Privacy Policy — Homebird

Last updated: 5 November 2026

1. Introduction

This privacy policy explains how Homebird (the "app"), for iPhone and Android, handles personal data. Homebird shows the time at home and, if you allow location, how far you are from home in home-screen widgets, and shows your home with the pet and people who wait there. You can set up more than one home, each with its own household.

Homebird has no server of its own and no ads. It has no usage analytics; crash reports only. It asks for no email address or password, and it relies on the outside services named in this policy. In short:

Your household stays with you. Your homes, and the names, looks and photos you give the pet and the people at each home, are stored only on your phone.
Your position is measured on your phone. The distance from home is calculated on the device, and we do not receive your position.
Some features contact outside services. Choosing a home on the map loads map tiles and can look up an address. Weather at home, which is on until you turn it off in Settings, sends the city of each of your homes to MET Norway (see sections 4 and 9).
Starting the app contacts outside services. The app creates an anonymous identifier, runs a security check and a version check with Google (Firebase) and asks RevenueCat about Plus. Crash reports reach us through Firebase.
Buying Homebird Plus goes through the App Store or Google Play.

The terms of use that apply to the app are in the app and at https://homebird.morrowline.app/. Users in Türkiye also have a separate information notice under Law no. 6698 (see section 16).

2. Who we are

The controller responsible for this policy is Seyfi Can Zeyrek, an individual developer in Türkiye trading under the brand Morrowline Apps, of Esenyali Mahallesi 52/75 Sk. Izmir/Türkiye. You can reach us through our support page, https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/. We have not appointed a data protection officer.

3. Scope

This policy applies to the Homebird app, its home-screen widgets, its notifications and, on iPhone, its Live Activity. It does not cover the App Store, Google Play, your operating system, your phone's location services or the services named in section 9, which have their own policies. Some screens in the app give extra information at the moment a feature is used.

4. Data we collect

We do not run a server of our own. Most of what the app handles stays on your phone or goes straight from your phone to an outside service. The only data we can see is what reaches our accounts at Firebase and RevenueCat: the anonymous identifier, crash reports and purchase records. This section tells you what the app handles and what reaches outside services.

Data that goes to outside services when the app starts or crashes

Anonymous identifier. The app creates an anonymous account identifier when you first open it; it is not tied to your name. Firebase creates it, together with a random device identifier for this installation of the app. RevenueCat receives the anonymous identifier too.
Security and version checks. At the start the app proves to Firebase that it is a genuine copy, with App Attest or DeviceCheck on iPhone and Play Integrity on Android, and reads the minimum app version from Firebase (an up-to-date result is reused for up to 12 hours). The app does not open without these checks.
Crash data and diagnostics. If the app crashes or a startup check fails, a report with technical details and your anonymous identifier goes to Firebase Crashlytics, and we can read it. The details are the error, where it happened in the code, and performance and device data such as the phone model, operating system and app version.
Purchase status. The App Store or Google Play handles the payment, RevenueCat keeps the purchase record, and the app asks RevenueCat whether you own Plus when it starts. RevenueCat also receives your IP address and basic device information at each start, whether or not you buy Plus.

Data that goes to outside services when you use a feature

Search queries. When you search for a place while choosing a home, the text you type goes to your phone's address lookup service. This is optional: you can move the map instead.
Precise location. When you place the map pin, or when the map first centres on your position, the position of the pin is sent to the address lookup service to show an address. This is optional; the address is only a label.
Approximate location. The home-selection map loads map tiles for the area you are viewing from OpenFreeMap. The request shows the part of the map you look at and your IP address. If you allowed location, the map can open around where you are, so those tiles then show that area.
Home cities for the weather. While Weather at home is on, the app sends the coordinates of the city of each of your homes, rounded to two decimals, to MET Norway, and your IP address reaches MET Norway with the request; MET Norway's terms say it stores both in its logs. Your device's position and the exact map pins are not sent for the weather. The switch is on until you turn it off in Settings; off means no requests. The app asks when it starts, when you return to it and when you change a city, only while it is on screen, with one request per city and at most once every 30 minutes for the same city. A home that is locked because Plus is not active gets no weather requests. The request carries only those coordinates and the app's name, version and App Store link.

When you search for your home or place the map pin, the text you type or the position of the pin is sent to your phone's address lookup service (Apple on iPhone, Google on Android), and the map tiles for the area you are viewing are loaded from OpenFreeMap.

Data that stays on your device

Your homes. Up to five homes, each with the name you give it, its city, its map pin and its own household. A new home starts as a copy of your main home's household, which you can then change.
Name or nickname. The names you give the people at each home.
Photos. A photo you pick for a person or the pet. The app saves a cropped square copy in its own private storage. A photo you pick for a share card is held in memory only to make that card, and the app does not save it.
Other content you create. House style, pet type and breed and how the people look, for each home; widget look and which home each widget shows; your home city and other clocks, the dates you left and go back, what you miss, your suitcase lists, the holidays and reminders you pick, including how often you want to be reminded to call, write or send a photo home, your latest quiz result and bingo ticks, and your other choices in the app.
The app's own notes. Small notes the app keeps for its own use: how many times you opened your home, which prompts and tips you have seen, when you put off the question about location, the location permission it last saw, and dated changes in how many items your suitcase lists hold.
Birthdays. The birthdays you add for the people at home (month and day).
Small things log. The small things you tick off at home, such as a call, when you did them and the memory wall they fill.
Stored weather. The latest forecast for each of your homes' cities, kept so the app does not ask again too soon.
Precise location. Your homes' map pins and your live position. Your position is read on your device to work out how far you are from home, and it is not sent to us. A reading taken just for the home screen is kept in memory only, while the app runs. A widget set to one of your other homes works out its distance on your phone from the last position the app read; no extra reading is taken for it.
Purchase status. RevenueCat's component keeps the latest answer about Plus on your device, so the app knows it when you are offline.
A short troubleshooting log of widget and alert activity, kept on the device.

What we do not collect

The app does not ask for your email address or phone number, and the names you enter stay on your phone. It does not use the camera, microphone, contacts or calendar, and it has no usage-analytics or advertising component.

Giving the app location access is optional. Without it the distance on the home screen and the widget and the arrival note do not work; the rest of the app does.

5. How we collect data

You provide: the names, photos, choices, dates, lists and search text you enter, the homes you add, their names and cities, and the pins you place on the map.
Collected automatically on your device: your position from the phone's location services, used for the distance, the arrival note and opening the home-selection map around where you are.
Created automatically with outside services: the anonymous identifier, the device identifier, the security check result and crash reports, through Firebase.
Sources outside the app: the App Store or Google Play confirms a purchase and RevenueCat tells the app whether you own Plus. The address lookup returns an address label for the position you chose. MET Norway returns the forecast for your homes' cities.

6. How we use data

The data above is used to:

provide the features you use: the time at home, the distance from home, the widgets, the Live Activity, your homes and the home view with your pet and people, the note when you arrive home and the reminders you turn on;
let you choose your homes on a map, with an address label;
show the real weather in your homes' cities, while Weather at home is on;
keep the app working and protected: check that it is a genuine, supported copy, and find and fix crashes;
unlock Homebird Plus after a purchase. Homebird Plus is a one-time purchase and does not renew.

We do not use data for advertising, profiling or usage analytics, and we do not sell it. Crash reports are used only to find and fix crashes.

7. Legal bases

Where the GDPR or UK GDPR applies, the legal basis is the contract with you: we need to handle the data to provide the app and the features you ask for (article 6(1)(b)). When you use search or place the pin, you ask for that lookup yourself. Reading your location depends on the permission you give in the system prompt, which you can withdraw at any time in system settings (section 8). Weather at home, the anonymous identifier and the purchase record are also part of providing the app. For crash reports and the security and version checks, the legal basis is our legitimate interests in keeping the app stable, protected from abuse and up to date (article 6(1)(f)); you can object by contacting us (section 20). We do not rely on consent for any other processing. Under KVKK article 5/2-c, the processing is necessary for the performance of a contract; for crash reports and the security and version checks we rely on legitimate interests under article 5/2-f.

8. Device permissions

You can refuse or revoke any permission in your system settings. The app keeps working without them, with the limits noted below.

Location while the app is open

Why we ask: to show how far you are from home and to place your homes on the map. A card on the home screen can offer this; the system prompt appears only after you say yes. If you choose Not now the card can come back after 14 days, and after two times it stops. What we do not do: use it for advertising, sell it, or send your position to us; the pin position can be sent to the address lookup service (section 4), and neither your position nor the pin is used for the weather. Stored or sent: your homes' map pins are stored on your device. When the app has no recent distance, the home screen takes one reading and works out the distance on your phone, against your main home's map pin or, without a pin, its city's centre. It also takes one reading right after you grant location access, to show you the distance. These readings stay in memory while the app runs; they are not saved or sent. The widget's refresh button takes one reading when you tap it, and on iPhone the widget also tries one when iOS reloads it, if iOS lets widgets use location; the result updates the distance stored on your device. Widgets set to your other homes measure from the same last reading, on your phone. How to turn it off: on iPhone, Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > Homebird; on Android, Settings > Apps > Homebird > Permissions > Location. On Android you may choose precise or approximate location.

Location all the time

Why we ask: the app collects your location in the background to keep the distance on your widget and trip-day card fresh and to tell you when you arrive home, even when the app is closed or not in use. This runs only around a trip home you have set, or if you live within 50 km of your main home. The app relies on the operating system's region monitoring around your main home and on position checks while you are away from home; on Android a background job runs about every 30 minutes during those periods. On Android the app shows you this explanation and asks you to agree before the system prompt. What we do not do: use it for ads or send it to us. This background position is not sent to any outside service. Stored or sent: the last reading and the last distance are stored on your device. How to turn it off: on iPhone, choose "While Using the App" in the Homebird location settings; on Android, Settings > Apps > Homebird > Permissions > Location and choose "Allow only while using the app". Android also shows a minimal-priority notification while it checks your position for a widget refresh.

Notifications

Why we ask: to tell you when you arrive home, to show the trip-day card on Android, and for the reminders you turn on: the trip reminders and the daily or weekly reminders to call, write or send a photo home. The app asks when you turn one on. These reminders only remind you: the app calls, writes and sends nothing. What we do not do: send marketing or ads. Stored or sent: the notifications are created on your phone. A reminder can show the first person at home by name, your home city and its time, and anyone who sees your screen can read them. How to turn it off: system settings > Notifications > Homebird; the reminders to call, write and send a photo can also be turned off in the app's Settings.

Photos

Why we ask: on iPhone, to let you pick one photo for a person, the pet or a share card. On Android the system photo picker is used. What we do not do: browse your library or read photos you did not pick. Stored or sent: a cropped square copy is stored in the app's private storage and is not sent anywhere. How to turn it off: on iPhone, Settings > Privacy & Security > Photos > Homebird. Removing the person or pet in the app deletes the photo.

Saving a card to your photos

Why we ask: on iPhone, if you choose Save Image in the system share sheet for a card, iOS can ask for this permission so that the card is added to your photos. It is used only then. What we do not do: write to your library ourselves, read your library through this permission, or upload anything. Stored or sent: iOS adds the card, with any photo you put on it, to your photo library, and it stays there until you delete it; Delete my data does not remove it. The app sends the card nowhere and keeps no copy: the finished card exists only as a temporary file while the share sheet is open. How to turn it off: on iPhone, Settings > Privacy & Security > Photos > Homebird.

Camera

The iPhone app declares a purpose text for the camera, but Homebird does not open the camera: the photos it uses come only from your photo library or Android's photo picker. You can check or refuse camera access in Settings > Privacy & Security > Camera.

Battery settings (Android)

The app needs no battery permission. It can open Android's battery settings so that you can choose whether Homebird may run in the background: Settings > Apps > Homebird > Battery.

Widgets and Live Activity

Homebird has three home-screen widgets: Distance, Time & weather and Days left. You choose which of your homes each widget shows (on iPhone with Edit widget, on Android in the widget's settings); a home that is locked without Plus shows a locked face. The Distance widget shows how far you are from that home, the Time & weather widget the time and weather in its city, and the Days left widget the days until a trip; they can show the home's name and city and that home's house, pet and people. The home-screen widgets and the Live Activity can show the time and weather at home, the days until a trip, the distance from home, the name of the home and your house, pet and people as pictures to anyone who can see your screen. The Days left widget and the Live Activity can also show a short line naming the pet or people waiting at home, and names are used as screen-reader labels. The widgets get what they show from the app on your phone; they send nothing anywhere. The Live Activity is available on iPhone only. It starts by itself on the day of a trip home you have set, while you are away from home; the app has no switch for it, and you can turn it off with the Live Activities setting for Homebird in iOS Settings.

Location Accuracy (Android)

If you switch on Google's Location Accuracy setting in Android, the phone's location services may use Wi-Fi and mobile networks to find your position. That is a system feature run by Google, not by the app.

9. Who receives data

We do not pass data to anyone ourselves. These recipients receive data directly from your phone. Google (Firebase) and RevenueCat act for us as service providers. The others are independent services: we do not control them and they decide how to process data under their own privacy policies.

Apple

On iPhone, Apple provides the address lookup (it receives the text you search and the pin position, plus technical data such as your IP address) and the App Store (payment and the Plus purchase record). The phone's Core Location also delivers your position to the app, as part of the operating system. App Attest and DeviceCheck take part in the startup security check.

Google

On Android, Google, or the lookup provided by your phone's maker, provides the address lookup (it receives the search text and the pin position, with technical data such as your IP address). Google Play handles payment and the Plus purchase record. Google Play services deliver your position and region alerts to the app on your phone. Play Integrity takes part in the startup security check.

Google (Firebase)

Firebase Authentication creates the anonymous identifier. Firebase App Check and Cloud Firestore run the startup security and version checks. Firebase Crashlytics receives crash reports and startup failures with the anonymous identifier and the device identifier, and we can read them in our Firebase account. Firebase also sees your IP address with each request.

RevenueCat

RevenueCat keeps the Plus purchase record under your anonymous identifier and tells the app whether you own Plus. It also receives your IP address and basic device information when the app starts. We can see the record in our RevenueCat account.

OpenFreeMap

OpenFreeMap provides the map tiles for the home-selection map. It receives the tile requests for the area you view and your IP address. The map is not loaded for the widget, the arrival note or the distance.

MET Norway

MET Norway (the Norwegian Meteorological Institute) provides the forecast for Weather at home. It receives the coordinates of the city of each of your homes, rounded to two decimals, one request per city, your IP address, and the app's name, version and App Store link. MET Norway's terms say it stores the IP address in its logs together with any coordinates. It does not receive an identifier, your device's position, the names of your homes or the exact map pins, and with the switch off it receives nothing from the app. The app credits MET Norway in Settings.

Other people

The app shows your household to nobody else. A widget or lock-screen card is visible to people who can see your screen. A card you share goes wherever you send it from your phone's share sheet.

Legal and corporate

We may disclose information only if the law requires it or to protect our rights. From our side, that could only be what is in our Firebase and RevenueCat accounts. If the app is transferred to another owner, this policy continues to apply to it.

Sale and sharing

We do not sell personal information and we do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising.

10. International transfers

Apple, Google, Google (Firebase), RevenueCat and OpenFreeMap operate in the United States and other countries, so the data they receive as described in section 4 can be processed outside the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Türkiye. The transfer starts from your phone; for it we rely on those services' own safeguards, such as standard contractual clauses and, where certified, the data privacy framework. MET Norway is in Norway, which is part of the European Economic Area. If you live outside it, for example in the United Kingdom, Türkiye or the United States, your homes' city coordinates and your IP address go abroad to Norway while Weather at home is on; you can stop this with the switch in Settings. Ask us at the address in section 20 for more information.

11. Retention

Your homes and each home's household, birthdays, small things log, photos, choices, reminder choices, the app's own notes, quiz result, bingo ticks, map pins, last reading, last distance, stored weather and the troubleshooting log: kept only on your device until you change or remove them, or remove the app. Removing a person or the pet in the app deletes their photo. Deleting a home deletes its household and its photos. If Plus is no longer active, your extra homes are locked but not deleted.
Plus status: kept on your device until you remove the app; it is checked again with RevenueCat on start.
Search text, pin position, map tile requests and weather requests: kept by Apple, Google, OpenFreeMap or MET Norway for the period each sets in its own policy or terms; we have not shortened it.
Anonymous identifier: kept at Firebase until you delete it (section 12).
Device identifier and crash reports: kept at Firebase for the period its settings and policy set.
Purchase records: kept by Apple, Google and RevenueCat under their rules.
Backups: your phone's own backup (for example the backup it makes to your cloud account) can include the app's stored data, depending on your device settings. Deleting the app does not delete a backup you already made.

To remove what the app stores on your phone, use Delete my data (section 12 lists what stays) or remove the app. Uninstalling does not cancel anything because Plus is not a subscription.

12. Account and data deletion

The only account is the anonymous identifier described in section 4. Delete my data in Settings deletes your anonymous identifier and erases what the app stores on your phone.

Deleted: the anonymous Firebase user and its identifier; on your phone, your homes with each home's name, city, map pin, household, birthdays and photos, the stored weather, trip, lists, small things log, quiz result and bingo ticks, keys and gift, preferences, the app's own notes, reminders, location tracking, the Live Activity, the widget content for every home and the last position reading; crash reports not yet sent and the identifier set on crash reports.
Not deleted: RevenueCat's record for the old identifier, which you can ask us to remove through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/; your purchase, which Apple or Google keep and you can get back with Restore purchases; crash reports already sent; the Firebase device identifier; the records of other outside services; cards you saved to your photos; the permissions you gave in your system settings; a small note on your phone that a system permission prompt was already shown; temporary files the map and photo components may leave on your phone, such as cached map images or the working copy of a photo you chose, which removing the app also clears; and your own phone backups.

Deleting the identifier needs an internet connection. If that step fails, everything else is still erased and the identifier stays until you try again or contact us through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/. After deletion the app starts as new and creates a new anonymous identifier.

Removing the app without using Delete my data erases what it stores on your phone but not the identifier. If you no longer have the app, ask through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/. The app does not show you the identifier, so tell us your phone model and roughly when you used the app; if we cannot match your request to a record, we will say so.

13. Your rights and choices

You control the data on your phone: you can change or delete it, withdraw permissions and turn off Weather at home in Settings at any time. For the anonymous identifier, crash reports and purchase records in our Firebase and RevenueCat accounts, you have rights such as access, copy, correction, deletion, restriction and objection; section 12 explains what Delete my data removes and how to ask for the rest. For data that other outside services hold, you can send your request to them. You can also contact us through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/ and we will answer within one month (45 days for US residents, 30 days in Türkiye), explain what we can and cannot do, and tell you how to appeal if we refuse; reply to our message to appeal. We will not treat you differently for using your rights, and an authorised agent may write for you with your permission. If the data protection law where you live gives you other rights, we honour them.

14. Additional information for the EEA and UK

The data protection law that applies is the GDPR and, in the UK, the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018. You have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, objection and portability (articles 15 to 21), where the law gives you them, and the right to withdraw consent for any processing based on it, at any time without affecting earlier processing. You have the right to complain to your local supervisory authority, for example your local data protection authority or, in the UK, the Information Commissioner's Office. In the UK you can also complain to us first: we acknowledge a complaint within 30 days and look into it without undue delay. Providing data is not a legal or contractual requirement; if you decline a permission the matching feature will not work. The startup security and version checks are needed to open the app. We do not make decisions based solely on automated processing that significantly affect you. We have not appointed a representative in the European Union or the United Kingdom under article 27 of the GDPR or the UK GDPR.

15. Additional information for US residents

In the last 12 months, through Firebase and RevenueCat, we have collected these categories of personal information: identifiers (anonymous identifier, device identifier, IP address), commercial information (the purchase record) and internet or network activity (crash reports and the startup security check). We use them to run the app and keep it stable and disclose them only to those service providers. We receive no geolocation or search history. Other outside services receive the following when you use a feature, as described in sections 4 and 9: identifiers (IP address), geolocation (pin position, map area, the coordinates of your homes' cities), search text and commercial information (the purchase record, handled by the store). Your precise location is read on your device only after you grant permission and is not sent to us. We do not sell personal information and we do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising, so there is nothing to opt out of. We have no actual knowledge of selling or sharing the personal information of anyone under 16. We do not disclose personal information to third parties for their direct marketing. Rights under state laws, including California (to know, delete, correct, limit use of sensitive information and not to be discriminated against) can be exercised through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/; Delete my data in Settings also deletes what section 12 lists. We verify requests by replying to your message; an authorised agent may write for you. If we refuse, you can appeal by replying to our message. The retention of each kind of data is in section 11.

16. Additional information for Türkiye

The data controller is Seyfi Can Zeyrek (see section 2). The information notice under article 10 of Law no. 6698 (KVKK) is a separate Turkish text, "Kişisel Verilerin İşlenmesine İlişkin Aydınlatma Metni", which is included at the end of the Turkish version of this policy in the app. Under article 11 of the law you may ask whether your data is processed, request information, correction or deletion, and object to results against you. Apply through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/ or in writing to the address in section 2. This policy does not ask for your consent for anything.

17. Children

Homebird is not meant for people under 13 and we do not knowingly collect data from them. If a child's parent or guardian tells us a child under 13 uses the app, we will help them remove what is stored on the child's phone and handle a deletion request as described in section 12. Under the age of majority where you live, use the app with a parent or guardian's permission. Parents can contact us through https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/.

18. Security

The app stores your household in its private storage on your phone, protected by your phone's own security, so a device passcode and system updates matter. Map tiles, weather requests and the calls to Firebase and RevenueCat use encrypted connections. We do not run a server of our own. No system is completely secure. If a breach affecting your data ever occurred at our end, we would notify you and the authorities as the law requires.

19. Changes to this policy

When we change this policy we update the "Last updated" date; a changed date shows that this is the current version. Earlier versions are available from us on request. If a change adds a purpose that needs your consent, we will ask for it first.

20. Contact

Seyfi Can Zeyrek, an individual trading as Morrowline Apps, Esenyali Mahallesi 52/75 Sk. Izmir/Türkiye. Support: https://homebird.morrowline.app/en/support/. Email: zeyrekseyfican@gmail.com. This contact information is also our trader identification for EU consumers. We reply within a reasonable time, normally within one month. For Türkiye, applications under article 13 of Law no. 6698 can be sent through the support page or in writing to this postal address. If you are in the EEA or UK, you can also contact your local data protection authority.