Animal Vision: Live Camera — Privacy Policy

In short

• Camera frames are processed on your device and are never uploaded automatically. A snapshot is saved only when you tap Save and leaves the app only when you tap Share or Save to Photos. A switch in Settings, Save to Photos automatically, is off unless you turn it on; with it on, Save adds a picture to Photos too, and a clip is never added automatically. From version 0.5.0, a short silent clip is rendered on your device from what the lens shows; temporary files are deleted. A clip, too, is saved only when you tap Save and leaves the app only when you tap Share.
• From version 0.5.0 you can also pick one photo with the system photo picker and see it through a lens. The app never sees the rest of your library, and Save to Photos only adds pictures to it. Nothing the app saves or shares carries a watermark.
• There are no accounts and no sign-in, and the app sends no analytics or crash reports of its own.
• The only third parties are Google Mobile Ads (AdMob) for ads, RevenueCat for the Pro purchase, and Google Play or the App Store for payment and the rating dialog.
• From version 0.4.0, ads are limited to content rated for general audiences. Pro removes every ad and every daily limit.

Camera

Animal Vision uses the back or the front camera to show its live animal-vision lenses. Each frame is rendered on your device, drawn to the screen and discarded; frames live only in camera and graphics memory while they are on screen. About every eighth frame the app measures the scene's average brightness so a lens can adapt to the light. That number is used at once and is not stored or sent anywhere.

The app does not record audio and does not request the microphone. It has no location permission and never reads GPS.

Pictures and clips

A snapshot is a rendered still image. From version 0.5.0 the app can also make a clip, a short silent video of up to three seconds that you make by holding the shutter. The app renders it on your device from what the lens shows: while you hold, it takes a burst of rendered snapshots into a temporary folder in the app's cache, and when you let go it turns them into an MP4 file with the device's own video encoder and deletes the snapshots. A clip has no sound.

While you review a snapshot or a clip, a temporary draft may exist in the app's cache; Save moves it to the app's own storage. If an interruption leaves a draft or a temporary clip file behind, the app removes stale drafts at a later start and every leftover clip file at the next app start, and the operating system may also clear the cache. Sharing happens only when you choose Share, through the system share sheet, to the destination you pick. The only other way a picture leaves the app is Save to Photos, described below. A picture made with Compare can be written out as before/after, 1:1 or 9:16 before you share or add it. Those files are made on your device in the app's cache, deleted when you leave the result, and any left behind are deleted at the next app start. My captures keeps the picture as the camera made it.

Nothing the app saves or shares carries a watermark.

Your photos

From version 0.5.0 the Photo option in the More menu lets you see a picture from your library through a lens. It opens the system's own photo picker, on iPhone, iPad and Android alike. You choose one picture, and the app receives only that picture, as a temporary copy in its cache. The app never sees, lists or browses the rest of your library, and it does not ask for permission to read it. A picked photo stays on your device. The app uses only the photo's pixels and its orientation, so the pictures and before-and-after cards it makes carry no location or camera details from the original.

The lens picture you see is written to the app's cache while you are in Photo and is deleted when you leave it. A before-and-after card is written to the cache for the share sheet and deleted once it has been shared. The app deletes the copy of the picked photo as soon as it has read it, or at the next start if the app was closed first.

Save to Photos, offered for pictures in Photo and on the capture result, adds a copy of a picture to your device's photo library. On iPhone and iPad the app asks only for permission to add (“Add to Photos”), never to read what is in Photos. On Android it is available on Android 13 and newer and adds the copy to your gallery; the app asks for no photo or storage permission. The copy in your library belongs to your device's Photos or gallery app, and the app cannot delete it.

Save to Photos automatically is a switch in Settings, offered where Save to Photos is, and it is off unless you turn it on. On iPhone and iPad the permission question comes when you turn it on or, if you never do, the first time you choose Save to Photos; on Android there is no question. With the switch on, choosing Save also adds a copy of the picture to your photo library, in the shape you chose on the result (Photo, before/after, 1:1 or 9:16). A clip is never added automatically.

Colour checks

When you use a colour check (version 0.4.0 and later), the app reads the colour inside the on-screen circle from the current frame, or, from version 0.5.0, from a photo you picked, and compares it on your device with the colour vision of the animal you chose. No image is kept for a check, and a saved check keeps only its colours and the animal. When you share a check as a card, the card image is written to the app's cache for the share sheet, and each new card replaces the previous one.

Purchase

Animal Vision Pro is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. Google Play (on Android) or the App Store (on iPhone and iPad) processes the payment; the app never sees your card details, billing address or store account credentials. RevenueCat, Inc. validates the purchase and tells the app whether Pro is active, under RevenueCat's privacy policy. Restore purchase asks the store and RevenueCat again which purchases belong to your store account, so Pro can come back on a new device.

The app does not identify you to RevenueCat. RevenueCat creates a random anonymous app-user identifier for the installation. Because the app checks whether Pro is active each time it starts, an anonymous RevenueCat record exists even if you never buy anything. Through those requests RevenueCat receives, and may log, that identifier, product and entitlement identifiers, the state of any purchase, basic device and platform information, and the IP address of the request. The app never sends RevenueCat your name, email address, phone number or advertising identifier.

Ads

Eight lenses are permanently free: Human, Dog, Cat, Horse, Snake, Deer, Rabbit and Mouse (before version 0.4.0, Cow was free instead of Snake). From version 0.5.0, each locked lens plays free for five seconds once per device-local calendar day and then shows an offer; before version 0.5.0, opening a locked lens played it free for five seconds every time. A rewarded ad starts only after you choose to watch it, and it earns one of two things. Watched to the end, it unlocks that lens for 60 seconds, with at most ten such previews per device-local calendar day (eight before version 0.5.0). Or, from version 0.5.0, it adds more colour checks, with at most three such ads per day, counted separately from the lens previews. Free users also see one full-screen ad about every fifth lens change, including changes between free lenses. It is about, not exactly: an ad that falls due when a locked lens, an offer or a sheet is on screen is skipped and not kept for a later change, so there is never more than one full-screen ad in five lens changes. Animal Vision Pro users see no ads. There are no banner ads and no app-open ads.

The colour checks are free in small amounts. From version 0.5.0, each device-local calendar day gives three toy or trainer checks on the Dog and Cat lenses and one gear check on the Deer lens. After those, you can choose to watch a rewarded ad for three more toy or trainer checks or for one more gear check, or get Pro, which has no limit. Between version 0.4.0 and version 0.5.0, later gear checks showed their result for ten seconds before offering Pro, with no ad. Saving a check, the Saved checks screen and the share card are never limited. The client demo (Show a client, for trainers and vets) is free to try once per installation; after that it needs Pro.

From version 0.4.0, every ad request is limited to content Google rates as suitable for general audiences.

From version 0.5.0 the consent questions come once, at the start. On first launch, after you finish the introduction, the app asks for camera access. If you do not own Animal Vision Pro, it then starts Google's consent check and the Google Mobile Ads SDK: it shows Google's consent message where Google requires one and, on iPhone and iPad, Apple's tracking prompt. They do not come while you change lenses, and Pro owners are not asked for ad consent. Before version 0.5.0, this check started at the first lens change, or when you chose a rewarded ad. Google's library may also do some work when the app starts.

When an ad is requested or shown, Google Mobile Ads may process your device's advertising identifier and other device and app identifiers, your IP address and an approximate location Google infers from it (the app has no location permission and never reads GPS), device and diagnostic information such as model, operating-system version, language and network type, your consent choices, and ad interactions. Google uses this under Google's privacy policy; see also how Google uses information from apps that use its services.

Before requesting an ad, the app refreshes your consent status with Google's User Messaging Platform. If Google reports that ads may not be requested, none is. On iPhone and iPad, the consent message is followed by Apple's App Tracking Transparency prompt; Google receives the advertising identifier (IDFA) only if you allow tracking, and you can change that at any time in Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking. On Android you can reset or delete the advertising ID in your device's Google or Privacy settings under Ads. Where Google requires it, a Privacy choices button in the app's Privacy screen reopens Google's consent form.

Rating prompt

From version 0.4.0 the app may ask Google Play or the App Store to show its standard rating dialog, at most once in 90 days and never in the first session. The store decides whether the dialog appears, and a rating or review you leave goes to the store, not to us. To time the request, the app notes in memory, for the current run only, when an ad or the Pro offer last closed, and whether you have just saved or shared something.

Kept on your device

The app keeps a small amount of state in its own private storage. None of it is sent anywhere, and all of it is removed when you delete the app or clear its data.

If device backup is on (Android backup, or an iCloud or computer backup on iPhone and iPad), saved snapshots, clips and this state may be included in that backup under Google's or Apple's terms.

What the app does not do

• Upload camera frames, photos, video or audio automatically.
• Send analytics, telemetry, crash reports or A/B-test data to any provider; there is no Firebase, Google Analytics, Crashlytics, Sentry or similar service in the app.
• Create accounts or ask for your name, email address or phone number.
• Request location, microphone, contacts, calendar or file permissions, or ask to read your photo library. On iPhone and iPad, Save to Photos asks only to add to it.
• Sell or rent personal information, or send marketing email or push notifications.

Permissions

On Android the only permission you are asked for is the camera. The app asks for no photo or storage permission: the photo picker is the system's own, and Save to Photos (Android 13 and newer) needs none. Android grants the other permissions the app declares without asking, for example internet and network-state access, Google Play Billing, vibration for haptics, and the advertising-ID and Privacy Sandbox advertising permissions that the Google Mobile Ads SDK needs, plus a few that the libraries it uses add (such as wake lock). None of them gives the app access to your location, microphone, contacts, photos or files. The exact list for a release is the permissions list in its Android manifest. On iPhone and iPad it asks for the camera, for permission to add pictures to Photos (add-only, so it cannot read your library), and, through Google's consent flow, for tracking permission. The Photos question is asked when you turn on Save to Photos automatically or first choose Save to Photos, not at launch. On neither platform does it ask for the microphone.

Links to other sites

Lens information and the methodology screen link to published scientific sources, and the purchase screen links to the store's terms. The scientific text is bundled with the app and works offline; only opening a link leaves the app, and the site you open applies its own policy.

How long data is kept

• Camera frames: not kept. Drafts, lens pictures, share cards and the 1:1, 9:16 and before/after files stay in the app cache only as described above. The copy of a photo you picked is deleted as soon as the app has read it, or at the next start if the app was closed first.
• Pictures you add with Save to Photos: in your device's photo library until you delete them there. The app cannot delete them.
• On-device data: until you delete the app, clear its data, or delete a capture or saved check. The cached Pro flag expires after 72 hours; the preview, free-look and check counters reset each local day, and the client-demo flag stays until you delete the app.
• RevenueCat purchase and entitlement records: while the purchase is valid, so Pro can be restored on a new device, and otherwise under RevenueCat's retention practices.
• Google Play and App Store purchase records: kept by Google or Apple under their own policies and payment, tax and fraud-prevention law. We cannot delete these.
• Google Mobile Ads data: kept by Google under its own policies and controlled through the consent and device settings above.

Request data deletion

The app has no accounts and no remote store of camera media. To remove everything kept on your device, delete the app, or on Android clear its data in Settings → Apps → Animal Vision → Storage. Pictures you added to Photos with Save to Photos are in your photo library, so delete them there. To control advertising data, use the in-app Privacy choices button where it appears, and your device's advertising or tracking settings.

To delete the anonymous purchase and entitlement record linked to your installation, email theflapsylab@gmail.com with the subject “Animal Vision data deletion request.” Because the record is anonymous, include your Google Play order number or your App Store order ID from the purchase receipt so we can find it. We answer within 30 days and will tell you plainly if we cannot find a record. Deleting it removes the history that lets Pro be restored to a new install; it does not cancel or refund the purchase, and it does not remove Google's or Apple's own transaction records.

Children

Animal Vision is not directed to children. Its Google Play target audience is 13 and over, it is not in Google Play's Families programme or the App Store's Kids category, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child under 13 created a purchase record, email us and we will delete it.

Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete or restrict the processing of your personal information, or to object to it. The app holds no account and no identifiable profile, so the things we can act on are the deletion routes above and your advertising choices. For data held by Google, Apple or RevenueCat, use their own privacy controls.

Simulated spectra

Some lenses show false-colour ultraviolet, polarisation and thermal effects. They are simulations computed from the ordinary camera image, not sensor measurements, and they transmit nothing.

Changes to this policy

When this policy changes, the new version is published at this address with a new date. Changes to what the app collects are also reflected in the Google Play Data safety section and the App Store privacy details.