Privacy Policy

Last updated: August 23, 2026

This Privacy Policy explains how Cars in Bike Lanes ("we," "us," or "our") handles information when you use carinbikelane.com, its city-specific subdomains, or our iOS and Android mobile applications (together, the "Services").

In brief: We use information to accept, moderate, publish, and attribute reports of vehicles in bike lanes, keep the Services reliable and secure, and support the features you choose to use. Submitted photos, locations, dates, and attribution may be made public. We do not sell personal information or use it for targeted advertising.

Information we handle

Depending on how you use the Services, we may handle the following information:

Reports and photos. Photos you choose to submit, the number of vehicles, a date and time, a location or cross street, and related report details. Photos may contain metadata such as capture date, time, device orientation, and precise GPS coordinates.
Social account information. If you sign in and request attribution through a supported social service, we may handle your handle, username, decentralized identifier, server address, session information, and access token. We use this information to verify your identity, attribute a report, or publish as requested. We do not ask for or receive your social account password. Cars in Bike Lanes does not create a user account for you; Bluesky and Mastodon sign-in are optional and are used only to attribute reports you choose to submit.
Website and service activity. Our servers and reliability tools may receive an IP address, browser or app type, operating system, request URL, response status, timestamps, referring page, cookie or session identifiers, and similar request and diagnostic information.
Mobile app information. The apps create a random installation identifier for abuse prevention and duplicate-upload protection. Depending on the device, this identifier may survive an app reinstall. Sentry automatically receives mobile reliability data that may include app version, device and operating-system information, errors, crash details, performance measurements, and feature outcomes such as whether a permission request was accepted or denied.
Game information. If you use a website's game, we process the display name you enter, game state, answers, and scores while providing the game.

Mobile permissions and information stored on your device

The mobile apps may request access to the following device features:

Camera to take a photo for a report.
Photos to save captured photos or let you choose existing photos. On Android, individual imports use the system photo picker rather than broad library access.
Location while using the app to record where a photo was taken or help you choose the report location. The apps do not request background location access.

Granting a permission does not by itself submit a photo or report. Captured and imported photos may remain in your photo library or private app storage. Drafts and queued uploads are stored on the device so a report can finish after a temporary connection failure. Social credentials and the random installation identifier are stored using operating-system secure storage when available. You can revoke camera, photo-library, or location access in your device settings. Revoking a permission stops the app's future access to that device resource but does not delete information you already submitted.

How we use information

We use information to:

receive, validate, queue, moderate, and publish reports;
read photo metadata and determine or confirm a report's date and location;
analyze images for relevant objects and unsafe content;
display reports on maps and publish or embed posts on supported social services;
authenticate users and provide optional public attribution;
operate website games and other requested features;
diagnose errors, measure performance, prevent duplicate reports, and improve reliability;
detect, investigate, and prevent abuse, fraud, or security incidents; and
respond to requests and comply with legal obligations.

Public reports and sharing

Reports accepted for publication may publicly display the submitted photo, location or cross street, date and time, number of vehicles, and social attribution you selected. We may also publish reports through social networks, feeds, or image-hosting services. Public information can be copied, indexed, reposted, or retained by other people and services outside our control. Removing a report from our Services may not remove copies held elsewhere.

We may otherwise disclose information:

To service providers. We use providers to host and operate the Services, store data, provide maps and geocoding, analyze and moderate images, monitor reliability, send internal report notifications, and publish content. We use providers whose applicable agreements, terms, and privacy commitments require them to protect user data consistently with this policy, applicable platform rules, and law.
When you connect another service. Bluesky, Mastodon, and other social or mapping services receive information necessary for the sign-in, attribution, map, embed, or publishing feature you request. Their own privacy policies govern their handling.

Service providers and integrations

Sentry is the only third-party SDK embedded in the mobile app specifically to collect automatic crash, performance, and diagnostic telemetry. Other providers receive or process information only for narrower service functions or user-directed transfers. These providers include Microsoft Azure for hosting, storage, databases, maps, image analysis, content safety, and Application Insights diagnostics; Google Maps on Android and Apple mapping services on Apple devices; Bluesky and Mastodon for optional sign-in and attribution; and social publishing, embedding, notification, content-delivery, or image-hosting services such as Threads, Slack, jsDelivr, and Imgur. Which providers receive information depends on the features you use and how a report is published.

Cookies and local storage

The websites use cookies required for sign-in and security. They also use browser local storage to keep certain social sign-in details, such as a Mastodon server address and access token, on your device. The mobile apps use cookies, app storage, and secure storage for the same functional purposes. These technologies are not used by us for targeted advertising. You can sign out to remove the social access tokens and attribution details held in the native app's secure storage, clear its supported sign-in sessions, and stop future report attribution. Signing out does not remove attribution from reports that were already published. Browser or device controls may let you clear other stored data. Blocking necessary storage may prevent sign-in or queued uploads from working.

Retention

We retain completed photo submissions and their associated report metadata indefinitely unless the app owner deletes them. Incomplete uploads are removed when they are no longer needed for submission processing, and queued content remains on a device while needed to send a report. We do not retain any information after deleting a report.

Your choices and privacy rights

You may submit a report anonymously or choose supported social attribution.
You may decline or later change camera, photo, and location permissions.
You may sign out to remove the native app's stored social credentials and stop future attribution, and you may clear other browser or app data using available device controls.
You may ask to access, correct, or delete personal information, or object to or restrict certain processing, where applicable law provides those rights.

You may request deletion of a photo published with your social attribution by emailing seattlecarsinbikelanes@outlook.com. Include enough information to identify the report. We will ask you to verify control of the social identity shown in the attribution. Once accepted, we will remove the photo and associated report metadata from storage and public social media we control and remove it from publishing destinations we control. We cannot verify ownership of an anonymous submission (it's anonymous!). Copies independently indexed, cached, saved, or reposted by other people or services may remain outside our control.

You may also use the same email address to ask to access or correct personal information, or to object to or restrict certain processing, where applicable law provides those rights. Some information may be retained or requests may be limited where permitted by law, including for security, legal compliance, or information that is not reasonably identifiable as yours. You may also have the right to appeal our response or contact your local privacy regulator.

Security and international processing

We use administrative and technical safeguards intended to protect information, including encrypted connections and operating-system secure storage where available. No storage or transmission method is completely secure. Our providers and connected services may process information in the United States and other countries where privacy laws may differ from those where you live.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as the Services or our practices change. We will post the updated policy at this URL and change the "Last updated" date. If a change is material, we may provide additional notice through the Services when appropriate.

Contact us

Cars in Bike Lanes
Email: seattlecarsinbikelanes@outlook.com