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41

Magic Earth has absolutely nothing to do with OM and Osmand because the application offers the basics, real time traffic, you use Magic Earth and Here WeGo or nothing at all.

42

PSA: Best of both worlds aka a workable compromise

Use Here WeGo Offline for Better Privacy

  1. Install the Here WeGo app.
  2. Download offline maps of your areas of interest.
  3. Disable network access for the app.
  4. Run the app in offline mode.

Notes:

  • Live traffic and other network-dependent features wonā€™t work offline.
  • For enhanced privacy, clear the appā€™s cache periodically or reinstall it.
  • Maps typically remain accurate for a year or longer, depending on your location.

This setup helps prevent data leakage while maintaining core functionality.

43

What youā€™re proposing isnā€™t compromise, itā€™s pointless, if thatā€™s what itā€™s all about you might as well use OM or Osmand.
Thereā€™s no logic in using a navigation application with real-time traffic without using real-time traffic, itā€™s useless.

1 Like
44

FYI, I just got an alert of Here WeGoā€™s privacy policy updating and it looks worse than it used to be. More specificaly, I donā€™t remember a paragraph like this before:

The Service may send your Location Data to HERE when you use location enabled features of the Service, such as enable navigation, ask information about nearby services or offerings, use search features, provide you with relevant offers from Transport Providers and public transportation vendors, as well as when the Service asks for new maps for new areas you have navigated into.

If I remember correctly, location data was only shared with HERE when you opted in for live traffic data.

At least they still claim to anonymise and aggreate the location data.

This also feels new:

The Service may include provision of location based advertising or other similar content. [ā€¦] The Service may also include behaviorally profiled advertisements. For the purposes of providing relevant advertisements to you, we may share your device specific advertising ID to advertising networks.

Iā€™m not sure this new Privacy Policy is any better than Google Mapsā€™ :frowning:

1 Like
45

Yeah really Iā€™m not big on relying on privacy policy and pinky promises anyway, if there was an online maps service that used homomorphic encryption or something to ensure they couldnā€™t access your data even if they wanted to then Iā€™d be interested but splitting hairs about which service technically has the better privacy policy isnā€™t very useful to me.

46

2 posts were merged into an existing topic: Magic Earth

47

Now that Magic Earth has become paid if you want offline maps or traffic info, I wonder if itā€™s worth having another look at HERE. The current recommendations, Organic Maps and OSMand, donā€™t have any traffic data, which, depending where you live, might make it completely useless for navigation and makes users fall back to Google Maps or Apple Maps.

Is Here WeGo good enough as a ā€œleast badā€ option for those needing traffic info? Or do the new changes to privacy policy disqualify it?

48

Here WeGo is not a privacy alternative to things like CoMaps/Organic Maps, taking a look at HERE WeGo | Maps & Navigation | Applications | HERE
Literally below it, expanding legal thereā€™s a ā€œDo Not Sell my Personal Dataā€ button

The fact that you have to actively opt out should say much

2 Likes
49

Google maps is the only product I canā€™t fully replace. I tried comaps again, but unfortunately, route recommendation is not taking traffic into consideration and itā€™s just terrible because of it, at least for me.

2 Likes
50

CoMaps is based off Organic Maps, they do not have traffic information

51

Might be some software misunderstandings going on here. Itā€™s impossible to have traffic data in FOSS apps as that data is a big part of the network effect of large businesses and it costs money. Google doesnā€™t sell this data, but other businesses like TomTom do. At the end of the day youā€™ll be paying for traffic data either with your money or your data or both.

1 Like
52

Sounds like the way to go indeed.
Car manufacturers are maybe also part of it?

Not sure where the data could come from besides FOSS street lights? Which is probably not a thing/or is a stretch. :joy:

53

Thereā€™s discussion on this thread at Organic Maps github about possible ways to incorporate live traffic. From plugging in your own subscription to some paid service to pulling free and open source data.

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