Privacy Policy
Last updated: June 14, 2026
Public Lands Map is a free map of who manages every acre of public land and the legal motorized roads across it. The map works fully without an account. This policy covers the data the app handles when an account is created, and how it is used.
The short version
- The map is usable with no account; anonymous visitors are not profiled or tracked.
- An account exists for one purpose — to save your own places (campsites, water, hazards, GPS tracks) privately to you.
- Saved places are private to your account. They are never shown to other users, sold, or used for advertising.
What is collected
When you sign in with Google: your email address and basic profile (name) from your Google account, used to create and identify your account. Authentication is handled by Supabase; sign-in is brokered by Google OAuth. No Google password is ever seen by this app.
Saved places: the coordinates, category, optional note, and timestamps of any pin or GPS track you choose to save. Stored privately and visible only to your account.
Email preference: whether you opted in to occasional trail and camp update emails.
How it is used
- To provide the save-my-spots feature and keep you signed in.
- To send the occasional update emails you opted into, delivered via Postmark. Every email carries an unsubscribe link; opting out is available at any time.
- Data is never used for advertising, profiling, or resale.
GPS tracks and trip recording
When you record an Activity, the resulting trail is saved as a single private file in a private storage bucket. It is reachable only through an authenticated request that verifies your account owns it. Your trails are visible to your account alone — never shown to other users, never sold, and never used for advertising. You can export any trail as a GPX file or delete it at any time.
Encryption
Your trails are encrypted in transit and encrypted at rest today. Zero-knowledge end-to-end encryption — where even we cannot read a raw trail — is on the roadmap, and it will be opt-in when it ships. Until then, your trails are private to you, and we say only what is true today: they are protected in transit and at rest, and visible to your account alone.
Making the map better
Public Lands Map gets more useful as it learns which areas people actually camp and travel. Any popular-area or aggregate feature built from recorded trails will use only aggregated and de-identified data: coarse, thresholded, with the start and end of each trip — your home and your campsite — removed first. It will require opt-in, and you can decline and still use every feature. Raw trails are never sold or shared.
Google user data
Public Lands Map's use of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. The only Google data used is your email and basic profile, solely to authenticate your account.
Service providers
The app relies on a small set of processors: Supabase (database and authentication), Google (sign-in), Postmark (email delivery), Vercel (application hosting), and Cloudflare (map-tile delivery). Public-land map data comes from public datasets (PAD-US, USFS, BLM, US Census, and similar) and contains no personal information.
Cookies
The app sets authentication session cookies (via Supabase) so you stay signed in. It uses no third-party advertising or tracking cookies and runs no analytics tracker.
Retention and your choices
- Any saved place can be deleted in the app at any time.
- Email updates can be stopped via the unsubscribe link in any message.
- To delete your account and all associated data, email feedback@publiclandsmap.com and it will be removed.
Children
The service is not directed to children under 13 and does not knowingly collect their data.
Changes
This policy may be updated; the date above changes when it does. Material changes are reflected on this page.
Contact
Questions about this policy: feedback@publiclandsmap.com. See also the Terms of Service.