Location

Knowing where an image was taken gives it weight. It is also a record of your movements: the setting is explicit, and can be turned off.

#What is sent

If the session has the Location option enabled (this is the default setting) and you accept the browser's location request on the field phone:

• the location is recorded continuously while the page is open: latitude, longitude, accuracy, and sometimes speed and heading;
• the points are sent in batches, every 20 seconds or every 10 points;
• the last known point is also attached, encrypted, to each video, photo or audio segment.

If you refuse the permission on the phone, nothing is recorded or sent. Recording works normally.

#Encrypted like the footage

Each point is encrypted on the phone with the same public key as the segments. The server stores unreadable points and only knows how many there are and when they arrived. It does not know where you were.

#Who sees it

The location is part of the session. It can be seen by you, from your account, and by the contacts the session is opened to, whether through manual sharing, immediate sharing, reminders, then sharing, the duress code or a field alert.

In the event of an alert or duress, this is what lets your contacts know where the last images were taken.

The location is included in the legal export (track.geojson).

#Turning it off

• For an upcoming session: untick Location when creating the session.
• For a session in progress: turn it off from the session detail page. The phone stops sending at its next check.
• On the phone: refuse the location permission, or remove it in the browser settings.

Turning it off does not erase points already received. They are locked like the rest of the session.

#The map, on request

The session detail page offers a map of the locations. It only loads if you click to display it.

At that point, your browser downloads the map tiles from OpenStreetMap's servers (tile.openstreetmap.org). Your locations are not sent to them, but those servers see your IP address, the name of the site (sent as the referrer, which OpenStreetMap's usage policy requires) and the area displayed. It is the only external resource the site can load, and only at your request. Use Tor if this is a problem for you.

#Good to know

• Accuracy depends on the phone: a few meters outdoors with GPS, much less indoors or in a dense crowd.
• Sending the location uses a little battery and data.
• If you do not want any record of your movements to exist, even encrypted, turn location off.