App privacy policy

This is a translation for convenience. The German version is legally binding.

Time K is an app for flying crew that presents your roster in a readable form, visualises FTL/FDP values and offers you optional additional features such as flight status, a colleague comparison, a trade marketplace and a family access. This privacy policy explains which personal data is processed when you use the app, for what purpose, on what legal basis, for how long and to whom it may be passed on. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) applies.

We address you informally in the app and in this policy – legally, the terms of the GDPR apply unchanged.

1. Controller

The controller within the meaning of Art. 4(7) GDPR is:

Knabe GmbH
Gräserstr. 6
52249 Eschweiler
Deutschland
Managing Director: Oscar Knabe
Email: mail@knabe-gmbh.de
Phone: +49 2403 97110330

We have not appointed a separate data protection officer.

2. Overview: processing on the device vs. on the server

Many features run locally on your device. For your account, synchronisation and some additional features, we operate a server in the EU (Helsinki, Finland). Which data reaches the server or third parties is described below for each feature.

3. Account and profile data

To use the app, you create an account. In doing so, we process:

• username,
• email address,
• password (stored only as a cryptographic hash, never in plain text),
• first and last name,
• home base (station, 3-letter code),
• airline (3-letter code),
• role/rank (e.g. SO, FO, SFO, CPT, FA, PU),
• status of email confirmation,
• app language (German/English), so that server-side messages reach you in your language.

Purpose: provision and management of your account, authentication, assignment of your roster data.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (performance of the usage relationship).
Storage period: until your account is deleted (see Section 18).

4. Login and session token

After login, we store a session token so that you remain logged in. The token is stored securely in the keychain (iOS Keychain) on your device. A session ends when you actively log out; the token also serves as an internal "last active" marker for usage statistics (see Section 14).

Purpose: maintaining the login, protecting the API.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.
Storage period: until logout or account deletion.

5. Roster import (PDF) and duty roster data

When you hand a roster PDF to Time K, it is transmitted to our parser service for evaluation and converted there into your calendar data (flights, rotations, layovers, standby, absences, days off, duty and flight times, locations). This may contain personal data, e.g. your name, your duty and flight times and stations.

The PDF itself is not stored permanently. For processing, it is only briefly placed in a temporary file, parsed immediately and deleted directly afterwards; once the request is complete, no PDF remains on the server. Only the structured result (your calendar data) is stored – assigned to your account so that your duty roster is available across devices and – only upon your explicit action – can be shared with connected colleagues or your family access.

Purpose: building and providing your duty roster calendar and the evaluations based on it.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.
Special categories of data: A roster may contain absence or unavailability codes from which, in individual cases, conclusions could be drawn (e.g. absence due to illness). You import this data yourself and solely for your own use; processing takes place at your instigation in order to provide the feature you have requested.
Storage period: until you delete the respective period or your account.

5.1 Crew details per flight

If your duty roster contains the crew of each flight (currently NetLine rosters), the app reads it and shows it to you in the flight details: rank or function, name, and cockpit or cabin. This is personal data of your colleagues that your employer provides to you with your roster.

The parser service returns the crew details only to your app and does not store them. In the app they are kept in a separate store on your device (excluded from iCloud backup), separate from your duty roster. They are therefore never shared with connected colleagues or your family access. Evaluations, such as who you flew with how often, are made only for you and only based on your own rosters. They are not combined with data of other users.

Purpose: showing the crew of your flights for your own duty planning.
Legal basis: towards you Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; towards the crew members concerned Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR. The legitimate interest is being able to view the complete duty roster information provided by the employer. The data is limited to name, rank and flight and accessible only to you.
Information of data subjects: notifying every crew member individually is impossible or would involve disproportionate effort (Art. 14(5)(b) GDPR). This policy is therefore publicly available. Crew members can also exercise their rights (section 21) via mail@knabe-gmbh.de.
Storage period: on the device until you re-import the period, delete your local data or log out.

5.2 Crew vault (end-to-end encrypted backup)

So that crew details survive a device change or reinstall, the app backs them up encrypted on our server. The feature is on by default. You can turn it off at any time in Settings ("Crew vault"); the backup on the server is then deleted.

Encryption happens on your device before any data reaches our server (AES-256-GCM). The key used for this is generated on your device and stored there in the keychain. On the server it is stored only in encrypted form, protected by a key derived from your password or from your optional recovery code. We have no access to the key in plain text and cannot read the crew details. The server stores the encrypted key with technical parameters, one encrypted data block per month, and timestamps.

If you reset your password via "Forgot password" and have neither a device holding the key nor your recovery code, the previous backup can no longer be opened and is created anew.

Purpose: availability of your crew details across devices.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; towards the crew members concerned Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (as in 5.1). End-to-end encryption rules out access to the contents by third parties, including the operator.
Storage period: as long as your account exists and the crew vault is on. The backup is deleted when you turn it off, on "Delete all data" and on account deletion. As it serves as a personal flight and crew logbook, there is no shorter fixed period.

6. Technical error reports

If an import or parsing process fails, we log a technical error report: error message (shortened), HTTP status, the step affected, the detected roster format, month/year, app and operating system version, and – for assignment – your username. No roster content and no PDF are stored.

Purpose: troubleshooting, stability and support.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (legitimate interest in a functioning service).
Storage period: for as long as necessary for error analysis, at most twelve months.

7. Push notifications

If you enable notifications, we process a push token of your device in order to deliver messages to you (e.g. flight status changes, trade notices, news). On iPhone/iPad this runs via the Apple Push Notification service (APNs); a token for automatically starting a Live Activity may also be stored (see Section 9).

Purpose: delivery of the notifications you have enabled.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR (consent by enabling notifications; revocable at any time in the system settings) and Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (functional delivery).
Recipient: Apple (APNs) – see Section 16.
Storage period: until deactivation, logout or account deletion.

7.1 Daily flight weather

If you have a flight the next day, you receive a message the evening before (9 pm) with the flight weather at your airports and along your routes. For this, we evaluate your stored duty roster on the server (next-day flights with airports and times). For the en-route estimate our server transmits only coordinates and times, without reference to you, to the weather service Open-Meteo. The message contains only your own flights, no data of other users. You can turn off the flight weather in Settings.

Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.
Storage period: the message until account deletion (like other messages in the news section).

7.2 Roster reminders

If you have not imported a roster yet, or the current month (or, from the 25th, the coming month) is missing, we remind you by push: at most once a week, and we pause after four reminders without an import. For this we check for which months rosters exist and log sent reminders (time, type, month, text variant, language). This limits the frequency and lets us evaluate in aggregate which texts are helpful.

Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (pointing out a missing input needed to use the service).
Objection: by unsubscribing from non-essential messages (section 15), by turning off notifications in the system settings, or by email.
Storage period: the log until account deletion.

8. Flight status / flight monitoring

To display and monitor the status of your own roster flights, we process the flight number, the flight date, departure and arrival airport (IATA) as well as the scheduled times and a last known status snapshot. This flight data is transmitted to the external service AeroDataBox (obtained via the RapidAPI platform) in order to query current status, gate and time information.

Purpose: flight status display and notifications.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (requested feature) or Art. 6(1)(a)/(f) GDPR (notifications, legitimate interest).
Recipient / third country: AeroDataBox / RapidAPI; this may involve a transfer to a third country (including the USA) – see Sections 16 and 17.
Storage period: until the flight has passed or you end the monitoring.

9. Live Activities (lock screen)

For the Live Activity on the iOS lock screen, we store an ActivityKit push token as well as a snapshot of the displayed state (flight number, date, status fields). When the status changes, the server updates the display via Apple (APNs).

Purpose: live updating of the flight status on the lock screen.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(a)/(f) GDPR.
Recipient: Apple (APNs).
Storage period: until the end of the respective Live Activity.

10. Weather (METAR/TAF)

To display flight weather, you retrieve weather data for airports. For this, your device transmits the ICAO codes of the relevant airports to our server; the server fetches the data from the freely available NOAA Aviation Weather API (a US authority) and returns it bundled and cached. Only our server appears towards NOAA; none of your identity data is transmitted to NOAA.

Purpose: display of weather information for relevant airports.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b)/(f) GDPR.

11. Map and satellite overlay

The base map is rendered locally on the device from a dataset supplied with the app (MapLibre, local map data) – no map requests are made to third parties for this.

For the optional cloud/satellite overlay, the app loads tiles directly from external services: NASA GIBS (gibs.earthdata.nasa.gov, USA) and EUMETSAT (view.eumetsat.int, EU). For technical reasons, the IP address of your device is transmitted to these services.

Purpose: showing the cloud/satellite situation on the route map (optional).
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.
Third country: NASA GIBS (USA) – see Section 17.

12. Airport database

Time K ships an airport database (based on OurAirports) with the app. The assignment of airports takes place locally on the device; no personal data is transmitted to third parties for this. Only version updates of the database are obtained from our server.

13. Social features (optional)

You use these features voluntarily.

13.1 Colleague connections and duty roster comparison

You can connect with colleagues. In doing so, the connection (requester, recipient, status) and – after a mutual connection – a comparison of your duty rosters are processed. This makes your duty roster accessible to the persons you are connected with.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR; the connection itself is based on your action and that of the other party (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR).

13.2 Trade marketplace (Trades)

You can post trade offers (month, day(s), a snapshot of the duty concerned, request, status). For public offers, other users are shown the airline, home base and rank as well as your Telegram username – the latter is mandatory for public offers because, in anonymous mode, it is the only way to make contact. Your real name and email are not published. The actual contact then takes place outside Time K via Telegram; Telegram's privacy policy applies there.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (use of the trade marketplace) or Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR (publication of a public offer including the Telegram handle).

13.3 Chat for coordinating trades

Messages in the in-app chat are end-to-end encrypted. Only the encrypted content as well as sender, recipient, read status and timestamp are stored on the server. We cannot read the message content. Your public key is processed for the encryption.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.

13.4 Family access

You can set up a separate, read-only web access for family members (label, access username, password hash, technical cookie secret). Through it, the persons you designate can view your duty roster in a browser. The family access is not a separate Time K account.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b)/(a) GDPR.

13.5 News / announcements

In the app, we show announcements written by the operator ("News"), where applicable targeted by rank, station or airline. You can mark announcements with "Like" (evaluated anonymously – only the number and whether you yourself liked it are counted, never by name who did) and archive them (per account).
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

14. "Last seen"

When you use the app, we store the date of your last use (without the time) in order to evaluate the functionality and use of the service (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR). It is not visible to other users and is deleted together with your account.

In addition, we store the day on which you last used the app on an iPhone or on an Android device, as well as the build number or version of the app. We derive this from the technical identifier that the app sends with every request anyway (user agent); we do not store any further device data, the full identifier or your IP address for this purpose. We use this to see which platforms and app versions are still in use and to fix errors in a targeted manner (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR). When you register, we also receive a one-time note as to whether you registered via the iPhone or the Android app. This information is not visible to other users and is deleted together with your account.

In addition, we evaluate operation on a purely statistical basis and without any personal reference (e.g. the number of parsing operations per day with format and success/failure – without account reference; aggregated daily metrics). This evaluation does not allow any conclusions to be drawn about individual persons.
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

15. Email dispatch and marketing

We send function-related emails (e.g. confirmation/verification email, password reset, notice of an email change, family access announcement). Dispatch takes place via an email service provider (Strato, Germany).

You can object to non-essential messages (marketing); for this we store an opt-out flag and an unsubscribe token (unsubscribe link).
Legal basis: Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (function-related emails), Art. 6(1)(a)/(f) GDPR (marketing, option to object/unsubscribe).

16. Recipients / processors

We pass on personal data only to the extent necessary. Recipients are in particular:

Recipient	Purpose	Seat / location	Classification
Hetzner Online GmbH	Hosting/server operation	EU (Helsinki, Finland)	Processor (Art. 28)
Strato (STRATO GmbH)	Email dispatch	Germany	Processor (Art. 28)
Apple	Push notifications (APNs), app provision/TestFlight	USA/Ireland	independent/recipient; third country
AeroDataBox / RapidAPI	Flight status query	USA, among others	Recipient; third country
NASA GIBS	Satellite tiles (optional, client-side)	USA	Recipient; third country
EUMETSAT	Satellite tiles (optional, client-side)	EU	Recipient
NOAA Aviation Weather	Weather data (server-side, without your identity)	USA	Recipient
Open-Meteo	Weather model data for en-route weather (server-side, only coordinates and times, without your identity)	Switzerland/EU	Recipient

We conclude contracts with processors pursuant to Art. 28 GDPR.

17. Transfer to third countries

Insofar as data is transferred to recipients in third countries (in particular the USA) (Apple, AeroDataBox/RapidAPI, NASA GIBS), this takes place on the basis of appropriate safeguards, such as a certification under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or standard contractual clauses pursuant to Art. 46 GDPR.

18. Storage period and account deletion

We store personal data only for as long as is necessary for the respective purposes or as statutory retention obligations exist. You can delete your account yourself in the app at any time (Profile → Delete account, confirmation with your password) or request deletion by email to mail@knabe-gmbh.de. In doing so, your account, your duty rosters, connections, trade offers, chats, family accesses, watched flights, push registrations, the crew vault, the roster reminder log and the "last seen" entry are deleted.

On logout, the duty roster data and crew details stored locally on the device are deleted. The encrypted backup in the crew vault remains until you turn it off or delete your account.

19. Data security

The connection between the app and the server is encrypted via TLS. Passwords are stored exclusively as a hash. The session token is kept on the device in the keychain (Keychain). Chat content and the crew vault are end-to-end encrypted.

20. No automated decision-making

Automated decision-making, including profiling within the meaning of Art. 22 GDPR, does not take place. The FTL/FDP values displayed in the app are for information purposes only (see the Terms of Use).

21. Your rights

Under the GDPR, you have in particular the following rights: access (Art. 15), rectification (Art. 16), erasure (Art. 17), restriction (Art. 18), data portability (Art. 20), objection (Art. 21) and the withdrawal of a given consent with effect for the future (Art. 7(3)). To exercise them, a message to mail@knabe-gmbh.de is sufficient.

22. Right to lodge a complaint

You have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority (Art. 77 GDPR). The authority responsible is the State Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information of North Rhine-Westphalia (LDI NRW), Kavalleriestr. 2–4, 40213 Düsseldorf, https://www.ldi.nrw.de.