Locavia Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy applies to Locavia: Map Anim & Places(the “App”), the community travel discovery app published on Android by Nohaya (“we”, “us”, “our”; package name com.locavia.anim). It explains what data the App collects, why, where it goes, and the choices you have. The Nohaya website is covered separately by our main Privacy Policy.

1. Summary

• You sign in with an email and password, or with Google. We use your account to save your places, XP, missions and badges.
• Places you share (with their photos, video and voice notes) are public once approved, in the App and on nohaya.com.
• Your location is used on your device to show nearby places and track trips. It is only sent to our server when you add a place or look for nearby explorers.
• Journeys, travel memories, group trips and checklists stay on your phone.
• We never sell your data. The App does not show ads today; if we add them, section 8 explains how they work.
• You can delete your account and data from inside the App at any time.

2. Data We Collect

• Account. Your email address, a username, display name and home city. If you sign up with a password, we store only a secure hash of it, never the password itself. If you sign in with Google, we receive your name, email address and profile photo from Google.
• Profile. Anything you add to your profile, such as a bio or profile photo.
• Places you share. The name, description, category, tips, location (latitude, longitude, address, city) and visit date of each place you add, plus the photos, video and voice recording you attach.
• Activity. Your upvotes and ratings, the people you follow and who follow you, missions you complete, XP, level, badges and streaks.
• Requests. Details you enter when you request a trip plan or a local guide, or book a guide: places, dates, group size, budget, transport and notes.
• Technical data. Like any web service, our hosting provider records the IP address, time and type of each request to our server in standard logs, which we use only for security and troubleshooting.

We do not collect your contacts, call logs, SMS or data from other apps.

3. Device Permissions

• Location (precise and approximate, only while you are using the App): to show where you are on the map, find places and explorers near you, tag a place you add, and record the route of a trip you are tracking. The App does not use your location in the background.
• Camera: to take photos and videos of a place you are adding, or for your profile.
• Microphone: to record a voice note about a place, only while you are recording.
• Photos and videos: only the items you pick in Android's photo picker are read. When you create a travel memory from photos, the App reads the date and location saved inside those photos on your device to place them on your route.
• Notifications: to remind you about trips, missions and activity. These are created on your device.
• Storage (older Android versions only): to save travel memory videos and images you export to your gallery.

Journey videos are created on your phone from your route and saved to your gallery. They are not uploaded unless you choose to share them.

You can turn any permission off in Android settings. The features that need it will then stop working.

4. How We Use Your Data

• To create and secure your account and keep you signed in.
• To show places, maps, directions, weather and nearby explorers.
• To review places you submit, publish them, and credit you with XP and badges.
• To run missions, leaderboards, follows and notifications.
• To answer trip plan and guide requests and handle guide bookings.
• To provide support and to protect the service against abuse, fraud and spam.

We do not sell your data.

5. What Is Public

Locavia is a community app. When a place you shared is approved, its details, photos, video and voice note are visible to everyone in the App and on public pages at nohaya.com, which search engines can index. Your username, display name, profile photo, level and contribution stats are shown with your places, on your profile and on leaderboards. Don't include anything in a place, photo or voice note that you don't want to be public, such as other people's faces or personal details.

6. Data Stored Only on Your Device

Trips you track, travel memories, drafts, saved places, trip essentials checklists, and group trips (including any UPI ID you enter for splitting costs) are stored on your phone and are not uploaded to our server. Your sign-in token is kept in encrypted storage. Uninstalling the App or clearing its data removes all of this from your phone.

7. AI Processing

To write trip plans and travel guides for nohaya.com, our team sends the published details of approved places (name, description, tips, category and location) to OpenAI. No account details, email addresses or voice recordings are sent. Under OpenAI's API terms, this data is not used to train OpenAI's models. See OpenAI's Privacy Policy.

8. Advertising

The current version of the App does not show ads. A future version may show ads from Google AdMob. We will update this policy before that happens. When ads are shown:

• AdMob may collect your device's advertising ID, IP address, approximate location, device information and ad interactions to serve, personalise and measure ads. See how Google uses information from apps that use its services.
• If you are in a region that requires it, such as the EEA or UK, we will ask for your consent before personalised ads are shown, and you can change your choice later in the App.
• You can reset your advertising ID or opt out of personalised ads at any time in Android settings (Settings → Privacy → Ads).
• We do not share your account details, places or voice notes with advertisers.

9. Service Providers

• Amazon Web Services: hosts our server, database and media storage (Mumbai region).
• Mapbox: maps, place search and directions. The Mapbox SDK may collect anonymous usage and location data to improve its maps. See Mapbox's Privacy Policy.
• OpenFreeMap: map tiles for trip routes and travel memories.
• Open-Meteo: weather and elevation for a location. Only the coordinates are sent.
• Google: Google Sign-In, and fonts. See Google's Privacy Policy.
• OpenAI: writing trip plans from published places, as described in section 7.
• Google AdMob: only if and when ads are added, as described in section 8.

These providers process data only to provide their service to us. We may also disclose data if required by law or a valid legal request, or to protect the safety of our users. Otherwise we do not share your data with anyone. Your data may be processed outside your country, including in India and the United States. We rely on our providers' safeguards for such transfers.

10. Retention and Deletion

• We keep your account data for as long as your account exists.
• Notifications are deleted automatically after 90 days.
• To delete your account and data, open the App → Profile → Delete Account, type DELETE and confirm. It takes effect immediately. You can also request it by email by following the steps at nohaya.com/locavia/delete.
• When your account is deleted, places you shared that are already published stay on the map without your name, so other travellers can still find them. Your voice recordings are removed from them. The deletion page lists exactly what is deleted and kept.
• Server logs are deleted automatically within 30 days.

11. Your Rights

You can see and correct your profile in the App, and delete your account at any time. Depending on where you live, including under India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and the EU/UK GDPR, you may also have the right to ask for a copy of the data we hold about you, to have it corrected or erased, to withdraw consent, and to complain to a data protection authority. Email us with your request and we will respond within 30 days. To remove a specific published place, photo or voice note without deleting your account, email us with a link to it.

12. Security

All traffic between the App, our server and our providers is encrypted with HTTPS/TLS. Passwords are stored only as salted hashes, your sign-in token is kept in encrypted storage on your phone, and our database and storage are access-controlled and encrypted at rest by AWS. No system is 100% secure, so please use a strong, unique password.

13. Children

Locavia is intended for users aged 18 and over. We do not knowingly collect data from children. If you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.

14. Changes to This Policy

When we update this policy we change the “Last updated” date above. For significant changes, such as adding ads, we will also tell you in the App. Continuing to use the App after a change means you accept the updated policy.

15. Contact and Grievances

Questions, requests or complaints about your data: nohayasite@gmail.com. Please send it from your Locavia account email, or include your username, so we can find your account.