1. Who we are
Otrip is run by Otrip Limited, a company registered in England and Wales (“Otrip”, “we”, “us”). We are the controller of the personal information described here. This policy covers the Otrip app on iPhone, iPad and Android and the website otrip.io. It is written to meet the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018 and, where they apply to you, the EU GDPR and US state privacy laws.
You can reach us about anything in this policy at hello@otrip.io.
2. What we collect
What you give us to run your account, what you share with your groups, and some technical details from your phone.
| Type | What it includes |
|---|---|
| Account | Email address, password (stored only as a secure hash), username and name. If you sign in with another account, the name and email that service shares with us. Passkeys and two-factor settings if you set them up. |
| Profile | Photo, bio, links, country, languages, interests, travel style, and your gender and home area if you add them. |
| What you create and share | Trips, plans, ideas, polls, lists, expenses and settle-ups. Chat messages, photos, videos, voice messages and files. Clubs, events, RSVPs, answers to join questions and payment receipts you upload. Community posts, replies and votes. Footprints, statuses, travel books and reels. |
| Location | Only for the features you use. Section 4 explains each one. |
| Emergency info | Emergency contacts and their phone numbers, blood group, allergies, medication, medical conditions, insurance, doctor and roadside assistance details, if you add them. Some of this is health information. |
| Documents | Passports, visas, tickets and bookings you add to Documents. They stay on your phone unless you turn on Document sync (Pro). |
| Purchases | Your plan, trial and renewal status from your app store. We never see your card details. |
| Device and security | A device ID, phone model, operating system, app version, language, region and time zone. IP address, the country it points to, and your signed-in sessions. |
| Usage | Which screens you open, how long they take to load and which features you use. What you view, like, save and search for in Discover. Crash and error reports. |
| Messages to us | Support emails, reports, appeals and feedback. |
We don’t collect your contacts or address book, and we don’t read data from other apps.
3. Why we use it
To run the app for you, keep it safe and make it better. For each use, the law requires us to name a legal basis.
| What we do | Legal basis |
|---|---|
| Run your account, sync your trips, deliver messages and send the notifications you asked for | Our contract with you |
| Plan with AI, Bookings, Ride Mode, Travel Tracker and the other features you choose to use | Our contract with you |
| Keep accounts secure: sign-in checks, new-device alerts, two-factor codes, stopping spam and abuse | Legitimate interests: keeping Otrip and its users safe |
| Review reports, run the community word filter, strikes and appeals | Legitimate interests, and legal obligations where they apply |
| Suggest trips, clubs, events and people in Discover, based on your interests, languages, country and what you view and save | Legitimate interests: showing you relevant things. You can object |
| Count how the app is used and fix crashes | Legitimate interests: improving Otrip. You can switch usage data off |
| Keep and share emergency info, and send SOS alerts | Your explicit consent, which you give by adding the info and can withdraw by deleting it. In an emergency, also to protect someone’s life |
| Show public trips on Otrip’s own social media accounts | Legitimate interests: telling people about Otrip. Ask us and we’ll take a post down |
| Manage subscriptions and keep tax and accounting records | Our contract with you, and legal obligations |
| Answer requests from courts, police and regulators | Legal obligations |
We don’t show ads, we don’t build advertising profiles, and no decision with legal or similarly significant effects on you is made by automated means alone.
4. Your location
Every location feature is off until you use it. Here is exactly what each one does.
| Feature | When it runs | What leaves your phone |
|---|---|---|
| Travel Tracker | In the background, only after you turn it on. Automatic tracking and spotting trips you didn’t plan are off until you choose them. | Nothing. Your route and stops stay on your phone. Only the stops you post as footprints are uploaded. |
| Footprints | When you post one. | The place, its exact location, your photos and caption. Footprints are public unless you make them private. |
| Live location in a trip | In the background, for one trip at a time, while you have it on. | Your latest position, shared with that trip’s members. We keep only the latest point, for up to 24 hours. |
| Ride Mode | In the background, with high accuracy, while a ride is running. | Your live position and a simplified trail, shared with the riders in that trip. Held for up to 12 hours and deleted when the ride ends. Your ride summary stays on your phone. |
| SOS | When you press and hold SOS. | Your location, posted to the trip so every member is alerted, with your emergency info shown to them for 24 hours. |
| Near you in Discover | When you search near your location. | Your position, to find trips, clubs and events nearby. |
| Trips near you alerts | Only if you turn these alerts on. | Your home area, updated when you move more than about 5 km. Your profile shows the city name only. |
| Travellers near you | Only if you choose to be shown. Off by default. | Other travellers can find you nearby. They see your name, photo and bio, never your location. |
You can change location access for Otrip at any time in your phone’s settings. Turning it off stops these features but leaves the rest of the app working.
5. Who can see what
Anyone, in the app and on otrip.io
- Your profile: name, username, photo, bio, links, languages, interests, country, travel style, follower counts, when you joined and the countries where you have public footprints.
- Public footprints: photos, caption, place, exact location and date.
- Public trips: the plan, the cover and the members’ names and photos.
- Club and event pages, and your posts and replies in country communities, with your name.
The people in your trips, clubs and events
- Messages, photos, plans, lists, polls and expenses in that group.
- Your live location and ride position, while you share them.
- Your emergency info, as you choose: everyone in the trip (the default), only its admins, or nobody. During an SOS, every member sees it for 24 hours.
- Organisers see your RSVP, your answers to join questions and any payment receipt you upload.
Only you
- Travel Tracker routes and draft footprints, private footprints and your Documents.
Your emergency page
If you turn on the emergency page, anyone who scans your Otrip QR sticker or opens its link sees the emergency details you chose to put there. It is off until you switch it on.
Otrip staff
A small number of authorised staff can see account details and chats that aren’t end-to-end encrypted. They do this only when it is needed: to review a report, help with a support request, protect someone’s safety or meet a legal duty.
6. Chats and end-to-end encryption
Our servers pass your messages on and then delete them. Chats with end-to-end encryption can only be read on the members’ phones.
Otrip chats are stored on your phone. Our servers keep a message only until every member’s phone has received it (at least 24 hours) and never for more than 30 days. The same goes for photos, videos, voice messages and files sent in a chat. Everything travels over encrypted connections.
We are bringing end-to-end encryption to Otrip chats, using the MLS standard for group messaging. When a chat is end-to-end encrypted, the app says so at the top of the chat. The messages, photos, videos, voice messages and files in it can then be read only on the members’ phones, not by Otrip.
Even then, some things are not end-to-end encrypted so that the app can work: who is in a chat and when messages are sent, polls and ideas (so votes can be counted), and SOS alerts (so everyone can be reached).
7. Services that help us run Otrip
We use trusted providers for things like storage, notifications and payments. They may use your data only to do that job for us, under contracts that require them to protect it.
| Type of provider | What for | What they receive |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting and storage | Running our servers and the website, storing and delivering files, protecting against attacks | Files you upload, IP address |
| Notifications and email | Push notifications and account emails | Your account ID, your phone’s notification address, your email address and the email’s content |
| App stores and subscription management | Selling and renewing subscriptions | Your account ID, email, name and purchase status |
| Sign-in services | Signing in with another account, if you choose to | The sign-in request |
| AI services | Plan with AI, and suggestions in Discover | For plans: the trip details you enter (places, dates, budget, style, interests and group size) and an account label that includes part of your name. For suggestions: your interests, travel style and gender, if you added it |
| Crash reporting | Finding and fixing crashes and errors | Your account ID and technical details of the error. Never screenshots |
| Maps | Maps, place search and place names | What you type into place search, and the map points being named. Map usage reporting is turned off |
| Translation | Detecting and translating the language of community posts | The text of community posts and replies |
| IP location | Working out your country during setup, and the city for new-device sign-in alerts | IP address |
| Booking partners | Bookings | Only your search (place, dates, guests), never your name or email. What you do on their sites is covered by their own policies |
Older versions of the app
App versions before 2.9 also included analytics and install-measurement tools from other companies, to measure how the app is used and which links led to installs. They received your Otrip account ID and username. On Android they could also read the advertising ID. On iPhone they used the advertising identifier only if you allowed tracking when asked. Version 2.9 and later include none of these tools. Updating the app stops this.
We also share information when the law requires it, to protect someone’s safety, or with a buyer if Otrip is ever sold, who must then follow this policy.
8. Transfers outside the UK
Some of our providers process data outside the UK, including in the United States and the European Economic Area. When they do, we rely on UK adequacy regulations (including the UK–US data bridge) or the UK International Data Transfer Agreement or Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses.
9. How long we keep it
| Data | Kept for |
|---|---|
| Your account and profile | While you have an account. Erased 30 days after you delete it |
| Chat messages and files on our servers | Until every member has them, and no more than 30 days |
| Live location in a trip | The latest point only, for up to 24 hours |
| Ride Mode positions | Up to 12 hours, deleted when the ride ends |
| Payment receipts for paid events | 90 days after the event, unless a refund is still owed |
| Notifications | 30 days |
| Signed-in sessions | Up to 30 days after you last use them |
| Security log (IP address and device) | 90 days |
| App usage counts | 90 days |
| Views, likes, saves and searches used for suggestions | 365 days |
| Support messages and reports | As long as we need them to help you and to keep a record of how we handled a report |
When you delete your account, some things you shared with others remain, because they are part of other people’s conversations and records. Messages you sent stay on their phones. Expenses in shared trips stay so their totals still add up. Your community posts and replies stay, shown as from a deleted user, without your name or photo.
10. Your choices
- Usage data: switch it off in Settings → About → Help improve Otrip. Anything not yet sent is deleted from your phone. Crash reports are separate and still sent.
- Location: turn each feature on or off in the app, or change Otrip’s location access in your phone’s settings.
- Public or private: choose for each trip and each footprint.
- Emergency info: choose who in your trips can see it, and whether your emergency page is on.
- People: block anyone, and report profiles and community posts.
- Notifications: manage them in Settings → Notifications, or in your phone’s settings.
- Sessions: see where you are signed in and sign out other devices in Settings → Security.
- Your account: delete it in Settings → Account. You can reactivate it within 30 days. After that it is erased.
11. Your rights
Under UK and EU data protection law you have the right to:
- get a copy of your personal information;
- have it corrected if it is wrong;
- have it deleted;
- restrict how we use it;
- receive it in a format you can take elsewhere;
- object to uses based on legitimate interests, including Discover suggestions and usage data;
- withdraw consent at any time, for example by deleting your emergency info;
- complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk, or to the data protection authority where you live.
Write to hello@otrip.io from your account’s email address. We answer within one month and don’t charge for it. We may ask you to confirm it is you.
US residents
Depending on your state (for example, California), you can ask to know, correct or delete your personal information, and you won’t be treated differently for asking. We don’t sell personal information, and the current app doesn’t share it for cross-context behavioural advertising.
12. Children
Otrip is not for children under 13, or under the minimum age for using online services without a parent’s consent where you live (16 in some countries). If we learn that an account belongs to someone younger, we delete it. If you think a child is using Otrip, tell us at hello@otrip.io.
13. Keeping it secure
Data travels over encrypted connections. Passwords are stored as secure hashes, and sign-in tokens are kept in your phone’s secure storage. You can protect your account with two-factor codes and passkeys, and see and end your sessions at any time.
Because Otrip works offline, your trips, chats and documents are also stored on your phone. Your phone’s own encryption protects them, so keep it locked with a passcode. No system is perfectly secure. If a breach puts your information at risk, we will tell you and the regulator as the law requires.
14. The otrip.io website
otrip.io shows public trips, profiles, footprints, clubs and events, and helps you get the app. You can’t sign in on it. It sets no cookies and runs no analytics or advertising scripts. Our hosting provider processes your IP address to deliver pages and protect the site from attacks.
15. Changes to this policy
When we change this policy we update the date at the top. If a change matters, for example a new use of your data, we tell you in the app or by email before it takes effect.
16. Contact us
Otrip Limited, registered in England and Wales. Email hello@otrip.io for privacy questions and requests, or support@otrip.io for help with the app.