Last updated 5th June 2024
IMPORTANT: This is a legal agreement between you and Altitude Angel Limited. By continuing to use this Service, you are indicating your consent to be bound by these terms. If this Service provides traffic alerts, flight and/or safety information, your attention is drawn to the relevant sections below in particular. We have tried to keep these terms easy-to-read and understand, and it’s important that you read them to understand what you may and may not do, and what we may and may not do with your personal information. If you have any questions or comments, please email us prior to commencing your use of the Service on dataprotection@altitudeangel.com.
Background and Scope
Altitude Angel is a global provider of navigation and communications services for drones and people and organisations who manage airspace.
These Terms and Conditions apply to your use of Altitude Angel’s software (hereinafter referred to as our “Services” or “The Service”) as an End User only. You are an End User when you (a) access any Service of ours via a normal web browser, or (b) through any mobile app published by Us, and in both cases any authorised Service that references these Terms and Conditions.
These Terms and Conditions do not apply to our developer services, to GuardianUTM Enterprise or GuardianUTM O/S, however, they may apply to your interaction with them as an End User if the feature(s) you access require us to.
Definitions
In this document, when we use the words ‘we’, ‘ours’ or ‘us’, we are referring to Altitude Angel Limited, a company headquartered in the UK and registered in England & Wales under company number 9350032 and whose registered office is at The Blade, Abbey Square, Reading, RG1 3BE in the United Kingdom, and/or our employees, shareholders, affiliates and partners as required by the context.
When we use the phrase “in these terms and conditions” we are referring to the terms and conditions contained herein this document.
When we use the words ‘you’, ‘your’ or ‘yours’, we are referring to you, the person to whom these terms and conditions have been displayed in the course of your interaction with one or more of our Services.
In general, words in the singular include the plural and, in the plural, in the singular.
1. Agreement
1.1. These terms of service govern your use of our Services (as well as your use of any data that you receive from them) and set out our rights to store, handle, process and use data you transmit to our Services.
1.2. The section above, “Definitions”, shall be used throughout these terms and conditions and is considered part of them.
2. Consent
2.1. By using this Service, you are giving your consent to and indicating your acceptance of these Terms and Conditions. If you do not agree to be bound by them, you won't be permitted to use any of our Services and you should immediately refrain from using them.
2.2. You can withdraw your consent to these terms and conditions at any time and for any reason by deleting your account or emailing us at dataprotection@altitudeangel.com.
2.2.1 If you do withdraw your consent, (a) it shall only take effect for and against any future use of The Service. For the avoidance of doubt, nothing you have previously consented to shall be affected, and (b) you must immediately cease all use of The Service.
3. Acceptable Use
3.1. Use of this Service is provided “as is”, without warranties of any kind, either express or implied.
3.2. Support for this Service shall be on a ‘fair effort’ basis and shall typically only be provided in the English language, unless otherwise stated.
3.3. You may only use The Service for your exclusive personal or business use for the intended purposes described, and only in a manner which is compliant with local laws and regulations.
3.4. You may not use The Service to conduct any illegal, defamatory, and/or immoral activity, or in any way to compromise the rights, safety and/or interests of any other individual or business.
3.5. You are only permitted to use The Service via the provided graphical user interface. All other use is expressly prohibited.
3.5.1 Use of any data obtained from our Service, including but not limited to ‘scraping’ the data to make it available in another Service or application, is expressly prohibited.
3.6. You may not rely on The Service as the sole source of safety information, but you may combine it with other normally acceptable due-diligence practices required to satisfy any local, state, national and/or federal rules governing the flight of your drone.
3.7. You may not use The Service, in any way, for automated flights, without a human in the loop.
3.8. You may not construe any of the advice, data or visual indicators as confirmation of the legitimacy of conducting (or not conducting) a drone flight in any location shown.
3.9. We use automated processes to help us minimise the risk of the introduction of any errors into the processing of our data. However, we cannot guarantee that the data in this Service is free from any errors and/or omissions. By using this Service, you acknowledge this risk.
4. Our rights
4.1. At any time, we may withdraw, suspend, temporarily interrupt or disable certain features or the entire Service without prior notice or consequence. Similarly, we may update or alter The Service, or any aspect(s) of it, without prior notice or consequence.
4.2. We may monitor, analyse, record and collect statistics and/or diagnostic information (sometimes called “logs”) every time you use The Service, for the purposes of understanding Service usage, to optimise and enhance The Service, to carry out product and/or market research and/or to provide technical support. Should we do this, the data we collect shall be handled in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
4.3. We may transfer and/or use information we have collected through your use of this Service with certain of our other Services, as (i) may be required from time-to-time to carry out the instructions you have given us in connection with the features provided by The Service, (ii) to provide enhanced situation awareness to others via certain other of our Services, and/or (iii) for marketing or other commercial purposes.
4.3.1. Howsoever we use and/or transfer your information between our Services, we shall do so in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
4.4. We reserve the right to use data we hold about you to tailor The Service to your requirements.
4.5. We may terminate your access to The service at any time and for any reason and without any prior notice to you.
5. Specific terms that govern Services where we use or display maps to you
5.1. Where we use Bing Maps to display map tiles to you, your usage of Bing Maps layers is governed by Microsoft’s Terms of Use, which are available at https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/maps/product.
5.2. If we use an alternative 3rd party to provide map tiles, the third-party may install cookies on your computer and we may send them extremely limited information about you (such as your IP address, but not intentionally any other information about you, such as your name, email address or any other data we hold about you), so that they can satisfy the request.
6. Specific terms for those who use The Service to help them plan or conduct drone flights
6.1. If you are a drone pilot, or plan to use our Service for any flight or flight planning activities, including safety and/or risk management/mitigation, please be aware that we provide The Service for use only in conjunction with your normal legal, moral, and professional obligations and you may not rely on the information we distribute to you via this Service as your exclusive source of safety-related information. At all times, responsibility for the safe operation of your drone shall remain with the pilot in charge of the drone.
6.2. You, at all times, are solely responsible for the safe and legal use of your drone. Nothing in our Service shall be construed as to override or alter your personal responsibility and liability for the safe conduct of your drone flight, and/or the execution of a drone flight in accordance with local laws and regulations.
7. If you are using one of our mobile apps to access our Services
7.1. Official mobile apps distributed by us are considered graphical user interfaces to one or more of our Services. Use of them is also governed by these terms and conditions.
7.1.1. We shall not have any liability to you if you obtain or install the app through any non-official method, such as (but not limited to) “side-loading”.
8. If you use certain Service(s) or feature(s) to obtain information about other air traffic
8.1. Where we provide capabilities detailing the position of manned aviation, or other air traffic whether manned or unmanned, there are limitations to these Services that mean it is not possible for us to show you everything that may be in a particular location at any time.
8.2. In general, for manned aviation to be visible to our Services, it must be equipped with an ADS-B transponder, within range of an ADS-B receiver and not be on a list of restricted aircraft that we are not permitted to tell you more about. It must also be visible to one of the third-party aggregators we may use to obtain this information, or within range of one of our own receivers.
8.3. Note that not all aircraft are required to carry or respond their location/information at all times and we cannot guarantee compliance by those aircraft or their operators with local laws and regulations.
8.4. There are circumstances where our Services are unable to register aircrafts in a location, even if they are so equipped or normally otherwise detectable.
8.5. We use a variety of surveillance technologies, properly authorised by our data suppliers, to bring you tracking and visibility Services, and are necessarily dependent on the capabilities and limitations of such systems. Where we use data that provides tracking information, we shall clearly provide you with a description of the performance characteristics and limitations of those systems such that you can make appropriate judgments about the risk of using those Services.
8.6. For the avoidance of doubt, we shall never be liable to you for any incident arising out of your use of our traffic Services, for errors or omissions in our tracking Services, or for data we relay to you from a 3rd-party supplier of these data, unless expressly otherwise stated.
9. If you use our ‘traffic alert’ (or similar) Services
9.1. You should note that any Services that provide or generate ‘traffic alerts’ or similar, are dependent at least in part on the data described under paragraph 8, and therefore subject to the same or more stringent limitations.
9.1.1.1. We will normally endeavour to explain to you any further limitations, or different limitations, prominently and obviously at the time you activate such a Service.
9.1.2. A failure of our Service, or any component upon which we are dependent for the delivery of the Service or feature, may mean we are unable to deliver to you in time (or at all) any traffic alert.
9.1.3. You are therefore not permitted to use any ‘traffic alert’ feature as anything other than a ‘convenience’ to supplement your normal legal, professional and safety-related activities, and you must at all times be physically present in the location in which you have activated the traffic alert feature on.
9.2. Your use of any ‘traffic alert’ feature is entirely at your own risk, and in accordance with any supplemental conditions, limits and/or constraints we may communicate from time-to-time, or which would otherwise ordinarily be known to a professional or suitably-qualified or otherwise reasonably knowledgeable individual.
10. If you use the Service to submit a request to fly your drone(s) at a given location
10.1. Certain of our Services have feature(s) which facilitate communication between you and the owner, operator, licensee, controller or other guardian of a specific volume of airspace and/or land for the purpose of obtaining permission to fly or operate your drone(s) at, over or within their facility or airspace (a “Flight Request Feature”).
10.2. If you use a Flight Request Feature, you should note the following:
10.2.1. We provide The Service to you as a convenience only.
10.2.2. We act as an intermediary between you and the operator(s) of the facility or airspace, and we may share certain of your information with them to assist with the submission and management by them of your request.
10.2.3. As an intermediary, we are not responsible for the outcome of your request, or any subsequent communication(s) you have with the facility about your request.
10.2.4. If the facility is not using Altitude Angel’s own flight request management software, you will be prompted prior to submission to agree to our sharing your data with a 3rd party service, you may additionally be required to specify further information, and we may not be able to automate as much of the process for you.
10.2.5. If the facility is using Altitude Angel’s own flight request management software, we will (as far as possible) attempt to use data we already hold on file about you to simplify the request process.
10.3. Flight requests are not managed by Altitude Angel. The ultimate decision about whether your requested flight can go ahead is entirely the decision of the parties involved in its management, and Altitude Angel accept no responsibility or liability whatsoever for the decision made by the operator.
10.4. All decisions made will be relayed to you ‘as given’ by the facility operator(s). Unless otherwise explicitly stated, a decision to permit your request is not an indication that to proceed would be without risk or is ‘safe’, or has otherwise been checked against a database of known or planned flights. You should still observe all normal local legal and regulatory rules while carrying-out your flight(s).
11. If you create an account on our Service
11.1. If you create an account on The Service, it will be based on our ‘Altitude Angel ID’ Service (which we’ll refer to as ‘Altitude Angel ID’ from hereon), which is independent of The Service you are currently accessing.
11.2. Altitude Angel ID is an authentication technology that is based on the OAuth protocol, which offers a simple way to publish and interact with protected data, and to establish trust with other Services and, sometimes, 3rd OAuth is an industry-standard protocol and is used by companies such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Twitter and countless others to enable seamless sign-on experiences and trusted data-sharing.
11.3. When you create an account via this Service, the information you enter to create the account will be stored and processed in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
11.3.1. You must only supply information that is accurate, and you must keep information we hold about you up-to-date via the ‘my account’ (or similar) function in The Service you are using.
11.4. For the purposes of data governance, we are the Data Controller of information held within your Altitude Angel ID. We are also often the Data Processor, but with your express consent, certain of our customers or other authorised 3rd-parties may process data held within, or linked to, your Altitude Angel ID.
11.5. The Altitude Angel ID typically contains minimal ‘personally identifiable information’, such as your name and email address, plus any other contact details you choose to provide. It will also contain an encrypted password that you supply us with, to protect your account.
11.6. You may not share your Altitude Angel ID with anyone else, and you must use your best endeavours to keep it safe and secure. Passwords should:
Be a minimum length of 12 characters
Contain a mix of upper and lower cases, numbers and symbols
Be unique – i.e. a password that you do not use anywhere else
To help achieve this we strongly recommend the use of a reputable password manager application – this is great practice for general internet safety.
As well as the above, you should also consider enabling multi-factor authentication (where available) – this helps further protect your account from misuse.
12. If this Service requires you to login, or you need to login to use certain of its features
12.1. If you are required to login in order to access The Service, or certain of its features, you will be required to sign in with your Altitude Angel ID.
12.1.1. If you do not have an Altitude Angel ID, you will be given the opportunity to create one.
12.2. If you login to one of our Services for the first time, you will be asked to explicitly grant access to The Service to access information that it has requested from your Altitude Angel ID. The information The Service is requesting will be clearly displayed to you, so that you can make an informed choice.
12.2.1. We will not ask you for explicit consent to access The Service you are currently using if you are creating a new Altitude Angel ID in order to access it, since this will be the only Service currently then associated with it.
12.2.2. We may also not ask you to explicitly grant consent to access a different version of the same, or similar Service, for example if you create your Altitude Angel ID on our online ‘drone safety map’ Service, and then login to the same Altitude Angel ID on the equivalent mobile-app of The Service.
12.3. We will typically use the Altitude Angel ID to store information you submit to us in our databases, so that you can retrieve it later. For example, you may send a flight plan to us, and we will use your Altitude Angel ID to associate that flight plan with it, such that you can retrieve it later.
13. If you use your Altitude Angel ID to sign in to a 3rd party service
13.1. Certain of our customers may establish a relationship with us that enables them to integrate with the Altitude Angel ID Service.
13.2. Such integration does not automatically entitle the 3rd party to any information in any of our Altitude Angel IDs.
13.3. Instead, the third-party’s own application may request certain information from your Altitude Angel ID and to do this it must securely authenticate itself with the Altitude Angel ID Service and then we will ask you for your explicit consent to share the information from your Altitude Angel ID that they have requested securely with them.
13.4. If you do give your consent, you should be aware that the information you have authorised us to release is now not in our exclusive control and may be copied by the third party. We will not be liable to you for the 3rd-party’s handling of the information you have authorised us to disclose, but you may at any time withdraw your consent from us continuing to share it with them.
13.5. If you do withdraw your consent, we will immediately cease transmission of any further data from your Altitude Angel ID, however, any information the 3rd party already received prior to this will not be affected. You will need to contact the 3rd party to remove it.
14. Exchanging information with third parties
14.1. Certain Services, and/or features within this Service, may by their nature require that we interact on your behalf with third parties. Typically, these third parties may be an Air Navigation Service Provider, an authority, an airport and/or a land owner or any other party with whom you are attempting to use The Service to communicate, obtain consent from, or exchange information with.
14.2. We will require your explicit consent the first time you submit information to a third party that you have not previously consented to. For example, to an ANSP that wishes to receive information from your Altitude Angel ID, or when you ask us to apply to the ANSP for permission for you to operate your drone.
14.3. By using any Service, or any feature of any Service, which is clearly intended to obtain consent from or engage with a 3rd party on your behalf, you are implicitly giving us permission to do so on your behalf, even if we do not explicitly ask for it.
15. Terms that specifically apply to information you share with us
15.1. If you enter data into The Service, or otherwise upload data to it, you confirm that you either own the data and the appropriate rights to use it, or if those rights belong to someone else, that you have secured all necessary permissions and/or permits from them to upload it.
15.2. Data that you share with us shall normally remain your property, unless we tell you otherwise at the time of submission, or unless otherwise provided for herein.
15.3. If you do upload or share data with us that infringes the intellectual property rights of somebody else, you agree to inform us immediately as soon as you become aware of such infringement, or a breach of these conditions. You agree to fully compensate us on demand for any and all such losses, whether in the form of direct costs or for our loss of time or for other things that are readily identifiable. Where we suffer other losses that are hard to quantify, we shall reserve the right to pursue you for recovery of these. Our right to take action to recover such losses or to insist on this indemnity will survive the termination of your account(s) with us, which would otherwise terminate our contract with you.
15.4. All information that you upload and/or share with us will be stored and handled in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
16. If you share flight information with us
16.1. We operate one of the largest networks of drone-related flight information.
16.2. By ‘flight information’, we are referring to:
16.2.1. The planned or actual flight path/trajectory of one or more drone(s) under your control
16.2.2. The date/time you intend to or have carried-out the flight(s)16.2.3. Any other information you tell us about the flight, such as what aircraft you are using and/or its capabilities, and/or the purpose of the flight;
16.2.4. Any broadcast identifiers associated with your vehicle, such as an ADS-B transponder code;
16.2.5. Any public contact information you have explicitly asked us to make available to third parties but not, for the avoidance of doubt, any information we hold in your Altitude Angel ID directly;
16.2.6. Identification numbers which we create and associate with each flight on your behalf that uniquely identify the flight and/or aircraft(s), operator(s) and/or pilot(s) associated with it, but which will not make any sense to any 3rd-party unless otherwise connected to certain of Altitude Angel’s other Services.
16.3. We often share flight information with third parties, including the general public, but only in a way that supports our primary goal to share essential safety-related information.
16.3.1. For example, we may share the location and date/time of a flight you are planning to conduct, as well as any information you explicitly ask us to share with 3rd parties (such as the purpose of the flight), but we will not share your personal information such as your name, email address and/or contact details.
16.3.2. We may provide a secure mechanism for a 3rd party to contact you through our Services, but we will never actually disclose your personal information to the third party.
16.4. Flight information is considered Altitude Angel’s property, and we may use it in certain of our Services as we see fit, or we may sell it, license it and/or otherwise display it.
16.5. We may exchange Flight Information with a properly authorised, regulated entity, such as a national aviation authority or Air Navigation Service Provider, for the purposes of enhancing safety.
16.5.1. If we do this, we will not share your personally identifiable information other than your name, unless required to do so by the law. However, we may provide a mechanism for the third party to contact you via certain of our Services, in a way that protects your confidential information.
17. If we display information to you that we have received from another user of our Service(s)
17.1. Sometimes we show information obtained from other End Users of our Service(s). We call this information “User Content”.
17.2. If we do this, it is important to note that we are not liable or responsible to you for the accuracy, content, or any views or opinions expressed in the User Content.
17.3. If you believe any User Content infringes your intellectual property rights, you should inform us immediately via dataprotection@altitudeangel.com. Please note, we can only offer this Service in English.
18. Intellectual Property
18.1. Unless we tell you otherwise, all intellectual property rights (for example, patents, rights to inventions, copyright and related rights, trade marks, business names and domain names, rights in get-up, goodwill and the right to sue for passing off, rights in designs, database rights, rights to use and protect any confidential information you share with us (including know-how), and all other intellectual property rights, in each case whether registered or unregistered and including all applications and rights to apply for and be granted, renewals or extensions of, and rights to claim priority from, such rights and all similar or equivalent rights or forms of protection which subsist or will subsist now or in the future in any part of the world) are our property.
19. Data Protection
19.1. We take the protection and safeguarding of your data extremely seriously.
19.2. In connection with data protection, we set out our full obligations and rights, as well as your obligations and rights, in our Privacy Policy.
19.3. You may however direct any questions or concerns relating to the protection of your data and/or privacy concerns to our Data Protection Team, at dataprotection@altitudeangel.com. Please note that we can only offer support via this Service in English.
20. General Disclaimers
20.1. Broadly stated, our Services are intended to supplement generally required drone operators' due diligence and awareness activities; not to act as a replacement for them, or a drone operator's normal legal obligations. Collectively or individually, our Services are designed only to assist with plan-to-avoid scenarios, and not to act as a replacement for this or a drone operator's see-and-avoid responsibilities, except where expressly stated otherwise.
20.2. None of our Services or any accompanying documentation (whether provided in electronic form or otherwise) constitutes advice on which you should rely and is provided for general information purposes only. Professional or specialist advice should always be sought before taking any action concerning the legal and safe conduct of any drone flight.
20.3. Insofar as is permitted by law, we make no representation, warranty, or guarantee that our Services will meet your requirements, that they will be fit for a particular purpose, that they will not infringe the rights of third parties, that they will be compatible with all software and hardware, or that they will be secure.
20.4. We take reasonable care to ensure that the content contained within our Services is complete, accurate and up-to-date. We do not, however, make representations, warranties or guarantees (whether express or implied) that our Services (and the Content therein) is complete, accurate or up-to-date.
20.5. We are not responsible for the content or accuracy, or for any opinions, views, or values expressed in any User Content created using our Services. Any such opinions, views, or values are those of the relevant user, and do not reflect our opinions, views, or values in any way.
21. Service availability
21.1. We work hard to ensure our Service is fast, efficient and reliable, 24 hours per day, 7 days per week and 365 days per year.
21.2. However, there are some circumstances that may temporarily interrupt or cause undesirable functionality, performance and/or cause us to withdraw or suspend The Service.
21.3. Unless otherwise expressly stated, we provide no performance or availability guarantee for this or any of our Services.
21.4. We shall reserve the right to operationally restrict access by network segment, IP address, geolocation or other policy at any time and without prior notice, for any reason.
21.5. We accept no liability for the availability or otherwise of this or any of our Services, howsoever caused.
22. Limitation of Liability
22.1. It would be unlawful for us to attempt to exclude or limit our liability for personal injury or death arising from our negligence or for any loss you suffer as a result of our fraud or for any statement we make fraudulently intending you to rely on it entering into this contract with us.
22.2. That said, there are certain types of liability that we are permitted by law to limit or exclude and, accordingly, to the fullest extent possible by law, we accept no liability to any person or persons, or any entity, including you, for any direct, indirect or consequential loss, damage or expense (whether foreseeable or otherwise), in contract, tort (including negligence), for breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, arising out of or in connection with the use of (or inability to use) our Services, including (but not limited to), our website, mobile apps or developer platform, howsoever that loss, damage or expense may arise.
22.3. We are also not liable or responsible for any failure to perform or for the delay in the performance of any of our obligations under these conditions that is caused by events that are beyond our reasonable control. This might include a failure of an internet service provider to deliver notifications or emails to you, poor weather conditions, packet loss, an act of war or any industrial strike, any decision by any governmental body to restrict its air traffic controls or data, or any failure by any third party upon whom we rely for the delivery of our Services to you.
22.4. We do strive to exercise commercially reasonable care and skill in everything that we do. That includes taking steps to ensure our Services are free from computer viruses and malware, but we cannot accept any liability for any loss or damage resulting from a virus or other malware, distributed via our Services.
22.5. If a court finds that we do owe you any compensation, this will be limited to 100% of any fees that you have paid to us in any calendar year. If you haven't paid us any fees to access The Services, our liability to you shall be capped at an aggregate maximum - across all claims - to £1 GBP.
22.6. If you terminate your account with us, these provisions still apply.
23. Law and Jurisdiction
23.1. These terms and conditions, and the relationship between you and us, whether contractual or otherwise, shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English law.
23.2. Any disputes concerning these terms and conditions, our relationship to each other, or any matters arising therefrom or associated therewith shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England.
23.3. Please note that we shall reserve the right to update these terms and conditions at any time without prior notice to you. We shall display clearly a prompt in each app or Service that is bound by these terms and conditions when an update is made. Your continued use of our Services after each update shall constitute acceptance of these terms and conditions.
24. Term and termination
24.1. Either you, or we, may terminate our relationship together at any time, and without prior notice.
25. Right of Assignment
25.1. We shall reserve the right to transfer our responsibilities and obligations under these terms and conditions to any other entity without prior written notice to you. However, these terms and conditions are non-transferrable or assignable by you to any other party.
26. Entire agreement
26.1. The terms and conditions contained herein represent the full and complete extent of our relationship together.
27. No partnership
27.1. Nothing in this agreement is intended to construe any relationship between you and us other than by way of you, the End User, using our Service.