BirdScribe Privacy Policy

Last updated: 3 October 2026

BirdScribe is a free field-recording tool for birders, built by Kingfisher Birding (Cairns, Australia). This policy explains what BirdScribe does and does not do with your data.

The short version: BirdScribe does not require an account, does not ask who you are, and does not store your identity unless you choose to give us your name or email. Almost everything stays on your device.

No account, no identity. BirdScribe does not require an account and does not ask who you are. There is no signup and no password. The only times BirdScribe accepts your name or email are when you choose to give them: when sending feedback, when asking for an export link by email, or on this website's signup forms, all described below.

What stays on your device. Your observations, transcripts, GPS coordinates, session notes, and exported eBird files are stored locally on your device using on-device storage. BirdScribe does not store these on any server, unless you choose to send an eBird export as a link or attach your trip to feedback (both described below). Some of them are sent for processing without being stored, as set out next. Backups you make are saved to a place you choose, such as iCloud Drive or Google Drive. BirdScribe never receives them.

What leaves your device. Nine things can leave your device. None of them includes your name or email address unless you type one in. Four carry a random install identifier that is not linked to any person or account, and several carry your location or your birding region, as set out below; trip details leave only when you choose to send them. Like any internet request, each one also reaches its recipient with your device's network (IP) address. First, when you record an observation, the text of what you said (for example, "five rainbow lorikeets in the fig tree") is sent through BirdScribe's server to Anthropic's Claude API so the app can suggest the species. Your birding region (for example, "East Sussex") goes with it, so the suggestions fit where you are. The request to BirdScribe's server also carries the random install identifier. To stop misuse, the server keeps a daily count of requests for each install identifier and for each network (IP) address, stored on Supabase. A network address is only ever stored as a one-way hash, never as the address itself (see "Network addresses" below). It does not store the transcript, and it does not pass the identifier or your network address to Anthropic. Your narration audio stays on your device and is never uploaded, unless you use BirdScribe 3.6 or later and choose to attach a voice clip to feedback (see "Feedback" below). Anthropic processes this text under their own terms; see anthropic.com/legal. Second, in BirdScribe 3.5 and earlier only (removed in 3.6): when you capture a bird call (a "sound bite"), the audio is sent to BirdScribe's own server for automated species analysis using BirdNET, with your location and the week of the year, and without an install identifier. To stop misuse, the server keeps a daily count of these requests for each network address, stored only as a one-way hash. The recording is analysed and then discarded straight away. BirdScribe 3.6 and later never send bird recordings anywhere. Third, to show a friendly place name for your session (for example, "Cattana Wetlands"), your GPS coordinates are sent once per session to Mapbox, a mapping service, which returns the nearest place name. When you open a map in the app, the map images for that area are also loaded from Mapbox, and Mapbox counts the map load. Mapbox processes those coordinates under its own terms (see mapbox.com/legal/privacy); BirdScribe does not store them on any server. Fourth, BirdScribe sends usage events (which features are used and whether recordings succeed), tagged with a random install identifier so events from one install can be counted together, along with the app version and build number, your phone's operating system version and its model. They are stored on BirdScribe's database, run on Supabase. That identifier is generated on your device, is not linked to any person or account, and the events never include your location, transcripts, species, or audio. Fifth, when you tap to export a checklist and choose to send it as a link, the CSV and a short summary are sent to BirdScribe's link-hosting service, run on Supabase; see "eBird export handoff" below. Sixth, if you choose to send us feedback from within the app, your written comment and device details are sent to BirdScribe's feedback service, also run on Supabase; see "Feedback" below. Seventh, if you tick "Share my learned names with the BirdScribe community" on the Learned names screen, the names you have taught BirdScribe (each phrase and the species it stands for) and your birding region are sent to BirdScribe's database, also run on Supabase, tagged with the random install identifier. Sharing is off unless you switch it on, and it never includes your location, recordings or trips. Eighth, if you ask for weather to be added to a trip (or switch on adding it automatically when a trip ends, which is off unless you do), your location to about 11 metres and the trip's start and end dates are sent from your phone straight to Open-Meteo, a weather service, which returns the conditions. No install identifier goes with it, BirdScribe does not receive or store it, and Open-Meteo processes it under its own terms. Ninth, to suggest nearby eBird hotspots, your location rounded to about 1 kilometre and your birding region are sent to BirdScribe's server, which returns hotspots from a stored copy of eBird's public hotspot list, or asks eBird for them. No install identifier goes with it and the location is not stored or logged. This is on unless you turn it off on the trip screen. The server briefly holds your network address in memory, not in a database, to limit repeated requests.

Your Calls. In BirdScribe 3.6 and later, bird recordings you make with Your Call stay on your phone. They leave it only if you share or export them yourself, or include them in a backup you save to your own storage. On iPhone, while a trip is running and the setting to catch the seconds before you tap is on (it is on by default and turns off in one tap), the microphone stays on and BirdScribe holds the last few seconds of sound (10 to 60, your choice) in memory, so a Your Call can begin just before you tapped. That sound is never written to storage, never uploaded and never kept. It is replaced continuously and discarded when the trip ends, the setting is turned off, or you leave the record screen without Pocket Mode on. The only way any of it is kept is as the start of a Your Call you save. iPhone shows its orange microphone dot while this is happening.

Network addresses. Where BirdScribe's server counts requests to stop misuse, it never saves a client (network or IP) address to its database as it is. The address is turned into a one-way hash, which cannot be turned back into the address, and the hash is used only for rate limiting. Rows holding a hashed address are deleted after 7 days. Our hosting and database providers also keep standard request logs, which include network addresses, for a short period to run and secure their services.

Speech recognition. BirdScribe uses your device's built-in speech recognition to turn your spoken words into text. Depending on your platform, device, and language settings, some audio may be processed on Apple's or Google's servers. That processing is handled by the platform provider under its own privacy policy, not by BirdScribe. BirdScribe does not store your voice recordings on its servers, except in BirdScribe 3.6 and later, where a voice clip you choose to attach to feedback is stored (see "Feedback" below).

Location. BirdScribe uses your device location to tag observations for eBird export. That location data is stored on your device and is included in the eBird files you choose to export. It leaves your device in the ways described in "What leaves your device" above: your birding region sent with each transcript so suggestions fit where you are; in BirdScribe 3.5 and earlier, your location sent alongside a captured bird call so BirdNET could narrow the matches to species for your region; your GPS coordinates sent once per session to Mapbox to look up a friendly place name, and the area you are looking at when you open a map; your location to about 11 metres and the trip's dates, sent to Open-Meteo, only when you add weather to a trip; your location rounded to about 1 kilometre, sent to BirdScribe's server to look up nearby hotspots; your birding region with your learned names, only if you switch on community sharing; the GPS coordinates in an eBird CSV, only if you choose to send your export as a link; and the GPS coordinates and other trip details in a feedback submission, only if you choose to attach your trip. None of this is linked to your identity. The BirdNET, Mapbox and Open-Meteo copies are not stored by BirdScribe, and the hotspot lookup location is not stored either; the eBird handoff and feedback copies are stored briefly, as described below.

eBird export handoff. When you export a checklist, BirdScribe always creates a CSV file on your device. You can also ask for that CSV as a link, emailed to you, so you can finish the checklist on a computer. If you ask for a link, BirdScribe sends the CSV (species, counts, comments, dates and GPS coordinates), a short summary (species count, date and location name) and the email address you give to BirdScribe's link-hosting service, run on Supabase infrastructure certified to ISO 27001 and SOC 2 (that certification covers Supabase's infrastructure, not BirdScribe as a company). The file is stored for 15 minutes and then automatically deleted, whether or not the link is opened. The link is not listed anywhere and is not indexed by search engines, so only someone with the exact link can open it, and only within that window. The email is delivered by our email service, Resend. That email address is used once, for that message, and is not kept on our server; BirdScribe remembers it on your device so you don't need to type it again next time. Your trip data always stays safely on your device too, so if a link expires before you use it, asking again gives you a fresh one and nothing is lost. BirdScribe never sees or stores your eBird username or password and never submits anything to eBird on your behalf. You log into eBird and import the file yourself, and what you do with it after that is governed by eBird's own terms.

Feedback. If you send us feedback from within the app, BirdScribe always sends your written comment together with device details: your app version, build number, operating system version, device model, and a random install identifier that is not linked to your name. Feedback never includes your location or logged birds unless you switch on the trip attachment below, and never includes a recording unless, in BirdScribe 3.6 and later, you attach a voice clip below. Six further things are optional, off by default, and independent of each other. First, your name and email, so we can reply to you; leaving these blank means your feedback carries no name or email. Second, a separate, second tick to hear about BirdScribe developments by email; this is a distinct choice from giving your name and email, we only act on it if you have also given an email address, and every email we send about developments carries a working unsubscribe link. Third, attaching your current trip, the only part of feedback that can carry your location, which is why switching it on takes an extra confirmation step. If you attach a trip, BirdScribe sends a short text summary (the date, the location name, and for each bird the time, species and count) along with the same eBird CSV your export would produce. That CSV also carries GPS coordinates for the trip, plus any comments you have typed against a species and any age, sex, plumage or behaviour details recorded for it. If you have separately chosen, elsewhere in the app, to include a bird's spoken transcript with its comment, that transcript is included too. Attaching a trip never includes your written Field Notes. Fourth, your learned names (each phrase and the species it stands for). Fifth, "mic start diagnostics": a technical record of recent times the microphone failed to start (the phone's audio settings and the app's state at the time, never anything you said). Sixth, in BirdScribe 3.6 and later, up to three of your voice clips, the recordings of your own spoken observations, which otherwise never leave your phone: each is ticked one by one, and each goes with the words and the bird its card holds, so we can hear what was misheard. Your bird recordings (Your Calls) are never attached to feedback. Feedback and anything attached to it, including any voice clips, are stored on the same Supabase infrastructure as the eBird handoff above, and kept until we have read, actioned or closed out what you have told us, then deleted. Each piece of feedback is also emailed to us through our email service, Resend, with your comment and any contact details you gave. You can ask us to delete it sooner at any time using the contact details below.

On this website. birdscribe.com counts visits with Vercel Web Analytics, which sets no cookies and does not identify you. Two forms on this site collect only what you type into them. The trailblazer signup takes your email address and which phone you use, and optionally your name and birding region. We use them to set you up as a trailblazer, which means giving your email address to Apple (for TestFlight) or Google (for Google Play) so they can send you the invitation, and each signup is emailed to us through our email service, Resend. The "Get new features first" signup on the What's new page takes only your email address, and we use it only to email you when a new version of BirdScribe is in the stores; every one of those emails has a working unsubscribe link. Both are stored on the same Supabase infrastructure as the app's data. You can ask us to delete them at any time using the contact details below.

Where data is processed. We use service providers, such as Supabase, who may store and process data outside Australia. That covers the providers named in this policy and the others we use to host our website and servers, deliver email, and process the text of what you say.

Children. BirdScribe is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect data from them.

Changes. If a future version of BirdScribe collects additional data, this policy will be updated and the change disclosed before that feature is enabled.

Contact. Questions: hello@birdscribe.com.