Privacy Policy

Summary

• FurEver has no accounts and never asks for your name, email address, or phone number.
• FurEver shows no ads, uses no advertising or analytics tools of its own, and does not sell or share your information for advertising. We do not track you across other companies' apps or websites.
• Your location is used only to find pets near you. It is rounded to about 1 km (0.6 miles) before it leaves your device and is not saved in any FurEver database.
• RescueGroups.org, the source of our listings, requires pet detail views to include a small image that counts pet views for shelters. FurEver loads it when RescueGroups.org provides one. It is described below.

Location

To find nearby pets, FurEver uses either your device's location (only if you allow it) or a ZIP code, city, or address that you type.

• Pet searches. The app rounds your coordinates to two decimal places (roughly 1 km) and sends them to our server with each pet search. The server uses them to work out which pets are within your chosen distance, then discards them. FurEver does not send your location to RescueGroups.org; we download listings in bulk and filter them on our own server.
• Typed locations. As you type a place, the text is sent to our server, which asks Google Maps Platform for suggestions and coordinates. Google receives that text from our server, not from your device. Those coordinates are used to search for pets. They are not drawn on the map. To avoid repeat lookups, our server keeps typed searches and their coordinates in memory and deletes them automatically within 25 hours (they expire after 24 hours and are cleared hourly). They are never written to disk, are not linked to you or your device, and are not recorded in our application logs (see Server Logs below for our hosting provider's logs).
• On your device. Your last location is saved on your device so you don't have to set it again.

You can turn off location access at any time. On iOS, go to Settings › FurEver › Location. You can still search by typing a ZIP code or city.

Information Stored on Your Device, and Search Filters

Your saved pets, the pets you've passed on, your saved filter choices, your last location, and a copy of your current results are stored on your device. FurEver does not upload your saved or passed pets. Deleting the iOS app, or clearing your browser's site data for furever.one, removes all of this.

Your filters are saved on your device, but to perform a search the app sends the filters you've selected (species, breeds, age, size, gender, and distance) to our server along with your rounded location. The server uses them to answer that search. Our application logs record the filters used for each search, without your location or IP address.

Server Logs and Retention

FurEver is hosted on Render, which delivers our site through Cloudflare's network. Like most web hosts, they process each request's IP address, device and browser information, and the address requested. That address can include your rounded coordinates and selected filters (for pet searches) or the place you typed (for location suggestions and lookups). Render keeps these logs for up to 30 days and then deletes them. We use them only to keep FurEver running, fix problems, and protect against abuse. Our own application logs do not record your location or the places you type.

RescueGroups.org Pet Adoption Tracker

Pet listings come from shelters and rescues through RescueGroups.org. Their terms require pet detail views to include their Pet Adoption Tracker, an invisible image used to report pet views to shelters. When RescueGroups.org provides a tracker URL for a pet, FurEver requests that exact URL from your device when the pet's card or full profile is shown. If no tracker URL is provided, no tracker image is loaded.

The request can send RescueGroups.org the pet identifier, referral information identifying furever.one, your IP address, and device and browser information. An image failing to load does not establish that the request or its data never reached RescueGroups.org. FurEver does not remove your IP address from this direct request and cannot guarantee that RescueGroups.org anonymizes it.

RescueGroups.org describes the tracker as a reporting and analytics tool for shelters, including visitor geolocation derived from IP addresses. Its privacy statement says that pet-view statistics may involve storing a cookie in your browser. RescueGroups.org's collection, use, and retention are governed by its own practices. For details, see its Privacy Statement and Pet Adoption Tracker service description.

Other Services Your Device Contacts

Some content loads directly from other providers. Each one receives your IP address and basic device and browser information when it does:

• RescueGroups.org — pet photos and the Pet Adoption Tracker described above.
• OpenStreetMap — map images whenever FurEver shows a map, which also shows them the area you are viewing.
• Google Fonts and unpkg — the fonts and map software used by the app.

“Contact Shelter” opens the shelter's own website in your browser, or a Google search for the shelter if no website is listed. Those sites have their own privacy practices.

We do not sell your information, and we do not share it with third parties for their marketing purposes.

Children's Privacy

FurEver is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe we have inadvertently collected such information, please contact us and we will take appropriate steps.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we do, we will revise the “Last updated” date at the top of this page. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or FurEver's practices, contact us at grant@aerobud.org. For help using the app, see our Support page.