Last updated ยท 22 August 2026
Fili Rocketry (called Fili on your device) is a personal flight log for hobby and high-power rocketry. This policy explains what information the app handles and where it goes. In short: your flight log stays on your own devices and in your own iCloud account. Fili has no advertising, third-party behavioural analytics, or third-party tracking SDKs, and we do not sell your data. A small amount of information is transmitted to Apple services or to the developer-operated services described below only when needed to provide a feature. For example, app-fetched weather sends launch coordinates, date and time, timezone, and any optional altitude or wind-profile parameters (such as a flight's expected apogee) needed for the lookup. The optional, off-by-default import-diagnostics feature sends an anonymized parse report only after you explicitly confirm the send. Separately, you can choose to upload a raw sample file for one import; that original file may itself contain flight data, notes, or device details, so it is always a separate, per-file action (see “Import diagnostics” below).
Where data is shared with a third-party service to provide a feature, Fili uses services that provide the same or equivalent protection of user data as described in this policy and required by applicable platform and privacy requirements.
Everything you enter into Fili is stored locally on your device, including:
This data is created and controlled entirely by you. It is not transmitted to the developer, except for the limited weather lookups and optional import diagnostics or raw samples described below. Your normal flight log and other user-created app data are not stored in a Fili account database.
If you are signed in to iCloud, Fili syncs your log across your devices using Apple's CloudKit private database. This data is stored in your own iCloud account and is accessible only to you. The developer of Fili cannot access it. iCloud data is governed by Apple's Privacy Policy. If you are not signed in to iCloud, your data simply stays on the device.
Photos, videos, and voice notes are stored locally with the associated flight. App-owned photos and voice-note originals may sync through your private CloudKit data so they are available on your other devices. Video-original sync is controlled by the app's sync settings; where an item already belongs to your iCloud Photos library, Fili may instead use Apple's photo-sync services. Fili does not upload media or voice-note originals to a Fili media server.
If imported media contains embedded location or capture-time information (EXIF), Fili reads it on your device to help fill in flight details. This processing is not sent to Fili.
When you choose to fetch weather conditions for a flight, Fili sends the flight's launch coordinates, flight date and time, timezone, and any optional altitude or wind-profile parameters needed for the request to the Fili weather backend (source repository) to retrieve normalized forecast or historical conditions from weather sources. No name, Fili account identifier, or device identifier is sent with these requests. The app rounds the launch coordinates to 0.01 degrees — roughly a kilometre, and the same grid the backend's cache key uses — before the request leaves your device, so the Fili weather service never receives your exact launch point and it cannot appear in that service's logs. The backend uses the coarsened location only to fulfil and cache the lookup. Your own flight record still holds the exact coordinate, for maps and for your own use; when iCloud sync is on it travels with that record into your private iCloud database, as described under iCloud sync above. Weather lookup data is not used for advertising, profiling, or tracking, and is not sold.
To obtain the weather, the backend may send a limited geographic area and the requested time to an upstream weather-data provider. The backend may use NOAA's NOMADS service for GFS and RAP data and, when enabled, the Copernicus Climate Data Store, operated by ECMWF, for ERA5 and ERA5T reanalysis data. Other providers will be listed here if they are enabled. This limited, location-derived request sharing is necessary to provide weather and is not a transfer of your flight log or identity.
If you accept weather fetched by the app and do not manually edit it, Fili may later make limited automatic follow-up weather requests for the same flight. These follow-up requests are used only to replace preliminary forecast or reanalysis data with final analysis data, or to improve the wind profile associated with that flight. If you manually enter weather, edit app-fetched weather, or never use the weather feature, Fili does not automatically refresh that weather.
With your permission, Fili can use your device's location to fill in the coordinates of a launch or recovery site. To show maps, offer place search, or turn coordinates (including those in imported media) into a place name, Fili uses Apple's MapKit services. These features may send search text or selected or queried coordinates to Apple, even if you do not grant device location permission. Location and sensor processing that stays on your device is not transmitted to Fili. Coordinates are sent to the Fili weather backend only when you use the weather feature, and are rounded to 0.01 degrees first, as described above. You can decline or revoke location access at any time in your device settings; the app remains fully usable without it.
On supported real devices, iOS may deliver app-health information to Fili through Apple's MetricKit framework. These reports can include crash, hang, CPU, disk-write, and daily performance diagnostics for this device. Fili stores the most recent reports locally so you can inspect them in Settings and share an individual report yourself, for example by Mail, Messages, AirDrop, or Files.
App-health reports are generated by iOS, not information you enter into your flight log, and they are kept separately from Fili's user-created app data. Fili does not automatically upload these on-device app-health reports to the developer or to the Fili backend. Separately, Apple may provide aggregate crash and performance information to the developer in Xcode Organizer for users who have opted in to sharing device analytics with app developers; that Apple analytics sharing is controlled by Apple's system settings and privacy policy, not by Fili.
Fili can read altimeter files from many different devices, and formats vary. To help us support more of them, the app has an optional import diagnostics setting, which is turned off by default. Nothing related to this feature is ever sent automatically.
When you turn it on, the import preview offers to send diagnostics to Fili: a small, anonymized diagnostic describing how a file was parsed. You can review the exact contents before sending, and nothing is sent to the Fili backend until you confirm the send action. (A share-sheet option (for example, email) remains available as a fallback.) A diagnostic contains only:
A diagnostic never includes your flight data values (altitudes, speeds, and so on), your name, locations, photos, or rocket details.
Submitted diagnostic records are retained separately to support import compatibility and are automatically deleted after 90 days.
Separately, Fili may offer a clearly distinct raw-file action, upload raw sample file (the original file you picked) so we can reproduce and fix the problem. Raw sample files may contain actual flight data such as altitudes, speeds, timestamps, or device details, so this is always a separate, explicit choice you make for that one file, with its own confirmation step; the raw file is never bundled with the diagnostics above or sent automatically. Uploaded samples are placed in backend quarantine for review before anyone opens or processes them and are normally retained for no more than 90 days. A sample may enter a compatibility or test corpus only after manual review and anonymization. You can turn off raw sample-file prompts entirely in Settings; doing so does not affect anonymized diagnostics.
If you save an altimeter or other import device for quicker reconnection, non-secret metadata such as its name, network name, type, and recent-use information is stored with your app data and may sync through your private CloudKit database. Wi-Fi board passphrases and access codes are stored separately in Apple's Keychain. Those Keychain items may sync through iCloud Keychain when you enable that Apple feature. Fili does not send these credentials to its backend.
Subscriptions and lifetime purchases are processed by Apple through the App Store and StoreKit. Fili does not receive your payment-card or bank details.
You can delete individual flights, or use Delete all data in Settings to remove your Fili records, including flights and plans; attached and managed media; saved sites, rockets, motors, devices, credentials, identity, membership, certification, achievement, telemetry, simulation, and provenance data; temporary raw-sample copies in Fili's current app-managed storage; and the app's weather cache. The operation also removes Fili's saved device credentials from Keychain. Display and import/privacy-consent preferences remain. App-health reports are cleared separately from the App Health screen. Deleting the app removes data stored on that device. Data held in iCloud can also be managed or removed through your device's iCloud settings.
To request early deletion of an import diagnostic or raw sample you submitted, contact filirocketry@icloud.com. These submissions are intentionally not associated with a Fili account or identity, so please include the submission or support identifier, upload ID, or any other details available to help locate it.
Fili is not directed at children and does not knowingly collect personal information from children.
If this policy changes, the updated version will be posted on this page with a new "last updated" date.
Questions about this policy can be sent to filirocketry@icloud.com.