Cyprus Bus — Privacy Policy

Last updated: 19 August 2026

Cyprus Bus shows live and scheduled public-transport times for Cyprus, published by BotSquash. This policy explains how the app handles your information. Short version: no account, no analytics, no ads, no advertising ID, your location never leaves your device, and the only outside data sharing is with Google Play Billing if you choose to buy the optional Cyprus Bus Pro unlock — described in full below.

Change on 19 August 2026: advertising was removed from Cyprus Bus entirely. Earlier versions of this app showed Google AdMob banner ads and used your device's advertising ID. The ad SDK has been removed from the app completely — no ads are served, no advertising ID is read or shared, and the app no longer requests the AD_ID permission. The consent prompt that existed to satisfy Google's advertising rules is gone with it, because there is no longer any ad-personalisation consent to give or withdraw. Monetisation is now a single optional one-time purchase (see "In-app purchase" below).

Cyprus Bus does not collect personal data itself, has no account, and no servers of its own. It contacts the Cyprus Ministry of Transport's public open-data endpoints to fetch bus schedules and live positions (no personal data sent), plus Google Play Billing if you choose to buy the optional Cyprus Bus Pro unlock. See "In-app purchase" below for exactly what that one third party sees.

Data we collect

None, ourselves. Google Play Billing — described below — is the only outside party involved, and only if you choose to make a purchase.

The app has no account or login.
Your favourite stops and settings are stored only on your own device. They never leave your phone.
The app does not use analytics, crash reporting, or tracking SDKs of its own.

Advertising

Cyprus Bus shows no ads. There is no ad SDK in the app, no advertising ID is read or shared with anyone, and no ad network receives any data about you. The app does not request the com.google.android.gms.permission.AD_ID permission.

Versions of Cyprus Bus published before 19 August 2026 did show Google AdMob banner ads and did use your device's advertising ID. If you used one of those versions and want to clear anything Google may hold from that period, you can reset your advertising ID in your device's system settings and use Google's own account privacy controls. Nothing from that period was ever sent to, stored by, or visible to us.

Location

If you grant location permission, Cyprus Bus uses your device's GPS to find bus stops near you. Your location is used entirely on your device — it is compared against the app's own bundled/downloaded stop database locally and is never sent to us or to any server. Location permission is optional: the app's search, favourites, and schedule features all work fully without it.

Why the app requests Internet access

Cyprus Bus contacts two official Cyprus public-transport open-data endpoints (operated by the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Works, via motionbuscard.org.cy) to:

download bus route and timetable data so schedules work offline afterward, and
fetch live vehicle position updates so arrival times can be shown as "live" rather than just scheduled.

These requests contain no personal information — no account identifier, no advertising ID, nothing that identifies you. They are the same kind of request any transit map or timetable website makes to read public data.

Permissions

Internet: fetches public transport schedule and live-position data (see above), and processes the optional Cyprus Bus Pro purchase via Google Play Billing.
Location (optional): used on-device only, to find nearby stops. See "Location" above.
The app does not use contacts, camera, or microphone, does not request the advertising ID, and stores nothing beyond its own app data.

Home-screen widget

The optional home-screen widget shows the next departure for your favourite stops. It reads data your device already downloaded and displays it locally — nothing is transmitted to make the widget work.

Third-party data source

Bus schedule and live-position data is sourced from the Cyprus National Access Point / the Department of Public Works, Ministry of Transport, Communications and Works (motionbuscard.org.cy), published as open data under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0) — full licence text at creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0. Cyprus Bus is an independent app and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the Cyprus government or Motion.

In-app purchase

The optional Cyprus Bus Pro unlock (product id cyprus_bus_pro) is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. It does not renew and nothing is charged again. It unlocks unlimited saved journeys, unlimited favourite stops, and the home-screen widget; every other feature — journey planning, search, timetables, the map, offline data, fares and service alerts — is free and always has been.

The purchase is sold and processed entirely through Google Play Billing. We never see or store your card or payment details. Google Play holds the record of the purchase, which is what makes it restorable: the Settings screen shows whether Pro is active and offers a "Restore purchases" button if you reinstall or switch devices.

Cyprus Bus previously offered a "Remove Ads" annual subscription (remove_ads_annual). That product was never activated in Google Play and was never sold to anyone, so no one holds a subscription to it and there is nothing to cancel. It has been withdrawn along with the ads it related to.

Your rights (GDPR / EEA, UK, and Switzerland users)

Cyprus Bus itself holds essentially no personal data about you — no account, no server-side profile, nothing beyond what's described above. To the extent any data processing does apply to you (only through Google Play Billing, if you make a purchase — Google's own processing, described above), you have the following rights under the GDPR:

Right of access — you can ask what data, if any, is held about you.
Right to erasure — you can ask for any such data to be deleted. Uninstalling the app removes everything held on your device; for anything Google holds directly (including anything from the pre-19-August-2026 advertising period), use Google's own account privacy controls.
Right to object — you can object to processing by contacting us (below). There is no longer an ad-personalisation consent to withdraw, since the app serves no ads.
Right to lodge a complaint — you can complain to your local data protection supervisory authority at any time. In Cyprus, that's the Office of the Commissioner for Personal Data Protection; if you're elsewhere in the EEA, your own country's supervisory authority applies instead.

To exercise any of these rights regarding data we could plausibly hold (there is very little, since the app has no account or server-side storage), contact us at the email below.

Children

The app collects no personal data from anyone, including children.

Changes

If this policy changes, the "Last updated" date above will change. Continued use of the app means you accept the current policy.

Contact

Questions about this policy? Email [email protected].