Family Clock
FrançaisPut my clock together

Privacy and legal notice

Updated 9 November 2026. This page covers the familyclock.fr website and the Family Clock apps for iPhone and Android, published by Robin Kubler (KUBLER ROBIN, sole trader (entrepreneur individuel, EI)). This is a translation of the Confidentialité et mentions légales; the French version prevails.

In short

  • The app sends your time zone’s name, for example Europe/Paris, never your position.
  • No account to create: no name, no email, no password.
  • The website uses no cookies, no visitor statistics and no content loaded from other sites.
  • Your data is never sold or used for advertising.
  • It is stored in the European Union, by Cloudflare.

The familyclock.fr website

When you visit the site

To send you the pages and protect the site from attacks, Cloudflare, the host, processes your device’s network (IP) address and technical details about your browser. We don’t record them. The site itself sets no cookies and stores nothing in your browser; the typeface and images come from the site itself. If Cloudflare has to filter out bots, it may set a strictly necessary security cookie that is used for nothing else.

Signing up for project news

  • Data: your email address, the page’s language, the date you agreed, the version of the text you agreed to, and your answers to the questionnaire (why you want one, your ideas, including what you write under “Other”, and whether four displays suit you, and if not how many). The first names and cities you type into the clock preview stay on your device: they are never sent.
  • Why: to tell you when the Ulule campaign opens and send news about the project, at most once a month. Your answers to the questionnaire help us decide what to build and write to you about the clock you put together.
  • Legal basis: your consent (GDPR article 6(1)(a)), which you can withdraw at any time. For your answers to the questionnaire, which you give freely: our legitimate interest in knowing what to build (GDPR article 6(1)(f)), which you can object to by writing to us.
  • How long: until you unsubscribe, and at most three years after your last contact (for example a reply or a click in one of our emails). After you unsubscribe we keep only a fingerprint of your address (a code computed from it that can’t be turned back into it), for three years, so we never write to you again. Your answers to the questionnaire are erased with your address.
  • Who has access: Robin Kubler. Addresses are stored by Cloudflare in the European Union. The service that will send the emails will be named here before the first one goes out. Our emails don’t track opens or clicks.
  • Unsubscribe: the link in every email, the unsubscribe page, or a message to contact@familyclock.fr.

To slow down bots, Cloudflare counts form submissions per network address for one minute. That address is not recorded.

Messages sent to contact@familyclock.fr

They pass through Cloudflare and arrive in a Gmail mailbox (Google). They are used to answer you (GDPR article 6(1)(f): our legitimate interest in handling your request) and kept while we handle it, then at most three years.

The Family Clock apps

Your account

The app creates an anonymous account by itself, with no name, email or password. A key kept on your phone links the app to that account; the server keeps only a fingerprint of it.

What the app sends

  • Your time zone’s name, for example Europe/Paris: when it changes, when you open the app, and about every six hours to confirm it hasn’t changed.
  • With each report: when the phone noticed it, a counter, a random report number, the kind of phone (iPhone or Android) and the app version.
  • The app’s wake-up address (see “Silent wake-ups”).

It never sends your position, coordinates, contacts or anything else from your phone.

Location

On iPhone, the app asks for “Always” location permission, because iOS only wakes a closed app with that permission. It uses it only to notice a time zone change: the position stays on the phone and is neither stored nor sent. If you refuse, the app still sends your time zone whenever you open it. On Android, the app doesn’t ask for location.

What clock owners type in

The clock’s name, the first name shown for each display, the cities chosen for fixed displays and the clock’s settings. When someone asks to become an owner of a clock that already has one, the first name they give is shown to the owners.

Who sees what

A clock’s owners see in the app each person’s first name and time zone, and when each last sent it. The clock itself receives only the time zones, not the names. Robin Kubler can access the server to run it and fix faults.

Codes and protection against abuse

Invitation codes, the code on the clock’s label and the code it shows when its button is pressed are kept only as fingerprints. When someone types a code, the server keeps a scrambled form of their network address for at most a day, to stop people guessing codes (GDPR article 6(1)(f): our legitimate interest in protecting clocks).

Silent wake-ups

If the server hasn’t heard from a phone for about seven hours, it sends the app a silent message, at most one every six hours, so it sends the time zone again. The message contains nothing about you and shows nothing. Apple (Apple Push Notification service) delivers it to iPhones and Google (Firebase Cloud Messaging) to Android phones, using a wake-up address they gave the app. On Android, Firebase is used only for these messages, with no analytics.

Legal basis

This data is used to run the service you asked for by installing the app and accepting an invitation (GDPR article 6(1)(b)).

How long it is kept

  • Each time zone report: 30 days. After that only the latest is kept, because that is what the clock shows.
  • The wake-up address: until the account is deleted, or until Apple or Google say it no longer works.
  • The scrambled network address: one day at most.
  • The account: until you delete it.
  • The clock’s name, first names and settings: until the last owner deletes their account or resets the clock.

Deleting your data

See delete my account, with or without the app. Uninstalling the app does not delete the account.

Service providers and transfers outside the European Union

  • Cloudflare, Inc. (USA): hosting the site and the server, storing data in the European Union, forwarding received emails. To route connections, Cloudflare also processes technical data in other countries.
  • Apple Inc. and Google LLC (USA): delivering silent wake-ups.
  • Google LLC: the mailbox for messages sent to contact@familyclock.fr.

These companies take part in the EU–US Data Privacy Framework, recognised by the European Commission on 10 July 2023, and the Commission’s standard contractual clauses apply as well.

Your rights

You can ask to access, correct, erase, restrict or receive a copy of your data, object to processing based on our legitimate interest, and withdraw your consent at any time. Write to contact@familyclock.fr; you will get an answer within one month. If you think your rights are not respected, you can complain to the CNIL, the French data protection authority (cnil.fr, 3 place de Fontenoy, TSA 80715, 75334 Paris Cedex 07, France).

Security

All connections are encrypted (HTTPS). Keys, codes and tokens are kept only as fingerprints.

Report a flaw

If you think you have found a flaw in the clock, the apps, the server or this website, write to security@familyclock.fr, in French or English.

  • Describe what you found and how to reproduce it.
  • Don’t access other people’s data and don’t disrupt families’ clocks.
  • Give us time to fix it before publishing anything.

You get an acknowledgement, then news of the fix. Fixes for the clock are sent remotely.

This information also exists in a format security tools can read: security.txt.

Changes

If this policy changes, the date at the top changes too. For an important change, people signed up for project news are told by email.