BlindNav privacy policy

Last updated 1 November 2026.

BlindNav is a navigation aid for blind and visually impaired pedestrians, made by Robert Spangler. It has no accounts, no advertising and no analytics.

What leaves your phone

• To find streets and intersections, BlindNav sends the area around you to BlindNav's own map server, osm.blindnav.net, which uses OpenStreetMap data. If that server does not answer, the same request goes to a public OpenStreetMap server (overpass-api.de). osm.blindnav.net keeps a record of map requests, including your phone's internet address and the area asked about, for 7 days, to find and fix problems. It is then deleted.
• To name places, and when you search, BlindNav sends your location, and what you type, to Google Places.
• Android's own address lookup and Google Play services' location are used to turn your position into an address and to find it.
• Google may use what it receives under its own privacy policy. The public OpenStreetMap server is run by others, not by BlindNav.

What stays on your phone

• Your settings and saved places.
• Trip logs, while they are on (Settings, Advanced): a record of each trip. They leave the phone only if you send them yourself, by email, from Settings, Advanced, Send Trip Logs.

Trip logs you send

If you send trip logs, Robert Spangler keeps them on his computer while BlindNav is being developed, and uses them only to find and fix problems. They are read with the help of an AI assistant (Claude, by Anthropic). Short parts of a trip may be kept as test data. They are never sold or shared with anyone else. Ask and they will be deleted.

Your email address comes with them, as with any email to BlindNav, and is used only to reply to you.

Phone calls

Calling a place from its details uses your phone's own calling. BlindNav does not keep or send the number.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version is posted here with a new date.

Contact

Questions, or to have your trip logs deleted: support@blindnav.net