Privacy policy

The short version

• No ads, no analytics, no tracking, no third-party SDKs. We never sell your data.
• The websites count page loads. socal.keeldragger.com and the web edition count which page was loaded, when, and which site linked to it: no IP address or device details, kept for two days. The apps' chart and data downloads are not logged.
• No account needed. Your log, waypoints, routes, photos and boat details are stored on your own devices.
• iCloud sync is on by default when your device is signed in to iCloud. It goes through your own private iCloud database, and we have no access to it.
• An optional Keeldragger account adds end-to-end encrypted sync. We can't read what you sync, but we can see your email address and details about the files, such as names, sizes and dates.
• Share My Boat (Follow Me) is off until you turn it on. While it's on, your position, boat details, instrument data and the AIS your boat receives go to our servers. That stream is not end-to-end encrypted, anyone signed in to a Keeldragger account can see your boat live, and shared passages are kept for 400 days unless you delete them.
• Messages and buddies are optional and need a Keeldragger account. What you write, and any position or photo you attach, goes through our servers to the people in the conversation. It is not end-to-end encrypted, and it is kept for 400 days to deliver it.
• Location in the background is used only while an alarm is armed, a passage is being logged, or you're sharing your boat.
• You can delete your account and your shared history in the app, or ask us by email.

1.Scope

This policy covers Keeldragger Sailing SoCal on iPhone, iPad and Mac, its Apple Watch companion, and the web edition at app.socal.keeldragger.com. Together we call them "the app". "We" and "us" means Keeldragger Sailing, which makes the app.

One Keeldragger account works across Keeldragger apps (SoCal, the Offshore Toolkit, Keeldragger 3D and others). This policy describes what that account holds for SoCal and how it is handled. Other Keeldragger apps have their own policies.

This policy takes effect on 18 October 2026. The 14 October version added what other sharing boats see (section 7) and corrected which boats the live video stream features; this one adds the websites' page-load counts (section 2 and section 13).

2.Our commitments

• The app has no advertising, no analytics, no tracking and no third-party SDKs.
• It doesn't use the advertising identifier, and it never asks to track you (there is no App Tracking Transparency prompt), because it doesn't track you.
• We never sell or rent your information, and we don't share it for advertising.
• The websites, socal.keeldragger.com and the web edition at app.socal.keeldragger.com, count page loads: which page, when, and which site linked to it (that site's name only, not the page). For the web edition, a page load is its opening and the update check it makes as it opens. No IP address, browser or device details, query strings or cookies are recorded. The records are deleted after two days, and only daily totals are kept.
• The apps' chart, tile and data downloads come from the same servers, but they are filtered out before anything is written, so they are never logged; nor is anything the web edition does after it opens. Request logging is switched off for the other CloudFront distributions, API Gateway and AWS IoT. The server functions keep their own logs for 14 days, for fixing faults. The logs of an earlier Follow Me relay, retired in October 2026, are being brought to the same limit.
• Because we don't track you across sites or apps, a browser's Do Not Track signal has nothing to switch off.

3.On your device

Most of what the app knows stays on your iPhone, iPad or Mac, in the app's own storage:

• your ship's log: the track, instrument readings, and the entries you write, including any crew names you type;
• your waypoints, routes, areas, vessel record, quick cards, and raw instrument recordings;
• photos you add. The app re-encodes each one and removes its location metadata;
• AIS vessels your boat has heard. Entries you haven't favourited are pruned after 24 hours;
• notes and contact details you type about other vessels or crews;
• downloaded charts, forecasts, notices and imagery, so the app works offline.

In the web edition, your routes, waypoints, areas, vessel record, quick cards and settings are kept in the browser's local storage, and your log and photos in the browser's own database, on that computer or phone. Photos added there are re-encoded and their metadata removed too. Clearing the site's data in your browser removes all of it.

The Apple Watch companion shows what your iPhone sends it.

4.Location

The app asks to use your location "While Using the App". It uses it to show your boat on the chart, for distances, bearings and arrival times, for the alarms, and for the ship's log. Nothing happens with location until you allow it.

When the app is not on screen, it keeps using your location only while:

• an anchor, collision or instrument alarm is armed;
• a passage is being logged with "Record in the background" switched on (it is on by default, in the Log); or
• Share My Boat is sharing your passage.

On iPhone and iPad, iOS shows its location indicator while this happens. It stops when you disarm the alarm, the passage closes, or sharing stops.

Your position can also come from your boat's instrument gateway (an NMEA Wi-Fi router). The app only listens to the gateway; it never sends anything to it. The app does not read the names of Wi-Fi networks.

Your position reaches us in readable form only if you turn on Share My Boat (section 7). The tracks in your log are synced only to your own iCloud and, if you use one, to your Keeldragger account, where they are end-to-end encrypted.

The web edition uses your location only when you tap "Use my location", to set the position you're planning from.

5.iCloud

If your device is signed in to iCloud, sync through iCloud is on by default. The app tells you so at first launch, and you can turn it off in More › Settings › Account & Sync.

It syncs your waypoints, vessel record, quick cards, AIS vessel records (including your notes and contacts), routes, areas, the log and its instrument recordings, and photos. They travel through your own private iCloud database, under your Apple Account, and count against your iCloud storage. Keeldragger has no access to them. Apple's privacy policy covers iCloud.

• Shore Watch (your alarm status, ashore) uses the same private database and Apple's push notification service, and reaches only your own devices.
• The iCloud key-value store keeps your gateway address and two print settings, so they follow you between devices.
• On the web, you can sign in with your Apple Account to read (never change) what the app keeps in iCloud. That connection runs between your browser and Apple.

Turning sync off stops it. To remove what is already stored, delete the app's data in your device's iCloud storage settings. If you also use a Keeldragger account, many of the same items go to that account as well, end-to-end encrypted (section 6).

6.Keeldragger account

The account is optional. It adds sync with the web edition and other devices, and you need it to share your boat or follow another.

• Where: Amazon Web Services in the United States. Sign-in is handled by Amazon Cognito.
• What you give us: an email address and a password. Amazon Cognito emails you confirmation codes.
• Sign-in tokens are stored in your device's Keychain, or in the browser's storage on the web.

Your synced content is end-to-end encrypted

Before anything leaves your device, the app encrypts it with AES-256-GCM using a data key. That data key is itself encrypted ("wrapped") with a key derived from your sync passphrase (PBKDF2-SHA256, 600,000 iterations). Your passphrase never leaves your device, so we can't read your synced content, and we can't recover it if you forget the passphrase. Your devices keep their own copies, and you can start sync over.

What we can see

• your email address;
• the names of your synced documents (including passage IDs), their sizes, version numbers and modification times;
• how many photos you have, and their file names, which are made from the photo's content;
• the wrapped key and a key check value, neither of which can be opened without your passphrase;
• the IP address your requests come from.

How long we keep it

Your account and synced content are kept until you delete them. When a document changes, the previous version expires after 30 days. Database backups are kept for up to 35 days, and server logs for 14 days.

Deleting something in the app does not delete it from our server. It stays there, still encrypted, until you delete your account or use Start Sync Over.

On the web

After you unlock the web edition with your passphrase, the data key and your sign-in tokens are kept in that browser's local storage, and your log and photos in the browser's own database. Signing out removes the key and the sign-in. The log and photos stay in that browser until you clear the site's data, so on a shared computer, sign out and clear the site's data.

Deleting your account

In the app, More › Settings › Account & Sync › Delete Account. In the web edition, Delete account in the Account panel. This deletes every document, every previous version and every photo, including what other Keeldragger apps keep in the same account, purges your Share My Boat data (section 7), and deletes your sign-in. Copies in our database backups expire within 35 days.

7.Share My Boat (Follow Me)

Share My Boat lets other people follow your boat live. It is off unless you turn it on, in More › Settings › Share My Boat. It needs a Keeldragger account, and the app asks for your consent each time you switch it on. Once on, it stays on: every passage you log is shared until you switch it off. Nothing is sent between passages.

What it sends

• your position, course and speed;
• your boat's details: name, model, MMSI, length and beam;
• the instrument data your gateway provides, such as wind, depth, speed, heading and engine;
• the AIS targets your boat receives;
• a passage ID and a random install ID.

It travels over Amazon Web Services IoT (MQTT over TLS). It is encrypted on the way, but it is not end-to-end encrypted: our servers can read it, because they pass it on to followers and keep the archive.

Who can see it

• Anyone signed in to a Keeldragger account, and anyone can create one. Treat it as public. The lobby shows each sharing boat's name, model, MMSI, position, speed and course. A boat name or model containing a word on the short list Messages checks (section 9) isn't shown; the boat appears as "Unnamed boat".
• Followers see the full stream, including your instruments and the AIS targets you receive.
• Other boats that are sharing or following see your boat, and the AIS targets you receive, on their own charts, marked as fleet traffic and a little behind real time.
• You see how many people are following, not who they are.

Keeldragger's live video stream

We run a public live video stream on Twitch featuring a few invited boats: today Keeldragger's own and two testers' boats. Only those boats can start it. If your boat is sharing near one of them while the stream is on air, your boat may appear in it, with its name. Anyone can watch a public stream, and recordings of it may exist.

What we keep

• the raw stream, for 30 days;
• passage logs, for 400 days;
• your boat's record with its last reported position, until it is cleared;
• an AIS traffic history, kept for 730 days: the AIS targets that sharing boats receive, recorded under a random key for each boat, not under your account;
• a security log of Share My Boat sessions (the account email, the boat, and times), kept without a set expiry; email us to have your entries deleted.

Deleting what you shared

More › Settings › Share My Boat › Delete shared history erases your passage logs and removes your boat's MMSI from the AIS history (app build 265 and later). Deleting your account does the same, and also clears your boat's record if she isn't sharing at that moment. The raw 30-day files are not rewritten; they expire on their own.

8.Following a boat

To follow a boat that is sharing, you sign in to a Keeldragger account. Each connection records your account and a random install ID, and those connection records expire after 48 hours. The boat you follow sees only how many people are following, not who.

9.Messages and buddies

Messages lets you write to other boats that use the app, one to one or in a group, and connect with them as buddies. It needs a Keeldragger account, and you choose a name and accept short terms before your first message. Nothing is sent until you use it.

What it sends and keeps

• Your profile: the name you choose, the boats you pick to show with it (name, model, MMSI and Follow Me boat), and, if you add them, the VHF channels you monitor and a line about you. Never your email address.
• Your messages: their text, and a photo or your position if you attach one. Sharing your position is on by default for each message and you can switch it off before sending. A position is your boat's own: the app never sends a simulated position or one from a boat you are following.
• Delivery and read receipts: when each person in a conversation last received and read it. The others in that conversation can see yours.
• Buddies: who you are connected with, requests waiting for an answer, and who you have blocked.
• Check-ins, if you set one: when you expect to check in, your note, which buddies to tell, and, if you don't check in, your last position from your own messages or your shared boat.
• A push token for each device, so it can be told about new messages.

Adding a buddy by email

When you add a buddy by their email address, we look the address up once to send them a request, and we don't keep it. The answer is the same whether or not the address has an account, so the app never tells you who is on Keeldragger.

Who can see it

• The people in a conversation see its messages, positions and photos, and each other's profile. Someone added to a group sees what is said from then on, not what was said before.
• Your buddies, and people you send a message or a request to, see your profile.
• Everyone with a profile may receive a notice from Keeldragger in their Messages.
• Keeldragger can read messages, because they are not end-to-end encrypted. We read them only to deliver them and to act on a report. A short list of words is checked automatically, and a message containing one is not sent.
• Notifications carry the sender's name and the start of the message through Apple's push notification service to your devices. A message request from someone who isn't your buddy shows only who it is from until you open it, and can't carry a photo until you accept it.

Reports and blocking

You can report a message or an account, and block anyone. A report sends us a copy of the messages you report, and we read every report within 48 hours. We may remove a reported message and its photo, which then reads "Message deleted" for everyone in the conversation, and stop the account that sent it. Someone you block can't message you, request you or add you to a group, and isn't told.

You can also report or block a boat sharing on Follow Me, from her row in Boats › Follow or her card on the chart. A boat report sends us her name, her boat id and what you write. Blocking her blocks her owner as above and hides every boat of that account on your device; Boats › Follow lists the boats you've hidden, to unhide.

Favorites

The boats in your Favorites tab, and the names and MMSIs you gave them, sync through your account like the rest of your content: end-to-end encrypted (section 6).

Deleting

Deleting a conversation hides it on your devices; the others keep it. Deleting your account deletes your profile, buddies, requests, blocks, devices, check-ins and photos, and every message you sent. The others in a conversation then see "Message deleted" in its place.

10.Author submissions

This applies only to invited waypoint authors. While submissions are switched on for an author, the app sends that author's waypoint edits, photos and notes, with the vessel name and the author's email address, to Keeldragger for review. It sends them automatically. We keep submissions without a set expiry, and entries we publish in the guide may carry the contributing vessel's name.

11.Public data sources

The app fetches public information directly from these services:

• the National Weather Service;
• NOAA (tides, buoys, satellite imagery and chart downloads);
• the U.S. Coast Guard Navigation Center;
• the Navy's San Clemente Island schedule site;
• the Avalon mooring availability service, and the City of Avalon and Catalina Island websites (harbor maps);
• Apple Maps;
• Keeldragger's own content delivery network.

The web edition also uses NASA's and USGS's imagery services and protomaps.github.io (map fonts), and Apple's CloudKit if you choose to read your iCloud data in the browser.

These services receive your IP address and an app identifier, as any web request does, and map and imagery services see which area of the chart is being drawn. They never receive your GPS position from the app. Whale data reaches you through Keeldragger's own network, so Whale Safe receives nothing about you.

12.Service providers and legal requests

We use Amazon Web Services (in the United States) for the account, Share My Boat, Messages and our content delivery network; Apple for iCloud, push notifications and the App Store; and Twitch for the live video stream. Each handles data under its own terms. If you use the app outside the United States, your account and Share My Boat data are stored in the United States.

We share your information with no one else, except as the law requires. If we receive a valid legal demand, we could disclose what we hold: your email address, your account's metadata (the items listed in section 6), your Share My Boat data, and your messages and Messages profile. We can never disclose your end-to-end encrypted content, because we can't read it.

13.How long we keep things

What	Where	How long
On your devices
Your log, waypoints, routes, areas, photos, vessel record, cards and recordings	Your devices	Until you delete them
AIS vessels heard (not favourited)	Your devices	24 hours
Web edition data	Your browser	Until you clear the site's data
iCloud sync and Shore Watch	Your private iCloud database (Apple)	Until you delete it from iCloud
Keeldragger account
Email address and sign-in	Amazon Web Services, US	Until you delete your account
Synced content (end-to-end encrypted), including items you deleted in the app	Amazon Web Services, US	Until you delete your account or use Start Sync Over
Previous versions of synced documents	Amazon Web Services, US	30 days
Database backups	Amazon Web Services, US	Up to 35 days
Server function logs	Amazon Web Services, US	14 days (an earlier relay's logs: being set to 14 days)
Website page loads (page, time, status and linking site; no IP address or device details)	Amazon Web Services, US	2 days; daily totals kept
The apps' CDN downloads, and API access logs	Not kept	None
Share My Boat and following
Raw stream	Amazon Web Services, US	30 days
Passage logs	Amazon Web Services, US	400 days, or until you delete your shared history or your account
Your boat's record and last reported position	Amazon Web Services, US	Until it is cleared: deleting your account clears it, or email us
AIS traffic history (from sharing boats)	Amazon Web Services, US	730 days
Session security log (account email, boat, times)	Amazon Web Services, US	No set expiry; deleted on request
Follow connection records (account, install ID)	Amazon Web Services, US	48 hours
Messages and buddies
Messages, with their positions and photos	Amazon Web Services, US	400 days, or until the sender deletes their account
Your profile, buddies and blocks	Amazon Web Services, US	Until you delete your account
Buddy requests	Amazon Web Services, US	30 days, or until answered
Device push tokens	Amazon Web Services, US	120 days after the device was last used
Check-ins	Amazon Web Services, US	Until 30 days after they close
Reports, with the messages reported	Amazon Web Services, US	400 days
An email address you add a buddy by	Not kept	None
Waypoint authors
Author submissions	Keeldragger, on Amazon Web Services	No set expiry

14.Your choices and deletion

• Use the app without an account. Everything that doesn't need one works without one.
• Turn iCloud sync off in More › Settings › Account & Sync, and remove what's already stored from your device's iCloud storage settings.
• Leave Share My Boat off, or switch it off at any time in More › Settings › Share My Boat.
• Change or withdraw location permission at any time in your device's Location Services settings.
• Leave Messages unused: nothing is sent until you set up a name and write. Block or report anyone from a conversation or a request, and mute or delete a conversation from the Messages list.
• Delete your shared history in More › Settings › Share My Boat › Delete shared history.
• Delete your account in More › Settings › Account & Sync › Delete Account, or in the web edition's Account panel.
• Email us at captain@keeldragger.com to ask what we hold about you, or to have it deleted. Write from your account's email address so we can tell the request is yours.
• Your vessel's MMSI. If a sharing boat received your vessel's AIS, you can ask us to remove its MMSI from the AIS history, even if you have never used the app.

15.Children

The app is not directed at children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect personal information from them. Sharing a location through Share My Boat, and Messages, are not for children. If you believe a child has created a Keeldragger account, email us and we will delete it.

16.Security, changes and contact

Security. Everything the app sends to us travels over TLS. Synced content is end-to-end encrypted as described in section 6. Share My Boat data is protected on the way and on our servers, but it is not end-to-end encrypted. No system is perfectly secure. If we learn of a breach that affects your information, we will tell you as the law requires.

Changes. We will post any change to this policy on this page with a new effective date. If a change means the app collects or shares more, we will also say so in the app's release notes.

Contact. Questions or requests: captain@keeldragger.com. Help with the app is on the support page.