BanditKin Privacy Policy
BanditKin is a private, end-to-end-encrypted location-sharing app — for families, teams, and any group that needs to stay together. It is built so that we cannot read your circle's locations or messages even if we wanted to — that is the product.
What the app collects, and who can read it
End-to-end encrypted (only your circle's devices can decrypt; our server stores ciphertext it cannot read):
- Your location (position, accuracy, speed, heading) and location history
- Text messages and voice messages
- Place names and boundaries (e.g. "Home", "School") and arrive/leave alerts
- SOS and check-in contents
The encryption key is created on your phone and shared between paired devices by scanning a QR code in person. It is never sent to our server.
Visible to the server (operational metadata):
- That a device belongs to a circle (random device and group identifiers — no ad IDs, no account names required)
- Timestamps and sizes of encrypted payloads
- Battery level, charging state, online/offline status, and app-health flags
- That an alert fired (but not where, or what it says)
We use this metadata only to run the service (delivering encrypted payloads to your circle, showing online status and battery). We do not sell or share any data with third parties. There are no ads and no third-party analytics SDKs in the app.
Background location
To keep your circle updated on your location, BanditKin reads your device location even when the app is closed or not in use and shares it with the members you paired with. Your location is end-to-end encrypted on your device before it leaves — only your circle's paired devices can read it; BanditKin's servers store only ciphertext they cannot decrypt. This data is never used for ads or shared with third parties. You can stop sharing at any time (pause sharing in the app, revoke the location permission, or remove the device from the circle).
Offline maps
Map tiles are downloaded once as an offline pack and rendered entirely on your device. After the pack download, viewing the map sends no network requests — where you look at the map is never transmitted anywhere.
Data retention and deletion
Location history is kept for the app's history window and then discarded. Removing a device from a circle deletes its data from the relay, and removing a member rotates the circle's encryption key on the remaining devices. You can also self-host the relay, in which case all data (including metadata) lives on hardware you control.
Children
BanditKin is intended to be set up and managed by an adult.
Contact
Questions: privacy@banditkin.com
We will update this policy as the product evolves; material changes will be noted in the app's release notes.