Privacy Policy

5-String Banjo Chords

5-String Banjo Chords asks you for nothing. There is no account to create and nothing to log in to, and every chord shape and every note of a picking pattern is worked out on your device. To make the app better, it sends anonymous information about how it is used: which pages and features get used, and recordings of sessions showing what was tapped and scrolled. None of it says who you are. You can turn it off in Settings, under “Help improve the app”. If you send feedback, we receive the words you write.

At a glance

• Usage statistics (the iPhone app): which kind of page is on screen and for how long, and a few events: a loop started (with its picking pattern, what it plays over and the kind of mode), a pattern chosen, a progression of your own saved (how many bars), feedback sent. Plus the standard details the analytics service records: first open, session start and length, app version, phone model, operating-system version and language.
• Session recordings (the iPhone app, the Android app and the web app): a record of the app’s screens as you use them, with taps, scrolling and the page you’re on, so we can watch where people get stuck. Anything you type is hidden before it leaves your device: the search box and the feedback box are masked.
• Sent with those: a random identifier for the install (or, in a browser, a cookie), so one person’s visits count once. It is not your advertising identifier, it is replaced if you reinstall, and it is never linked to your name or email (we have neither).
• Worked out from your IP address: an approximate location (country, sometimes region). Never precise, never from location services.
• Feedback, only if you send it: the words you write in “Send feedback”, with the app’s version, which kind of device (iPhone, Android or web), the page you were on and your country. No name or email is asked for.
• Never collected at all: name, email, phone number, contacts, photos, files, precise location, advertising identifier, purchase history, and anything you type.
• The tuner uses your microphone on your device only: sound is analysed as it arrives and is never recorded, stored or sent. The app asks before it listens, and only once you start the tuner. It stops listening when you stop the tuner or leave its page.

Turning it off

Settings → Help improve the app. Off, the app sends no usage statistics and no recordings, and in a browser the recording service’s cookies are deleted. The app works exactly the same either way, and fully offline.

In the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Switzerland, the recording service sets no cookies at all: each visit is recorded on its own and cannot be joined to the next.

Usage statistics

The iPhone app uses Google Analytics for Firebase. The events in the list above are the only ones the app sends.

No advertising identifier, and no tracking. The app is built with the version of the analytics library that has the advertising-identifier code removed. Nothing links the statistics to your name, your email or an account (there is none), and nothing follows you to another app or website. That is why 5-String Banjo Chords never shows an App Tracking Transparency prompt: there is nothing to ask permission for.

Session recordings

The app uses Microsoft Clarity to record sessions. A recording is a replay of the app’s own screens (the chord boxes, the buttons, what was tapped and how the page was scrolled), rebuilt from what the app showed, with typed text hidden. It is used only to see what works and what confuses people, and is never used for advertising. Microsoft keeps recordings for 30 days, and the aggregate figures (such as how many sessions used the Picking page) for up to 13 months.

Feedback

“Send feedback” sends what you write to our own address, through Cloudflare, which runs the small service that receives it. It arrives as an email and is kept in our mailbox so we can act on it. Because it carries no name or email, we can’t reply to it: to get a reply, email support@bendigogames.com instead. Please don’t put personal details in it.

What is stored on your device

The app remembers your settings (the tuning and any custom tuning you set, the capo and what the 5th string does with it, whether the 5th string rings on a tap, A = 440 or your own pitch, left-handed, your colours, sound on or off, and whether to help improve the app), the chords and keys you opened recently and the ones you starred, the frets you last tapped in the chord finder, the keys you last picked, the picking pattern and tempo you last used, and the progressions you made yourself. The iPhone app also counts the days you have used it and the pages you have opened, so that it asks for an App Store rating only after real use, and at most every few months. These are kept in the app’s own storage on your device and are not sent anywhere: deleting the app deletes them.

The web app

The web app at bendigogames.com/banjo-chords/play/ is the same app, made for the web, with the same session recordings and the same switch to turn them off (it has no usage statistics and no rating prompt). Loading it is an ordinary visit to this website: your browser downloads the app’s files from our host, Cloudflare. Its settings, recent and starred chords, your progressions and the chord finder are kept in your browser’s storage for this site; clearing the site’s data in your browser deletes them.

The rest of bendigogames.com (this page and the chord charts included) carries no analytics and no recordings.

Third parties

• Google processes the iPhone app’s usage statistics as our service provider, under policies.google.com/privacy.
• Microsoft processes the session recordings as our service provider (Microsoft Clarity), under microsoft.com/privacy/privacystatement.
• Cloudflare hosts this website and receives feedback, under cloudflare.com/privacypolicy.

Their servers may be outside your country and outside Australia. Nothing is shared with anyone else (no advertisers, no data brokers) and nothing is sold. 5-String Banjo Chords contains no advertising, no social media integrations and no crash reporting. The Apple App Store may collect information about downloads under its own policy; we receive no personal information from it.

How long it is kept

Usage statistics: no longer than fourteen months at event level, after which only totals remain. Session recordings: 30 days. Feedback: until we have dealt with it, in our mailbox. What is stored on your device lasts until you delete the app (or clear the site’s data, for the web app).

Security

Everything the app sends travels over HTTPS.

Children

5-String Banjo Chords has no advertising, no purchases, no chat and no way for people to contact each other. It asks nobody, of any age, for personal information. The usage information is the same for everyone and is not used to identify or contact anyone.

Your rights

Because nothing is linked to you, we cannot look up “your” data: there is no name, email or account to search by. What you can do yourself, at once: turn off “Help improve the app” in Settings, or reinstall the app (its identifier is replaced, so new data cannot be connected to old).

For anything else (access, erasure, objection, a question) email support@bendigogames.com. A person reads it.

• GDPR: usage information is processed on the basis of legitimate interests (improving the app), and you can object with the switch in Settings or by email.
• California residents: 5-String Banjo Chords does not sell or share personal information, and never has.
• Complaints: you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner at oaic.gov.au, or to your own data-protection authority.

Changes to this policy

If this policy changes, the revised policy will be posted on this page with an updated date, before the version of the app it describes is released.

Contact

5-String Banjo Chords is made by Bendigo Games. Questions about this policy, or about privacy in the app, can be sent to support@bendigogames.com.

Last updated: 13 November 2026