any person.

Recipients of your data are the providers listed in Section 4.

Your rights. You have the right to access, rectify, erase, restrict, and object to processing of your personal data, and the right to data portability. In practice, because we do not maintain accounts and our processing of your photo and location is transient and account-free, we hold essentially no personal data of yours on our servers and cannot link a request to any specific past processing or retrieve such data, because we do not store it. The personal data the app does keep lives on your device and is fully under your control via "Delete my data." For any request, contact [email protected].

Automated decision-making. The species identification and the regulations verdict are generated with AI. They are advisory only and do not produce legal or similarly significant effects on you; you remain responsible for verifying any result (see Section 12).

Complaints. You have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. In the UK this is the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO); in the EEA it is your local Data Protection Authority.

International transfers are described in Section 5.

9. Your rights under the CCPA / CPRA (California residents)

If you are a California resident, this section describes your rights and our practices under the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the CPRA.

Categories of personal information we collect, and the business purpose for each:

Sources: we collect this information directly from you and your device. Third parties to whom information is disclosed for these business purposes are listed in Section 4 (Cloudflare, Anthropic/OpenAI, RevenueCat, Apple, Google).

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it for cross-context behavioral advertising. Because we do not sell or share in this sense, we are not required to offer a "Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information" link, and we do not.

Sensitive personal information. Precise geolocation is "sensitive personal information" under the CPRA. We use it only to perform the regulations check you request and not to infer characteristics about you or for advertising, so the right to limit its use is not triggered; we disclose it here for transparency.

Your California rights: the right to know/access the personal information we collect, the right to delete it, the right to correct it, the right to opt out of sale or sharing (not applicable, as we do neither), the right to limit use of sensitive personal information (as noted above), and the right not to be discriminated against for exercising your rights. To exercise any right, email [email protected] or use Settings → Delete my data in the app.

10. Children's privacy

Gillscan is not directed at children. You must be at least 13 years old (or 16 in the EEA/UK) to use Gillscan, and by agreeing to the Terms at onboarding you confirm that you meet this age requirement. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under those ages. If you believe a child has provided personal information through the app, contact [email protected] and we will address it.

11. Security

Data sent between the app, our backend, and our providers is transmitted over encrypted HTTPS connections. On-device data is stored within the app's storage area provided by your operating system. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, but we take reasonable steps to protect the limited data the app handles. Because we keep no accounts and do not retain your photos or location server-side, the amount of personal data exposed to risk is minimal by design.

12. Accuracy and advisory disclaimer

Species identification is AI-generated and may be incorrect.

The fishing regulations information — including legality, size, bag, and season rules — is advisory only and may be outdated, incomplete, or wrong. Gillscan does not provide legal advice. A misidentified species may produce inapplicable or incorrect regulation guidance, so you must independently confirm both the species and the rules. You are solely responsible for confirming the current, applicable rules with the official fisheries or wildlife authority before keeping any catch. Please see our Terms of Service for the full disclaimer and limitations of liability.

13. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we do, we will revise the "Effective date" above and post the updated policy at gillscan.com/privacy. Material changes will be reflected there. Your continued use of the app after an update means you accept the revised policy.

14. Contact us

For any privacy question or request, contact us at [email protected].

This policy is published at gillscan.com/privacy and is also accessible from the app's Settings menu.