CarScope privacy policy
Who is responsible
The operator named in the legal notice: autosensa.com/legal-notice
Contact for privacy requests: privacy@autosensa.com
In short
- CarScope has no account. We do not ask for your name or e-mail address.
- Vehicle data — VIN, fault codes, live readings, reports, trips and routes — stays on your device. CarScope does not send it to us.
- CarScope contains no advertising, analytics or crash-reporting services.
- Our server is contacted only if you buy a brand pack or report credits. It then receives anonymous purchase and installation identifiers, never vehicle data. The server and its database are hosted by Google Cloud in Frankfurt, Germany (region
europe-west3).
Data that stays on your device
CarScope connects to your OBD adapter over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi. This connection runs only between your phone and your adapter. Vehicle data, saved vehicles, reports, recordings and settings are stored in the app's private storage on your device. They are excluded from Android backups and are deleted when you uninstall CarScope.
If you turn on trips, CarScope uses your device's location to record trip routes. Routes are stored on your device only and are never transmitted.
The settings for reliability reports and anonymous usage are stored on your device. This version of CarScope transmits no usage statistics and no crash reports, whatever these settings say.
Purchases
Payments are processed by Google Play. CarScope does not receive your payment details. Google Play's privacy policy applies to the payment.
CarScope Pro is checked on your device with Google Play. Our server is not involved.
Brand packs and report credits. To unlock them, the app sends to our server:
- the purchase token that Google Play issued for your purchase and its product ID;
- a random installation identifier and a public key that the app creates on first use. They are not derived from your device, your Google account or any hardware identifier.
Our server checks the purchase with Google Play and stores, per purchase: a hash of the purchase token, the product, the Google order number, the credits granted and used, a refund flag, and the installation identifiers (at most five) the purchase is used on. When you download a brand pack, the app proves the purchase with a signed entitlement; the encrypted pack itself is delivered through Google Cloud's content delivery network without any identifier. When you use a report credit, the app sends a one-way code for that report so the credit is charged only once; the report itself, the VIN and the vehicle data are not sent.
We do not know who you are. Google, as the operator of Google Play, can link the order number to your Google account, and so can we through the order records Google Play provides to developers. We use these records only to provide what you bought and to prevent misuse.
Legal basis: performance of the purchase contract (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR) and our legitimate interest in preventing fraud and misuse (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR).
To restore the ledger after a failure, our server also keeps a write-once backup journal of credit spends and refunds. Each entry holds the hash of the purchase token, the product, the credits granted and, for a spend, the installation identifier and the one-way code of the report. It is stored in the same Google Cloud region and cannot be changed or deleted for one year after it is written.
Retention: purchase records, including their journal entries, are deleted 10 years after the purchase. Records of a refunded purchase are deleted 3 years after the refund. We run the deletion once a month for every record whose period has ended. Until then we keep the records because deleting them would allow the same purchase to be redeemed again.
Server, hosting and logs
Our server runs on Google Cloud Run with a Firestore database in Frankfurt, Germany (europe-west3). Google acts as our processor. Every connection is encrypted (HTTPS); the app refuses unencrypted connections to our server.
Like every internet service, our server receives your IP address while it handles a request. It uses it only in memory to limit excessive requests. Our server log records technical events (for example time, route, status code and pack ID) without your IP address, purchase token or installation identifier. Hosting request logs that would contain IP addresses are not stored.
Google services you choose to use
- Ask Google AI. If you tap "Ask Google AI about this code", CarScope opens Google Search in your browser with the fault code, its description and your saved make and model. The VIN and readings are not included. Google's privacy policy applies.
- Rating. If you choose to rate CarScope, Google Play shows its rating dialog or the store page.
Services not offered
CarScope does not offer live data sharing with A Better Routeplanner (ABRP) or any other third-party service. We will update this policy before such a feature is offered.
Sharing that you start
When you share or export a report, CSV file, trip or issue report, CarScope opens Android's share sheet. The data goes only to the recipient or app you choose.
App permissions
- Bluetooth and nearby Wi-Fi devices: to find and connect to your OBD adapter.
- Network access: for the adapter's Wi-Fi link and for purchases described above.
- Location: only for trips you turn on; stays on your device.
- Notifications and foreground service: to keep recordings and trips running and show that they are active.
- Google Play Billing: for purchases.
Your rights
Under the GDPR you have the right of access, rectification, erasure, restriction of processing, data portability and objection (Art. 15–21 GDPR). Because we hold no name or e-mail address, please include the Google Play order number of your purchase so we can find the records. Send requests to privacy@autosensa.com. You may also lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority.
Changes
We will update this policy before CarScope processes data in a new way, and show the new version in the app.