Effective date: 22 June 2026 Last updated: 21 October 2026 Version: 2.4
This page says what Gleich does with your data: what we collect, why, the legal basis under the GDPR, who receives it, how long we keep it, and your rights. If anything is unclear, email us at info@kesselapps.de.
Gleich is an app for iPhone and Android for getting together with friends. You make a plan (a place and a time), invite friends with your link or QR code, sort out who brings what, and, if you want, share your location with the others in the plan while you are on your way.
In short:
The rest of this page is the detailed version.
The controller of your personal data under the GDPR is:
de.kesselapps.gleichapp).Your account has a random identifier that Gleich makes, and a display name. The display name may be filled in from the name Apple or Google gives the app when you first sign in, or you type it. Until you confirm a name, you show as "Guest". Your name is shown to the people in your plans. It does not have to be your real name.
Your account also keeps the email address Apple or Google gives us when you sign in, if they say it is verified. On iPhone, if you chose Apple's "Hide My Email", it is the relay address Apple made for Gleich. We store it encrypted and use it only to answer you when you write to us and to write to you about your account. The other people in your plans never see it, and it is not part of the totals (section 3n). If a later sign-in gives a different address, we keep the new one.
Names, plan titles and notes go through an automatic check: the server refuses swear words, slurs and hate slogans in English, German and French. If a name from Apple or Google fails the check at sign-in, it is not used. A refused word is not stored and not counted.
When you sign in, the app asks Apple for your name and your email address. Apple gives the app a signed token. Our server checks it and keeps your Apple user identifier: a stable value Apple makes for Gleich only. If the token carries your email address and Apple says it is verified, our server keeps that too (section 3a). The app itself does not read or keep the email address.
When you sign in, our server also gets a token from Apple and stores it encrypted. It is used for one thing: when you delete your account, our server asks Apple to end Gleich's access to your Apple ID. No part of Gleich shows this token.
Google gives the app a signed token and the name on your Google Account; the app reads only these two. Our server checks the token against Google's public keys and stores two things from it: your Google user identifier and, if Google says it is verified, your email address (section 3a). We store no Google token. The app offers the name from your Google Account as your display name. An account made with Apple and one made with Google are two separate accounts.
When you make a plan, we store its title, its type, the place (its coordinates and, if you picked one, its address), the meeting time, who hosts it, its status and when it was made.
A list is a plan with no place and no time. We store its title, who made it, when it was made and last changed, and its items: for each item the words, who added it, and who bought it and when. No location is shared on a list.
Only the plan's members can see a plan or a list. To anyone else our server answers as if it did not exist, and there is no list of all plans.
Directions. When you tap Directions on a plan, the app opens a maps app with the plan's place: on iPhone Apple Maps or Google Maps, on Android the maps app you choose. It hands over the plan's address or, without one, the place's coordinates and the plan's title. Our server is not involved, and that maps app's own privacy policy applies.
For each bring line: the item, an optional note, who brings it and when it was added. The host can add a line marked as needed that nobody has taken yet.
If your group uses costs:
Gleich moves no money. A "paid" mark is a note that two people settled outside the app. We take no card or bank details.
While you share your location for a plan, your phone sends its position. If you only open a plan's map to see the others ("See the map"), your phone sends no position and the app does not ask for your location.
If you scan a friend's QR code to join a plan, the app uses your camera to read the code. Gleich does not store or upload photos.
When you search for a plan's address, the app sends what you typed and your phone's language settings to our server. If you are changing a place you already picked, or you add a house number to the place you picked, it also sends that place's position; for a house number the app runs one more search with the place's words and the number. Our server then asks Mapbox, passing on the text, your first language only and that position rounded to about 11 km. Mapbox sees our server, not your phone.
Our server keeps recent searches and their results in its memory for up to 24 hours, so it does not ask Mapbox twice. They are gone when the server restarts, and what you typed is never written to our database. Our log notes that your account searched and how many results came back, never what you typed. The address you pick is saved with the plan (d. above).
Gleich sends two notifications, both about asking to join:
Each notification is one of these two fixed sentences and nothing else. On iPhone, the one to a host also sets the number on the app's icon: how many people are waiting to join your plans. Gleich sends no other notifications.
The push address. To deliver them, your phone gives our server a push address: on iPhone the device token that Apple's push service gives the app, on Android the installation ID of Google's Firebase library in the app. The phone gives it only while all three hold: you are signed in, notifications are allowed for Gleich, and your phone hosts a plan or waits to be let into one. The Android app keeps Firebase's automatic start switched off and switches it on only then. It uses Firebase for notifications only.
When your phone asks. On iPhone, and on Android 13 and later, your phone asks whether Gleich may send notifications when you tap "Notify me" (as a host, or while you wait to be let in), or when you start sharing your location. Whichever comes first, your answer counts for both. On Android 12 and older, Android asks no question, so the app waits for your tap on "Notify me" or "Turn on" (as a host, or while you wait to be let in): only after it does the phone give the push address, and only while notifications stay switched on for Gleich in the phone's settings. If an earlier version of the app gave the address without that tap, the app, when it next starts, tells our server to delete it and asks Google to delete its Firebase installation.
What we keep. Our server keeps the push address with your sign-in session on that phone, with the kind of phone and when it was given. It is never shown to anyone and never written to our logs. For each notification, our server sends the push address and the sentence to Apple's push service (iPhone, with the icon's number) or to Google's Firebase Cloud Messaging (Android), and they deliver it to your phone (section 6b). How long we keep the address is in section 8.
Turning them off. Switch notifications off for Gleich in your phone's settings. The next time the app starts or comes to the front, it tells our server to delete the push address. Without notifications, a host sees requests to join when they open Gleich.
On your phone. Reading the push address on your phone is needed only to deliver these notifications. Where you say yes first, to your phone's question or with your tap on Android 12 and older, your yes is your request for them, so the app does not ask for a separate consent (§ 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG).
The notices about your own sharing (section 5) come from the app itself and go through no push service.
Our server receives the technical data any internet service needs to answer, such as your device's IP address. What our logs hold:
To limit how often a device can call our server, the web server counts requests by IP address in its memory; it does not log them.
Errors are written only to our own server's logs. No crash-reporting service receives anything.
To see whether Gleich is used and growing, our server counts totals from the records it already holds to run the service: for example how many accounts exist and how many were used recently, how many plans were made and how many people were in them, how many groups planned again, how many items people bring, and how many reports and blocks there are. It keeps one set of totals for each day. Each total is one number for one day. It holds no name, no account identifier, no plan title and no place. We collect nothing extra from your phone for this, the app contains no analytics SDK, and no outside analytics service receives anything.
Gleich does not collect your phone number, password, contacts, photo library, health data, card or bank details, or advertising identifiers. The apps contain no analytics, advertising or crash-reporting SDKs.
Some data about you comes from other people, not from you:
| What | Who gives it |
|---|---|
| A bring line with your name on it, and a line the host marks as needed | another member of your plan, or its host |
| A cost you are said to have paid or to share, and a "paid" mark between you and someone else | another member of your plan |
| That you asked to join through someone's link, and the host's decision on your request | the member whose link you used, and the host |
| A report about you, with the reason the reporter picked | the person who reported you |
| A block against you | the person who blocked you |
| Your name, your Apple or Google identifier and your email address at sign-in | Apple or Google, when you sign in |
None of this comes from public sources. A report is seen only by Kessel Apps: the person reported is not shown the report or who filed it.
On iPhone the app asks for location "While Using the App" and never for "Always". While you share, the app keeps getting your position with the phone locked, until your sharing stops. Far from the place the app asks for your position to about 1 km and sends a new one after about 500 metres; near it, to about 100 metres, after about 25 metres. Near the place it may ask iOS for full accuracy for a short time, to notice that you have arrived. When someone new can see you while you share, the app tells you, as a notification when Gleich is in the background; that is why it may ask about notifications when you start sharing.
On Android the app asks for precise and approximate location. While you share, it runs as a foreground service and shows the notification "Sharing your location" with a Stop button. It never asks for location "all the time". A second notification channel, "Who can see you", tells you when someone new can see you.
You can withdraw the location permission at any time in your phone's settings.
This is not "tracking" in Apple's App Tracking Transparency sense, and Gleich shows no tracking prompt.
| Company | What it does for Gleich | What it receives | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hetzner Online GmbH | Hosts our server, the database and its backups | Everything our server stores (section 3) | Germany (EU) |
| Cloudflare, Inc. | Sits in front of our server (encryption of the connection, proxy) and runs the website gleich.app | Connection data, including your IP address | USA / global |
| Mapbox | Draws the map in both apps; finds addresses through our server | From the apps: map and map-tile requests, with your IP address. The map's own usage reporting to Mapbox is switched off in both apps before a map is drawn. The (i) on the map opens Mapbox's own setting: if you turn the reporting on there, Mapbox receives location and usage data from the map for its own purposes, under its own privacy policy. On iPhone your choice is kept; on Android the app switches it off again after its next start. From our server: the search text, your first language and the rounded position (section 3k) | USA |
| Apple | Runs iOS and the App Store; Sign in with Apple; delivers Gleich's notifications to iPhones (Apple Push Notification service); ends Gleich's access to your Apple ID when you delete your account; passes on email we send to an Apple relay address | The sign-in, that request, any email we send to a relay address, and for each notification the push address, the sentence and, to a host, the icon's number (section 3l) | USA / global |
| Runs Android and Google Play; Sign in with Google; on Android, works out your phone's position for the app; delivers Gleich's notifications to Android phones (Firebase Cloud Messaging) | The sign-in. From the Firebase library in the Android app: its installation ID, the app's version and details of the phone, such as its model, brand and Android version, and which store installed the app. From our server: for each notification, the installation ID and the sentence, and a request for the right to send notifications, which carries nothing about you. Our server also checks Google's sign-in token against Google's public keys | USA / global | |
| IONOS SE | Hosts our email, info@kesselapps.de | The emails you send us and the emails we send you, with the addresses | Germany (EU) |
If you tap Directions, the maps app you choose receives the plan's place from your phone (section 3d).
Their own privacy policies: Hetzner https://www.hetzner.com/legal/privacy-policy · Cloudflare https://www.cloudflare.com/privacypolicy/ · Mapbox https://www.mapbox.com/legal/privacy · Apple https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/ · Google https://policies.google.com/privacy
We do not sell data and do not use it for advertising.
We may disclose data if the law requires it (for example a valid request from a competent authority), and only as far as required.
Our server, database and backups are in Germany. Cloudflare, Mapbox, Apple and Google, including Apple's and Google's services that deliver notifications, are based in the USA and may process data there. Where data goes to a country outside the EU, the transfer relies on one of the safeguards the GDPR provides: an adequacy decision of the European Commission (Art. 45 GDPR) or the EU Standard Contractual Clauses (Art. 46 GDPR). Write to info@kesselapps.de to ask which safeguard applies to a company and for a copy of it.
In the app: on your plans list, open Settings, then tap Delete account, on iPhone and on Android. Without the app: follow https://gleich.app/delete-account.
Deletion happens at once and is permanent. Our server first asks Apple to end Gleich's access to your Apple ID (if you signed in with Apple), then deletes:
What stays:
There is no soft-delete. Your data stays in our backups until they expire.
To work, the app keeps a few things on your phone:
These are strictly needed for the service you asked for, so the app does not ask for consent to store them (§ 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG).
Notifications. The app keeps no copy of the push address. On iPhone it asks iOS for it while the conditions in section 3l hold, and holds it in memory only. On Android, Google's Firebase library makes its installation ID on the phone once the app switches the library on. When this happens, and the law it rests on, is in section 3l.
| What we do | Why | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Your account, sign-in with Apple or Google, sessions | So you can sign in and stay signed in | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR |
| Ending Gleich's access with Apple when you delete your account | So deletion is complete | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) |
| Your email address | To answer you when you write to us, and to write to you about your account | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f): answering requests and knowing whose account a request is about; Contract, Art. 6(1)(b), where it is about the service you signed up for |
| Plans, lists, members, invite links, requests to join, bring lines and list items, costs and "paid" marks | To run the plan or list you made or joined | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) |
| Data other members enter about you (section 4) | So the people in a plan can plan it together | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f): the members' interest in running their plan |
| Sharing your location with your plan | The live map you turn on | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) |
| Notifications: your push address, and sending the sentence through Apple or Google | To tell a host that someone asks to join, and to tell you that you are in | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b). Reading the push address on your phone: § 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG, where you say yes first (section 3l) |
| Mapbox's usage reporting, only if you turn it on in the map's (i) | Mapbox's own purposes | Consent, Art. 6(1)(a), given by turning it on; you can turn it off there at any time |
| Camera for the QR code | To join a plan by scanning | Consent, Art. 6(1)(a), through your phone's camera permission |
| Address search through Mapbox | To set a plan's place | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) |
| Blocks | So two people stop seeing each other | Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) for the person who blocks; legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f), for the person blocked: keeping people safe |
| Reports, and keeping them 180 days | To review abuse and act on it, and to keep a record if an account is deleted | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f): keeping people safe |
| A short record of a deleted account, kept 90 days (section 8) | To look into problems and misuse after an account is deleted | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f): keeping people safe and finding faults |
| The automatic word check on names, titles and notes | To keep slurs and hate out of plans | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f) |
| Logs | To run the service, find faults and stop misuse | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f) |
| Checking that requests come from a current Gleich app | To stop automated misuse of our server; older builds are refused | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f) |
| Backups | To restore the service after a failure | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f) |
| Counting totals (section 3n) | To know whether Gleich is used and growing, and to plan the server and the company's funding | Legitimate interests, Art. 6(1)(f); further processing for statistical purposes with the safeguards of Art. 89(1) GDPR. Totals are never used for a decision about you |
| Keeping the sign-in token and the other items of section 9 on your phone (the push address has its own row above) | So the app works | § 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG, and Contract, Art. 6(1)(b) |
Is this data required? Signing in with Apple or Google and a display name are needed to have an account. Sharing your location is needed only for others to see you on the live map; without it you can still make, join, plan and look at the map. Notifications are optional too. There is no legal duty to give us any of it.
We do not use your data for advertising or profiling, and we make no automated decisions with legal effect. The word check only refuses a word; it decides nothing else about you.
You have the right to object, at any time, on grounds relating to your particular situation, to processing of your data that is based on our legitimate interests (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR). That covers: data other members enter about you, blocks against you, reports, the word check, logs, the app check, backups, your email address and the counting of totals (section 10).
To object, write to info@kesselapps.de. We then stop that processing, unless we can show compelling legitimate grounds that override your interests, rights and freedoms, or the processing is needed to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.
Under the GDPR you have the right to:
For anything you cannot do in the app, write to info@kesselapps.de. We answer within one month.
No online service can promise that nothing ever goes wrong. If something does, we will tell you as the law requires.
gleich.app is run by Cloudflare. The site's own code sets no cookies and runs no analytics, and its server logs are switched off. Cloudflare receives your connection data, including your IP address, as it does for our server (section 6b).
Gleich is not meant for children. You must be at least 18 to use it. We do not knowingly collect data from anyone younger; if you believe a child uses Gleich, tell us and we will delete the account.
We update this policy when Gleich changes. We then change the "Last updated" date and the version above. The current version is always at https://gleich.app/privacy.
Questions or privacy requests: