SENTINEL Privacy Policy

Last updated: 22 September 2026

SENTINEL ("SENTINEL," "we," "us") is a tactical mapping and team-coordination app for search-and-rescue, public-safety, and professional field teams. This policy explains what data the app handles, how it is used, and the choices you have. Questions: privacy@strike-apps.com.

1. Data we collect

• Email address — to create your account and sign you in.
• Sign in with Apple — if you choose it instead of (or in addition to) an email and password, Apple gives us an identifier that is unique to you and to SENTINEL, and the email address you choose to share. With Apple's Hide My Email that is a private relay address and we never see your real one. Your name, if you share it, is used only to pre-fill your display name. We do not receive your Apple ID password, and Apple does not tell us anything about how you use other apps.
• Display name — the name teammates see for you in chat and on the shared map. You choose it and can change or clear it at any time.
• Precise location — collected only while you turn on "Share my location," and used to show your position to members of your own team. Location sharing is off by default and can be switched off at any time, including in the background.
• User content — chat messages, notes, markers, and operational data (e.g., landing-zone or MEDEVAC information) you create. This content is end-to-end encrypted (see §4) and shared only with the team you send it to.
• Account identifiers — a server-side account ID and device install ID used to route your team's messages.

We do not collect health/PHI data, contacts, photos, advertising identifiers, or any device tracking identifiers.

2. How we use data

Data is used solely to provide app functionality: authentication, delivering messages and position updates to your team, and supporting the app's tools. We do not use your data for advertising or profiling.

3. What we do NOT do

• We do not sell or rent your data.
• We do not track you across other apps or websites.
• We use no third-party analytics, advertising, or tracking SDKs.

4. End-to-end encryption

Chat messages, position updates, and operational data are encrypted on your device and only decrypted on your teammates' devices, using standard cryptography (ChaCha20-Poly1305 with X25519 key agreement). Our relay server moves this content as opaque ciphertext and cannot read your messages or positions. The keys live in your device Keychain and never leave your device, so nothing we move or hold is readable by us. All network traffic additionally uses TLS.

Content is passed straight to your teammates' connected devices as it arrives. When a teammate is not connected, a message for them is held on our server, still encrypted, until their device collects it — and deleted the moment it does. Anything never collected is deleted automatically after 7 days. This covers messages and shared map items only: position updates are never held, and neither are file transfers. For a teammate on a satellite connection, traffic is also held in server memory only — never written to disk — for at most five minutes until their device collects it.

You can switch this off in the app (Chat → Catch up after signal loss). With it off, anything waiting for you is discarded and you receive traffic only while you are connected.

5. Third parties

We rely on a small number of service providers strictly to operate the app:

• Apple — App Store distribution and subscription billing (we never receive your payment card details), and Sign in with Apple if you choose to use it.
• Our hosting/relay infrastructure — operated for us to route encrypted team traffic; it does not have access to decrypted content.
• Transactional email provider — to send account-verification and password-reset emails.
• adsb.lol (air traffic data) — only if you turn on the Air Traffic tool's Internet source. To show aircraft near you, the app asks adsb.lol for traffic around the centre of the area shown on your map (which is often where you are), or your approximate position if the map has not loaded yet. The location is rounded to about 1 km and sent with a search radius; the request carries no account, name, or other identifier, though adsb.lol, like any website, sees your device's IP address. The request goes directly from your device to adsb.lol, not through our servers, and adsb.lol's own privacy practices apply. Using a portable ADS-B receiver instead sends nothing over the internet.

6. Data retention & deletion

You can permanently delete your account from inside the app (Account tool → Delete Account). Deletion removes your profile and group memberships from our server, along with any encrypted messages still waiting for your devices. If you used Sign in with Apple, deleting your account also revokes SENTINEL's authorization with Apple. You can also stop location sharing at any time without deleting your account.

Undelivered messages (§4) are deleted as soon as the recipient's device collects them, and in every case within 7 days. Signing out on a device also deletes whatever was waiting for it.

7. Security

We protect data with end-to-end encryption of content, TLS in transit, and Keychain storage of keys and credentials on your device.

8. Children

SENTINEL is a professional tool and is not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect data from children under 13.

9. Changes

We may update this policy; material changes will be posted here with a revised date.

10. Contact

privacy@strike-apps.com