Privacy policy — Press Release
Last updated 6 October 2026
Press Release draws an animation on the edge of your screen when you press a hardware button. It is made by Richard Lombos (LMBS Apps, Düsseldorf, Germany; details in the imprint), who is responsible for the processing described here. Press Release has no account, no analytics and no crash reporting of its own. Its free version shows ads from Google AdMob, which one purchase removes.
This policy says what the app does with your button presses, what stays on your phone, what leaves it, and why.
Your button presses: the accessibility service
Press Release uses Android's accessibility service API, because it is the only way an app can notice a hardware button being pressed while you are using other apps. You switch it on yourself in Android's Accessibility settings, after the app has explained what it does, and you can switch it off there at any time.
- What it receives: hardware key presses only. Which key, and when it is pressed and released.
- What it does with them: for the buttons you have added, it draws the animation you picked at the edge of the screen, next to that button, on top of whatever app is open. Presses of other keys are ignored.
- What it never does: it does not read the content of your screen, what you type, or anything inside other apps. It is set up without permission to retrieve window content.
- What happens to the press: every press is passed on to your phone unchanged, so your volume keys keep working as they always do. The one exception is while you add a new button: that single press is used to identify the key, and is not passed on.
- What is kept: nothing. Presses are not logged, stored or shared, and never leave your phone.
What stays on your phone
Everything Press Release keeps is in its own private storage on your device, and none of it is sent to me or to anyone else:
- The buttons you added: the name you gave each one, the key code Android reports for it, its edge and position, its length, its animation, and whether it is on.
- Your choice of colour, size and speed.
- A note of whether you bought Pro, so it stays unlocked when you are offline.
If Android's backup is on, these settings are part of your device's backup with Google and are handled under Google's backup terms, not this policy.
What leaves your phone
Ads, from Google AdMob
Unless you have bought Pro, Press Release shows a banner ad from Google AdMob at the bottom of its settings screen. It never shows ads over other apps or on your screen's edge. AdMob is provided in the EEA and the UK by Google Ireland Limited. To choose, show and measure an ad, and to prevent fraud, Google's ad software in the app collects:
- your device's advertising ID,
- your IP address, and an approximate location derived from it,
- information about your device and the app, and how you interact with the ads.
In the EEA, the UK and Switzerland, Press Release shows Google's consent form before any ad is requested. You decide there whether ads may be personalised and whether information may be stored on or read from your device for advertising. The legal basis is your consent, Art. 6 (1) (a) GDPR and § 25 (1) TDDDG. If you decline, Google may still show ads that are not personalised, using the minimum it needs to deliver them and to prevent fraud. You can change your choice at any time in Press Release under More › Ad privacy choices.
On phones that support it, Google's ad software may also use Android's Privacy Sandbox (ad topics and attribution), which you control in Android's settings under Privacy.
You can reset or delete your advertising ID in Android's settings. How Google uses information from apps that show its ads is explained at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.
Once you have bought Pro, Press Release stops requesting ads altogether and the ad software is no longer started.
The Pro purchase
Pro is bought through Google Play. Google handles the payment; Press Release never sees your payment details. It receives only a confirmation that this Google account owns Pro, which it checks with Google Play to unlock the animations and turn ads off, including on a new phone.
Emailing support
If you write to support from the app, your email app opens with the app's version, your Android version and your phone's model added at the end of the message. You can delete them before sending. I receive only what you send, and use it only to answer you.
Permissions
| Permission | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Accessibility service | Noticing hardware button presses and drawing the animation beside the button, as described above. Granted separately in Android settings. |
| Internet, network state | Loading ads in the free version, and checking the Pro purchase with Google Play. |
| Advertising ID, ad services | Used by Google's ad software in the free version, as described above. |
| Google Play billing | Buying Pro. |
| Wake lock, foreground service | Used inside Google's ad and billing software to finish its work reliably. |
How long
What is on your phone stays until you change it or uninstall Press Release, which removes all of it. Press Release keeps nothing anywhere else. What Google keeps is set by Google's own policies. Support emails are kept only as long as it takes to answer them.
Your rights
Under the GDPR you have the right to access, correct and erase data about you, to restrict or object to its processing, to data portability, and to withdraw consent at any time without affecting what happened before. Because Press Release keeps everything on your phone, uninstalling it or clearing its storage erases what it holds. For data held by Google, use your Google account and Android settings.
You can also complain to a data protection authority. Mine is the Landesbeauftragte für Datenschutz und Informationsfreiheit Nordrhein-Westfalen (LDI NRW).
Children
Press Release is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect anything from them.
Changes
Any change to this policy will be published here with a new date.