Delete your Where Dogs Lead account

Operator

Where Dogs Lead is operated by STEPHEN WILLIAM ROBERTS, an individual developer trading as PocketForge Studio, not a registered limited company. Postal contact: 12 Albert Avenue GRANGEMOUTH FK3 9AT United Kingdom. Privacy and deletion requests: privacy@wheredogslead.co.uk.

Delete from the app

Open Where Dogs Lead, go to Profile, then Settings and Delete account. Enter your current password and confirm. You need a connection. This is permanent: do not use account deletion merely to sign out or troubleshoot a device.

After you confirm your current password, routine cloud cleanup starts automatically. A private request is bound to your account and device challenge. You do not need to email us or wait for an administrator to approve an ordinary request. Community posting is paused for that account during cleanup. Your sign-in account is kept until the required cloud cleanup is ready. Shared contributions, existing safety evidence or uncertain ownership may require individual review; the app explains when a request remains pending. Contact privacy@wheredogslead.co.uk for an exceptional or interrupted request.

The trusted process removes your linked reviews, Community Terms receipt and own/incoming blocking references. Places attributable to your account are removed where this can be done safely without deleting another member's contribution. Shared places are hidden privately pending review, with other members' reviews preserved. Useful non-identifying place information may be restored after its creator link and identifying text/location details have been reviewed and removed. Reports, posting suspensions and other safety evidence receive an individual necessity and retention decision rather than being blindly erased.

We keep minimal private request and recovery records where needed to resume interrupted work, verify completion and prevent deleted information being restored. Routine deletion does not require a manual approval dossier. These records and any necessary safety evidence remain subject to the necessity reviews, retention limits and justified holds below. No automatic evidence purge is enabled.

After cloud readiness, Firebase sign-in deletion is confirmed and the app removes confirmed account-owned local profile, dog and saved-walk records and applicable per-account files/preferences. Retry local cleanup handles temporary failures. Shared or uncertain-owner files remain pending for ownership review rather than being silently erased.

Deletion has several steps. If a later step fails, some cloud reviews or preferences may already have been removed. Your main local records are kept until account deletion is confirmed. Follow the result shown in the app; do not assume a failed or interrupted request completed every step.

Request deletion without the app

Email privacy@wheredogslead.co.uk with the subject 'Where Dogs Lead account deletion request'. Where possible, send it from the address used for your account. If you cannot access that address, explain this so a proportionate identity check can be arranged. Do not send your password. You do not need to reinstall the app to submit a request. Include any particular remaining-data concern so it can be assessed with the request.

The privacy and support addresses forward through hosts.co.uk to the operator's Gmail account. STEPHEN WILLIAM ROBERTS checks the forwarded mailboxes, including spam, daily and records and reviews requests for associated personal information as well as the sign-in account. It is a manual request route, not an immediate automated deletion endpoint. We verify the original case using proportionate evidence; email possession or a newly registered same-email account alone is insufficient for legacy recovery. Independent, verifiable historical account/case evidence is required. Uncertain or conflicting requests remain pending while further review is arranged. Never send passwords or routine identity-document copies.

Signed-out recovery and information kept for review

If account deletion was interrupted or the original session has ended, use Recover without signing in and contact the privacy mailbox with the app's recovery details. They identify the account, device challenge and data fingerprint; they do not upload your walks or photos. The trusted service checks authoritative account absence and completed cloud cleanup before issuing a short-lived signed confirmation for that case/device. An expired session, disabled account or failed lookup is not proof of deletion. The app verifies the confirmation without signing in to the deleted account.

Only necessary evidence for a genuinely unresolved moderation, security or legal matter is retained, with identifying information minimised and a documented reason, reviewer and next review. Dismissed/unneeded reports are removed or irreversibly anonymised within 7 days; unnecessary identifiers in resolved cases and deletion/recovery journals are removed within 30 days of verified closure. Necessary contained-security incident evidence is retained for up to 90 days, reviewed every 30 days. Specific exceptions require a continuing documented need and a release condition. See the Privacy Policy for the full review schedule. No automatic evidence purge is enabled.

Our operational review limits do not promise immediate erasure of every provider backup. Restricted recovery backups and provider copies are separate from live cleanup. Google states associated Firebase Authentication information is removed from its live and backup systems within 180 days after deletion is initiated. We do not assert a fixed Gmail, forwarding-service or other provider-backup deletion time. See https://wheredogslead.co.uk/privacy.html for provider processing and backup limits.

Main local record deletion does not purge every photo, gallery original, raw GPS diagnostic log, diagnostic export, local place record, pending/recovery file, device-wide preference or SDK cache. Some of these can contain personal information. A web request cannot erase files that exist only on a device the operator cannot access. Account deletion on one device does not remotely clean other devices or recall copies you shared elsewhere.

Unknown ownership is reviewed safely rather than resolved by a blanket timer or clearing app storage. We do not mark required cleanup complete while attributable data or necessary review remains outstanding. Pending deletion/recovery cases are reviewed weekly; agreed support steps preserve other accounts' information. Removing a creator link alone is not enough if remaining place details still identify someone.

Questions and your rights

For help, email privacy@wheredogslead.co.uk or support@wheredogslead.co.uk. We may need to verify the request and explain any information that cannot lawfully be erased. Data-rights requests are generally responded to within one month, subject to applicable identity checks or lawful extensions; that is a response standard, not a promise that every device, provider backup and external copy is erased immediately. See the Privacy Policy for details and your right to complain to the ICO.