Kazoo Labs Inc., a New York corporation, operates the One Step mobile application (the "App") and this website (the "Site") ("we," "us," or "our"). This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, who we share it with, and your rights regarding your data. One Step is free, has no advertising, and sells nothing, including your data.
By using the App, you agree to the collection and use of information as described in this policy. If you do not agree, please do not use the App.
1. Information we collect
1.1 When you send a report
A report goes to a dispatcher only when the App says the animal needs help, and only with a location in New York City. The App checks a rectangle drawn around the five boroughs, so a report from just across the border, such as Jersey City, is sent too. If the App tells you to leave the animal alone or to watch it, nothing is sent unless you come back and tell the App it is injured or got worse. Without a location, the report stays on your phone.
With no signal, the report waits on your phone and goes when the signal returns. A report that cannot be sent within a day is dropped, because it would be too late to act on.
A report contains:
| Category | What is sent | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Photo | The photo, if you took or chose one. Before it leaves your phone it is resized, and everything stored inside the file, including where it was taken, is removed. The server removes it again when the photo arrives. | So the dispatcher and the rescue can see the animal. |
| Where the animal is | Your phone's location and how accurate it was, or the spot you moved the pin to, and the nearest street address. | So help can find the animal. |
| What you told the App | The kind of animal, the situations you ticked, and the advice the App gave you. | So the dispatcher knows what is happening and what you were told to do. |
| Note | What you type in the note. | Anything else the dispatcher should know. |
| The App's guess | The App's guess at the kind of animal, made on your phone, and how sure it was. | So the dispatcher can check it against the photo. |
| Time and version | When you reported, and which version of the App you use. | To act in time, and to find problems with a version. |
| Anonymous ID | A random identifier created the first time the App connects (Firebase Anonymous Authentication). It is not your name, email or device ID. | So the server knows which reports are yours and which cases you may follow. |
1.2 Other information you provide
| Category | Details | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Messages | Messages you write to a dispatcher about a report. They cannot be edited, or deleted one at a time, in the App. They are deleted with everything else when you delete your data (Section 6.1). | To talk about the case. |
| Phone number (optional) | Only if you add it in the messages. It is stored with your anonymous ID, not with one report. Only the dispatcher who has your case can see it, and the admins; each time a dispatcher looks at it, the case's record says so. You can change or remove it in the App. | So a dispatcher can call you about an urgent case. |
| Reporting a message | If you report a message a dispatcher sent you: the reason you chose, anything you type with it, which message it was, and your anonymous ID. We also keep a copy of the message with the report. | So someone at One Step can review it and act. |
| Stopping a dispatcher | If you stop a dispatcher's messages: which dispatcher, the message you did it from, when, and your anonymous ID. | So that dispatcher can no longer write to you, and another dispatcher takes your case. |
What One Step never collects: your name, your email address, your contacts, the rest of your photo library, your browsing, or anything for advertising.
1.3 Location data
The App uses your location only while you are using it, so that a report records where the animal is, the map can show the places nearest you, and the App knows whether you are in New York City. One Step receives your location only inside a report. The map in a report and the street name on a report page come from Apple Maps: to draw them, your phone sends Apple the location being shown, as any map app does. You can deny location access; the App still works, but a report without a location is not sent.
1.4 Camera and photos
Photos you take in the App are kept in the App's own storage on your phone, not in your photo library, unless you save or share one of your pages yourself. If you allow access to Photos, the App can offer a photo you took in the last hour within about 1 km of where you are. Screenshots and screen recordings are never offered. To choose which photos to offer, the App reads the time and place stored with your recent photos, on your phone. Only the photo you pick is used. If you allow access to some photos only, the App sees only those.
Working out what kind of animal is in a photo happens on your phone, using Apple's Vision framework. That step uses no server and uploads nothing. Its guess is sent with the report, as listed above. No server judges the photo or how badly the animal is hurt. If that changes, this page will say so, with a date, before it starts.
1.5 Automatically collected information
| Data | How | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Anonymous ID | Created by Firebase Anonymous Authentication the first time the App connects. | To tie your reports and cases to this install. |
| Notification address | Issued by Apple and Google (Firebase Cloud Messaging) if you allow notifications, and stored with your anonymous ID. | So updates about your case can reach this phone. |
| Report count | When a report arrives, the server counts how many reports the same install sent in the last hour, and marks the report if there are more than five. An install that sends far more than anyone would (more than 20 reports in an hour, or a flood of messages) is stopped from sending for a while. | To notice floods of reports without waking a dispatcher for each. |
| Message check | Every message a dispatcher writes to you is checked by our server before you see it, for abusive or sexual language, personal questions (such as your age or school), and contact details or links outside One Step. The words a dispatcher writes on your case are checked too. A message the check holds back is read by an admin, who decides whether you get it. A photo a dispatcher adds to the end of your case is looked at by an admin before you see it. Messages you write are not checked. | To keep conversations with dispatchers safe. |
| App check | When the App connects, Apple's App Attest confirms to Firebase App Check that the request comes from the real One Step app on a real iPhone. Google receives that confirmation and a key your phone made for this install of the App. Neither is your name, your phone number or anything you sent. | So that programs can't pretend to be the App. |
| Flags and blocks | A dispatcher can flag a reporter who is abusive or sends false reports. An admin may then stop that install from sending reports and messages; that is recorded with its anonymous ID. | To protect dispatchers and keep dispatch working. |
| Technical logs | Firebase keeps technical logs, which can include the anonymous ID. | To keep the service running and find faults. |
| Device and SDK details | Firebase's software sends Google the device model, iOS version, language, time zone and SDK versions, which Google describes as not linked to a user. | So the Firebase services work. Google also uses them to see how its software is used. |
We do not collect Apple's Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA), device fingerprints, contacts or browsing history. We do not use any analytics or advertising software, and we do not track you across other apps or websites.
1.6 Our website
The Site has no advertising and no analytics, and sets no cookies of its own. Everything on it, its typeface included, comes from the Site itself, so showing a page doesn't make your browser contact any other company.
If you use the contact form, the volunteer form or the feedback form, what you enter is kept by Netlify, which receives the forms for this site: your name and email address where a form asks for them, a phone number if you give one, what you write or choose, and on the feedback form any screenshot you add. Netlify may filter entries for spam, and may use another company's spam filter to do it. What you send is used only to reply to you, to contact you about volunteering, or to read your feedback, and it is deleted if you ask. The same goes for anything you email us. Nothing from the App is sent to Netlify.
Netlify, which hosts this site, keeps standard server logs, such as IP addresses, as its own privacy policy describes.
2. How we use your information
- Get the animal help. A dispatcher reads your report and contacts a rescue or rehabilitator. The dispatcher passes the location, the photo and what you described to the one who takes the case. Your phone number is passed on only if you agree to it in the messages.
- Keep you informed. If you allow notifications, the App tells you when your case moves on and when a dispatcher writes to you. A notification about a new message shows the start of that message.
- Join reports about the same animal. If someone else reports the same animal, both reports join one case. They can see how the case is going and where the animal was reported, but never your photo, note, phone number or messages.
- Prevent abuse. We use the report count described above, and we may ignore or delete reports that break our Terms of Use.
- Keep messages safe. You can report any message a dispatcher sends you and stop any dispatcher's messages in the App. Reports, held messages, flags and blocks are read only by a small number of people at One Step who review them ("admins"), never by other dispatchers. A dispatcher you report is not told, and neither is a reporter a dispatcher flags. A dispatcher you stop can tell that someone on your case stopped them, because they can no longer write to you or work on your case. They never see why, and they can no longer see your phone number or your messages. A dispatcher whose message is held sees only that it is waiting for review. An admin may remove a dispatcher, or stop an install from sending.
- Remind you. If you ask to be reminded when a place opens, the reminder is set on your phone.
- Reply to you. We use what you send through the Site's forms or by email only to reply to you.
- Give counts. This site may give counts and short descriptions of cases, such as how many birds went into care in a month. These never include your name, phone number, messages or the exact place you reported, and your photo is never published without your permission.
Reports are not public, and there is no public feed of them. We do not use your data for advertising, and we do not sell or rent your information.
3. Third-party services and data sharing
We share data with the following services and people solely to provide the App and the Site. We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information for advertising or marketing purposes.
| Service | Data shared | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Google Firebase (Authentication, Firestore, Cloud Storage, Cloud Functions, Cloud Messaging, App Check) | Everything in a report, messages, your phone number if you add it, the notification address, the anonymous ID and the App Check confirmation. | To receive, store and route reports, to send notifications, and to turn away programs posing as the App. |
| Apple Push Notification service | The notification address and the text of each notification. | To deliver notifications to your phone. |
| Apple Maps | The location shown on a report's map. | To draw the map and find the nearest street name. |
| The rescue or rehabilitator that takes the case | The location, the photo and what you described; your phone number only if you agree in the messages. | To get the animal help. |
| Netlify (Site only) | What you enter in the Site's forms, which Netlify may filter for spam, and standard server logs. | To host the Site, and to receive its forms and keep spam out of them. |
Recognizing the animal uses Apple's Vision framework on your phone and shares nothing.
We require the rescues, rehabilitators and volunteer dispatchers who receive report data to protect it at least as well as this Privacy Policy describes, and to use it only to get the animal help.
4. Data storage and security
4.1 On your phone
Your reports and their photos are kept in the App's own storage on your phone until you delete them in the App or delete the App. They are protected so that they can't be read while your phone is locked. Your phone number, if you add it, is kept in your phone's keychain, on that phone only. To work without signal, the App also keeps a copy of what our server has sent it about your reports, including your messages.
If your phone backs up to iCloud or to a computer, your reports and their photos are in that backup, as other apps' data is. Reports waiting for signal and the photos a rescue sends for an ending are not, and your phone number never moves to another phone.
iOS may keep the App's anonymous ID and your phone number in your phone's keychain after the App is deleted, where no other app can read them. If you install the App again, it carries on as the same install and removes the phone number. Delete everything (Section 6.1) removes both.
4.2 On our servers
Sent reports, cases and messages are kept in Google Firebase: photos in Cloud Storage, everything else in Firestore. Security rules decide who can read what: your report can be read by you and by a dispatcher, and by nobody else. Your phone number can be seen only by you, the dispatcher who has your case, and the admins. Reports about messages, flags and blocks can be read only by admins. Dispatchers open photos through links that expire after 15 minutes. Photos are never public. Only dispatchers on our list can sign in to the dispatch console.
4.3 Data location
Firestore is in Google Cloud's nam5 multi-region in the United States, and Cloud Storage and Cloud Functions are in us-central1 in the United States. If you use the App outside the United States, your data will be transferred to and processed in the U.S.
4.4 Security measures
- All network traffic between the App and Firebase uses TLS encryption.
- Server-side data is encrypted at rest using Google Cloud's default encryption.
- Photos are stripped of their metadata on your phone and again on the server before anyone but a dispatcher can read them.
No internet-connected service can be 100% secure. We will notify affected users without undue delay if we detect a breach involving their personal data, and we will notify regulators where required by applicable law.
5. Data retention
| Data type | Retention |
|---|---|
| Each case and everything about it (your report, photos, messages, the outcome, the dispatcher's notes and the record of notifications sent about it) | Kept while the case is open and for one year after it closes, then deleted automatically. If a case is reopened, the year starts again when it closes again. A case nobody closes is deleted once nothing has happened on it for a year. |
| Reports about messages, held messages and flags on a reporter | Deleted with their case, once an admin has dealt with them. One still waiting for an admin when its case is deleted is kept until an admin deals with it, then for one year. If the case is already gone, one year after an admin dealt with it. |
| Stopping a dispatcher | Kept while you have any report on our servers, and for at least one year after you stopped them. |
| A phone stopped from sending | The mark stays with that anonymous ID until we lift it, or until you delete your data in the App. |
| Your anonymous ID | Until you delete your data in the App. |
| Your phone number | Until you remove it in the App, delete your data in the App, or ask us to delete it. |
| After you delete your data in the App | Reports you made about a dispatcher's message, held messages, flags and blocks involving your install are kept for review without your anonymous ID, on the schedule above. Everything else listed in Section 6.1 is deleted at once. |
| The notification address | Kept with your anonymous ID until iOS replaces it, a notification to it fails, or you delete your data in the App. |
| Firebase's technical logs | About 30 days. |
| A report waiting for signal | Sent when the signal returns, or dropped if it cannot be sent within a day. |
| The copies on your phone | Until you delete them in the App, or delete the App. |
| Site form entries and emails | Until we no longer need them to reply to you, or sooner if you ask. |
6. Your rights and choices
6.1 All users
- Access and export: email hello@onestepnyc.org with the case number the App shows and roughly when you reported. We will respond within 30 days.
- Delete everything in the App: on the Profile tab, under Your reports, tap Delete everything One Step keeps about me and confirm. Our server deletes, at once: every report you sent, with its photo, note and messages; your phone number and notification address; every case that only you reported, with the dispatcher's notes and the outcome; and your anonymous ID. Where someone else reported the same animal, their case stays, with your report and anything that identifies you taken out. Reports you made about a dispatcher's message, and any flag, block or held message involving your install, are kept so that abuse can still be reviewed, but without your anonymous ID; a report about a message keeps the reason and note you gave and the copy of the message. Then the App deletes from your phone your reports, its copy of your messages and your phone number, and starts again with a new anonymous ID. It keeps two things, on your phone only: which dispatchers you stopped and which messages you reported, so those stay hidden. Your phone's notification address stays the same and is used for the new anonymous ID. It needs a connection: if the App is offline or our server cannot finish, it says so and nothing on your phone is deleted, so you can try again.
- Deletion on your phone only: deleting a report in the App, one page at a time or all at once under Your reports on the Profile tab, removes it from your phone. If it was still waiting for signal, it is not sent. The copy the dispatcher has, and any messages, stay until the case is deleted as described above, or until you delete everything as described just above, or sooner if you ask: email hello@onestepnyc.org with the case number and roughly when you reported, and say which reports you want removed, or ask for everything. It is deleted within 30 days, and we will confirm when it is done. You do not have to explain why.
- Phone number: change or remove it in the App at any time.
- Notifications: turn case updates on or off on the case page, or turn off all notifications in iOS Settings > Notifications > One Step. A dispatcher's message notifies you whenever iOS allows One Step's notifications, because it is usually a question for you.
- Location: revoke at iOS Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > One Step.
- Camera and Photos: revoke at iOS Settings > Privacy & Security.
6.2 EU/EEA, UK, and Swiss residents (GDPR)
You have the right to access, rectify, erase, restrict processing of, transfer, and object to processing of your personal data. Our legal bases are: (i) your consent (for location, camera, photos and notifications, and for each report you choose to send), (ii) performance of contract (providing the App's features you use), and (iii) our legitimate interests in getting the animal help and in preventing abuse. To exercise these rights, email hello@onestepnyc.org. You may also lodge a complaint with your local data-protection authority.
6.3 California residents (CCPA / CPRA)
You have the right to know what personal information we collect (Section 1), request a copy (Section 6.1), request deletion (Section 6.1), opt out of "sale" or "sharing" of personal information (we do neither), and not be discriminated against for exercising these rights. Contact hello@onestepnyc.org.
7. Children's privacy
The App is not directed to children under 13 (16 in the EEA). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children below the applicable age. If you are a parent or guardian and believe your child has sent us personal information, contact hello@onestepnyc.org and we will promptly delete it. Users between the applicable minimum age and 18 may use the App with a parent's or guardian's permission. Every message a dispatcher sends is checked before it is shown, and anyone can report a message or stop a dispatcher's messages in the App, as described in Section 1.
8. International data transfers
Our backend services are based in the United States. If you are located outside the U.S., your data will be transferred to and processed in the U.S. We rely on the standard contractual clauses and data-processing agreements published by our service providers (Google Cloud and Netlify) to safeguard such transfers.
9. Changes to this policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of material changes by updating the "Last updated" date at the top of this page and, where appropriate, by an in-app notice. Anything that meaningfully expands what is collected will be announced in the App before it takes effect. Your continued use of the App after the change constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.
10. Contact us
Kazoo Labs Inc. (operator of One Step)
Email: hello@onestepnyc.org
Privacy questions, data access, or deletion requests.