Effective 2 October 2026
Privacy policy
RoadTales has no accounts, no ads, no analytics and no tracking. It uses your location to find places near you, and sends only what it needs to write and voice a story about them.
RoadTales is made by Emil Sjöblom, an independent developer, who is responsible for the data described here. Contact: support@roadtalesapp.com.
What the app uses, and where it goes
| Data | Why | Sent to |
|---|---|---|
| Your location (while exploring) | To find places near you and ahead of you | Wikipedia and Wikivoyage (Wikimedia Foundation), to search for nearby articles; Apple, to look up the name of the town you're in |
| Names of nearby places, article text about them, and the location of the place a story is about | To write the story | The RoadTales service (hosted on Cloudflare), which passes it to Anthropic to write the story |
| The text of the story | To read it aloud | The RoadTales service, which passes it to ElevenLabs to make the audio |
| A random install ID | To give each install its free daily stories and protect the service from abuse | The RoadTales service |
| An Apple App Attest check (first launch) | To confirm requests come from the genuine app on a real iPhone | Apple, then the RoadTales service |
Your own location is never sent to the RoadTales service, Anthropic or ElevenLabs — only the names, texts and locations of the places stories are about. The install ID is created on your phone and is not linked to your name, Apple ID, email or any other identity.
What is kept, and for how long
- On your phone: the stories you've heard (history), the audio files, your settings, the install's token in the iPhone Keychain, and a diagnostics log. They never leave the phone unless you share the log yourself. Deleting the app deletes them.
- Story cache: stories and audio are stored by place for up to 180 days (two hours for "what's on" pieces), so the next driver past the same place gets them instantly. Each is labelled with the install ID that first requested it, to trace misuse.
- Usage counters: how many new stories each install ID used on each day, for the free daily allowance. Deleted automatically after 90 days.
- Service logs: short-lived operational logs of requests (including IP address, as for any web service), used to keep the service running and deleted automatically.
Who processes data for us
- Cloudflare hosts the RoadTales service and this website — privacy policy
- Anthropic writes the stories — privacy policy
- ElevenLabs makes the audio — privacy policy
- Wikimedia Foundation answers the nearby-article searches — privacy policy
- Apple provides place names and App Attest — privacy policy
None of them receive your name or contact details from RoadTales, and nothing is sold or used for advertising.
Your choices and rights
You can turn off location access in the iPhone Settings app at any time (RoadTales can't find stories without it), and delete everything on your phone by deleting the app. If you are in the EU, UK or a similar jurisdiction, you can ask us for a copy of, or deletion of, data linked to your install ID — email us, and include the install ID shown at the top of the diagnostics screen (press and hold the RoadTales name at the top of the main screen, or open Settings › Diagnostics). You can also complain to your local data protection authority.
Children
RoadTales is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect their data.
Changes
If this policy changes, the new version will be posted here with a new effective date.