Active Captain, RIP? Life Support?

[barcoMeCasa]

Originally Posted by Leadfree

There is a big difference between having a look at another boat right in your view and tracking them throughout their travels. I find that aspect completely unacceptable.

Again down to you, I find it extremely useful for passage planning if someone has their travels in a potential new area recorded, useful to see what anchorages they went to, sometimes there will be a link to a writeup on blog site of a particular location. Or I can message the cruisers with any specific or general questions. And just interesting to see where someone has been.

Completely down to you if you think that's good or bad. You don't have to.

[Leadfree]

Contrast NFL with Zulu Waterways. Above is a screenshot from the ZW offering at the App Store at Apple. NO DATA GATHERED. So far, IMO ZW is winning.

[CaptTom]

Originally Posted by Leadfree

If you think about it, tracking is not 'mostly harmless.' Any bad actors can track you just as easily as your friends can. There is a big difference between having a look at another boat right in your view and tracking them throughout their travels. I find that aspect completely unacceptable.

And before someone chimes in with 'but AIS!' You can turn AIS off, although as is my option, I do not transmit AIS info, either.

I see your point. I do happen to transmit AIS, although I certainly retain the option to turn it off if I'm somewhere I'd feel uncomfortable transmitting.

And, at least on my Android devices, I'm am prompted to decide when to allow an app permissions (like using GPS, or data.) The choices include always, never or just when the app is open. So, unless there's a feature I am unaware of, I still have the option to turn it off.

Of course, once I've allowed my position to be published on their app and web page, I wouldn't expect it to be deleted. Could that be what the clause you mention be talking about?

[Leadfree]

Originally Posted by CaptTom

Could that be what the clause you mention be talking about?

I don't know nor will I experiment to find out. Apple does have options to turn off things similar to what you mention above, but the only way to know for sure is to take a risk I'm not interested in taking. The disclaimer's wording indicates to me that as long as the app is installed, it is tracking you.

My reason for posting what I have is to offer a warning bc I'm sure that plenty folks don't realize how much they are being tracked. What is the saying? 'If something is free, then it's you they're selling' or some such. And since NFL feels the need to offer not one but two disclaimers, I'm backing away...

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Leadfree

First I've heard of it, thank you. But possibly not popular bc it's online only?

[fxykty]

Originally Posted by Leadfree

The statement from NFL is quite clear, sir. If one downloads the NFL app, they WILL be tracked, whether app is in use or not.

You can use NFL without putting your boat on the map. You won’t be able to post content, but that’s up to you. And if you do put your boat on the map, you can put it in a location of your choice and never update that location. There is no automatic updating of the boat location unless you set it up to do that.

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by fxykty

You can use NFL without putting your boat on the map. You won’t be able to post content, but that’s up to you. And if you do put your boat on the map, you can put it in a location of your choice and never update that location. There is no automatic updating of the boat location unless you set it up to do that.

That actually makes sense. Since this is a PHONE app (as opposed to a chartplotter or maybe even a SPOT), there is no way for the app to know where you boat is (it only knows where you are, or more precisely, where you phone is). Tracking your phone is kind of pointless (unless they are making money off that somehow, perhaps to advertisers?). But a boating app showing the world your location while you sit in your office on Tuesday afternoon isn't going to be very interesting.


It still leaves open the idea that NFL has your location and can do "something" with it, but it pretty much makes it unlikely that a bad person can use it to figure out where you boat is.

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by GordMay

I wonder why the “World Cruising and Sailing Wiki” free online world cruising guide never gained traction, with [at least] CF members, nor others?
➥ https://www.cruiserswiki.org/wiki/Wo...d_Sailing_Wiki

Dunno, but the main Chile page has had over 250,000 views. Mind you it is currently rendered almost unusable by the masses of Temu ads.

It is possible to download pages as PDFs for offline reference.

[steve.neal]

Originally Posted by Leadfree

I don't know nor will I experiment to find out. Apple does have options to turn off things similar to what you mention above, but the only way to know for sure is to take a risk I'm not interested in taking. The disclaimer's wording indicates to me that as long as the app is installed, it is tracking you.

My reason for posting what I have is to offer a warning bc I'm sure that plenty folks don't realize how much they are being tracked. What is the saying? 'If something is free, then it's you they're selling' or some such. And since NFL feels the need to offer not one but two disclaimers, I'm backing away...

Hi - as the developer of noforeignand, I think I should speak up in our defence here as this topic seems to have got out of hand.

My wife and I have been buidling NFL for the past 7-8 years and have no interest in gathering users' personal data.

The clause in our T&C regarding location access is a requirement by both Google Play and Apple App Store because our app can use the location services in your phone to record your boat track. Without this clause, we would not be able to publish our app on the above platforms. If you do not share your boat locatoin, then we do not store any location data for your account.

The only personal data we record is what you see in the app: Your name and email address, and boat deatails if you choose to register one.

Most importantly, we do not share any of your personal data with third parties.

Note that we are full time liveaboard cruisers ourselves. We initially built NFL to help a small group of sailing friends stay in touch and share destination information. It's now grown beyond anything we ever imagined and we're very proud of it.

We apologise if the wording in the T&C caused any concern but as mentioned above the phrasing used was very precisely required by Google and Apple in order to publish on Google Play and the App Store.

I hope that clears up any concern.

Steve & Helena.