Terms of Use & Privacy Policy

Last updated: April 2026

This document sets out the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy for the CFSScan service, available at cfsscan.com and via the CFSScan mobile applications for iOS and Android.

By creating an account or using the service you agree to both sections of this document. If you do not agree, you must not use the service.

Terms of Use

1. About the Service

CFSScan monitors the South Australian emergency services pager network (FLEX protocol) and delivers real-time notifications to subscribers. The service captures publicly transmitted pager messages, stores them, and makes them searchable. Notifications are dispatched to registered web, iOS, and Android devices based on rules you configure.

CFSScan is an independent monitoring service. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated in conjunction with any South Australian government agency, the South Australian Country Fire Service, the South Australian Metropolitan Fire Service, or any other emergency services organisation.

2. Accounts

You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and for all activity that occurs under your account. You must notify us immediately at admin@cfsscan.com if you suspect unauthorised access.

We reserve the right to suspend or terminate accounts that violate these terms, are used to attempt to disrupt the service, or remain inactive for an extended period.

You may request deletion of your account at any time through our dedicated Account Removal page. Account deletion cancels any active subscription, removes your personal information, and deregisters all devices. Billing and transaction records are retained as required by law — see Privacy Policy — Account and Data Deletion for full details.

3. Subscription Plans and Billing

CFSScan offers paid subscription plans on a monthly or annual billing cycle. Plan features and pricing are described on the pricing page. The following applies to all subscriptions:

  • Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period unless cancelled before the renewal date.
  • Annual subscriptions are billed in full at the start of each billing year.
  • You may cancel at any time via your account settings. Access continues until the end of the paid period; no partial refunds are issued.
  • We reserve the right to adjust pricing with reasonable notice. Price changes will be communicated by email before they take effect on your account.
  • Failed payments may result in service suspension. We will attempt to notify you by email before suspending access.

Each account is eligible for one free 14-day trial, activated at a time of your choosing. Once activated, the trial runs for 14 days and cannot be suspended, transferred to another account, or cancelled. At the end of the trial your account will not automatically convert to a paid subscription — you will receive email notifications before your trial expires with details on how to subscribe. If you do not subscribe, access to paid features will cease when the trial ends.

Payment is processed by Stripe, PayPal, or Braintree depending on the method you select at checkout. CFSScan does not store your full card number or CVV. We retain a payment method token issued by the processor to facilitate recurring billing.

4. Registered Devices

Push notification delivery requires devices to be registered to your account. Device limits apply per account and vary by subscription plan. The following base limits apply unless otherwise stated on the pricing page:

  • Free and Individual accounts: 3 registered devices
  • Premium accounts: additional devices included as specified in the plan
  • Additional device slots may be purchased separately

You are responsible for removing devices you no longer use. We may change device limits at any time; the current limits are always reflected on the pricing page and in your account settings.

5. Notification Rules and CAP Code Subscriptions

The number of notification rules and CAP code subscriptions available to your account is determined by your subscription plan. Rules are evaluated against incoming pager messages in real time. We do not guarantee that all messages matching your rules will result in a delivered notification; delivery depends on factors outside our control including device availability, network conditions, and platform notification services.

6. Service Availability

CFSScan does not guarantee 100% uptime. The service depends on infrastructure outside our direct control, including the GRN paging network, Raspberry Pi demodulators, hosting providers, and third-party platform notification services (Apple APNs, Google FCM). Outages or data gaps may occur due to hardware failure, power outages, network disruption, or GRN maintenance.

We reserve the right to suspend or discontinue the service, or any part of it, at any time. If we are required to discontinue the service by a government or regulatory authority we will provide notice by email to affected subscribers where practicable.

CFSScan's live feed and notification service depends entirely on the GRN paging network transmitting on open, unencrypted frequencies. If the pager network is encrypted, migrated to a private protocol, or otherwise made inaccessible — whether by government decision, network operator action, or regulatory requirement — the live feed and all dependent notification services will cease to function. This would be entirely outside CFSScan's control. In such an event, CFSScan is not liable for any refund of subscription fees paid, whether in full or in part, for any remaining subscription period.

7. Acceptable Use

You must not use the service to:

  • Interfere with or disrupt the service or its infrastructure
  • Attempt to gain unauthorised access to any part of the system
  • Resell or redistribute data obtained from the service without written permission
  • Use automated tools to bulk-harvest message data
  • Impersonate another person or organisation

Pager transmissions captured by CFSScan are publicly transmitted on open frequencies. Use of this data must comply with applicable Australian law. CFSScan makes no representation that use of this data for any particular purpose is lawful in your jurisdiction.

8. Intellectual Property and Ownership

All intellectual property rights in the CFSScan platform, including but not limited to the website, mobile applications, software, source code, database architecture, compiled message data, search indices, notification rule evaluation engine, user interface design, graphics, and all other content produced or maintained by CFSScan, are and remain the exclusive property of CFSScan. No rights in any of the foregoing are transferred to you by virtue of your use of the service or your subscription.

Pager transmissions monitored by CFSScan are publicly broadcast on open radio frequencies and are not owned by CFSScan. However, the collection, processing, storage, indexing, formatting, and presentation of those transmissions — including the compiled database of messages, the search infrastructure built upon them, and the notification delivery system derived from them — constitute proprietary works of CFSScan and are protected accordingly.

Subject to your compliance with these terms and payment of any applicable subscription fees, CFSScan grants you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to access and use the service for your own personal or internal organisational purposes. This licence does not permit you to copy, reproduce, distribute, modify, create derivative works from, publicly display, or commercially exploit any part of the service or its underlying data.

9. Unauthorised Access, API Use, and Reverse Engineering

You must not, and must not permit any third party to, do any of the following without the express prior written permission of CFSScan:

  • Access or attempt to access any part of the CFSScan platform, API, database, or infrastructure through automated means, including web scrapers, bots, crawlers, or data extraction tools of any kind
  • Access or attempt to access the CFSScan mobile or web API through any means other than the official CFSScan mobile applications or web interface
  • Reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble, or otherwise attempt to derive the source code, algorithms, or underlying logic of any part of the CFSScan software or services
  • Frame, embed, mirror, or otherwise incorporate any part of the CFSScan service, live feed, or data within a third-party website, application, or service without written authorisation
  • Systematically download, harvest, or aggregate message data or any other content from the service in bulk, whether through automated or manual means
  • Circumvent, disable, or otherwise interfere with any technical measures implemented by CFSScan to control access to or use of the service, including authentication, rate limiting, or access controls
  • Use data, content, or outputs obtained from the service to train, develop, or improve any machine learning model, artificial intelligence system, or automated data processing tool without express written consent

Any unauthorised access to or use of the CFSScan API, platform, or data constitutes a material breach of these terms and may constitute a breach of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth) and other applicable Australian law. CFSScan reserves the right to pursue all available legal remedies in such circumstances.

10. Brand and Trademarks

The CFSScan name, logo, and associated brand assets are the property of CFSScan. You must not use the CFSScan name, logo, or any confusingly similar mark in any context — including but not limited to websites, applications, social media profiles, marketing materials, or domain names — without the express prior written consent of CFSScan.

You must not represent or imply any affiliation, endorsement, partnership, or sponsorship between yourself and CFSScan without prior written authorisation. CFSScan is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of the South Australian Country Fire Service, the South Australian Metropolitan Fire Service, the South Australian State Emergency Service, or any other emergency services organisation, and you must not represent otherwise.

11. Limitation of Liability

The service is provided "as is". To the maximum extent permitted by law, CFSScan excludes all warranties, express or implied, including fitness for a particular purpose. CFSScan is not liable for any loss or damage arising from reliance on the service, including but not limited to missed notifications or service outages.

CFSScan is not an approved emergency response notification service and must not be relied upon for life-safety decisions or as a substitute for official emergency alerting systems. The service is intended for information and monitoring purposes only. CFSScan accepts no liability for any loss, injury, or harm arising from reliance on the service in an emergency or safety-critical situation.

Nothing in these terms limits liability for fraud, death, or personal injury caused by negligence, or any liability that cannot be excluded under Australian consumer law.

12. Governing Law

These terms are governed by the laws of South Australia, Australia. You agree to submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of South Australia.

13. Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms of Use at any time. Continued use of the service after the updated terms are published constitutes acceptance. We will notify subscribers of material changes by email.

Privacy Policy

CFSScan is committed to protecting your privacy. We are bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs).

1. Information We Collect

We collect the following categories of personal information:

  • Account information: name, email address, password (stored as a salted hash)
  • Billing information: billing address; payment method tokens issued by our payment processors (we do not store card numbers or CVVs)
  • Device information: device identifiers and push notification tokens for registered iOS, Android, and web devices
  • Usage data: notification rules and CAP code subscriptions you configure, message search history, account preferences and settings
  • Technical data: browser type, operating system, pages visited, access times, and referring URL, collected automatically for the purpose of operating and improving the service

2. How We Use Your Information

We use your personal information to:

  • Operate your account and deliver the service
  • Process subscription payments and manage billing
  • Dispatch push notifications to your registered devices
  • Send service-related communications (billing receipts, outage notices, account alerts)
  • Respond to support enquiries
  • Improve the service through aggregate, anonymised analytics

We will not use your information for unrelated purposes without your consent or as required by law.

3. Sharing of Your Information

We do not sell your personal information. We share it only with:

  • Payment processors: Stripe, PayPal, and Braintree, to process transactions. Each processor's privacy practices govern their handling of your data.
  • Push notification services: Apple APNs and Google FCM, to deliver notifications to your registered devices.
  • Hosting and infrastructure providers: as necessary to operate the service.
  • Legal authorities: where required by law or a valid court order.

Any third-party service providers we engage are bound by confidentiality obligations consistent with this policy.

4. Payment Security

All payment transactions are processed by our payment processors over encrypted connections. CFSScan does not receive or store full credit card numbers, CVVs, or equivalent sensitive payment credentials. We retain only the tokens and identifiers necessary for recurring subscription billing.

5. Security

CFSScan uses TLS encryption for all data in transit. Access to stored customer data is restricted to personnel who require it for their role (such as billing administration or system maintenance). We apply reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your information, though no system can guarantee absolute security.

6. Data Retention

We retain your personal information for as long as your account is active. If you close your account, we will delete or anonymise your personal information within a reasonable period, except where retention is required by law or for legitimate business purposes such as resolving disputes or enforcing agreements. See Account and Data Deletion for the specific deletion and retention rules that apply when you close your account.

7. Your Rights

Under the Australian Privacy Act you have the right to:

  • Request access to the personal information we hold about you
  • Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information
  • Complain about a breach of the APPs

To exercise any of these rights, contact us at admin@cfsscan.com. We will respond within a reasonable timeframe. We may ask you to verify your identity before processing a request.

8. Account and Data Deletion

You may request deletion of your account and personal information at any time. Submit your request through our dedicated Account Removal page. You must be signed in to your CFSScan account to submit a request — for your security, we will not action deletion requests submitted by anyone other than the account holder.

Removing a single device

If you only want to remove a specific device from your account (and not delete your account entirely), you can do so at any time without contacting us. Visit your registered devices page in your account settings.

The deletion process

When you submit a deletion request:

  1. We send a confirmation email to the address registered on your account. You must click the link in that email within 24 hours to verify the request. Unverified requests automatically expire and have no effect on your account.
  2. Once verified, our support team will action your request within 30 days. We may contact you to further verify your identity before proceeding.
  3. You will receive a final confirmation email once your account has been deleted.

What is removed or anonymized

Where possible, we permanently delete your data. Where we are required to retain records that reference your account (such as financial transaction records under Australian taxation law), we anonymize those records so they can no longer be linked to you. Anonymization includes removing or replacing:

  • Your account credentials and login information
  • Your name and email address
  • Your billing and contact addresses
  • Your registered devices and push notification tokens
  • Your notification rules and CAP code subscriptions
  • Your saved payment method tokens
  • Your profile images, account preferences, and personal settings
  • Any active subscription (no partial refund is issued for the remaining billing period)

If you own a brigade or group account

If you are the Owner of a CFSScan group account (for example, a brigade with multiple members), deleting your personal account will also close that group account. Other members of the group will lose access. If you wish to preserve a group account, you must transfer ownership to another member before submitting your deletion request. Please contact our support team if you need assistance with ownership transfer.

What we retain and why

The following records are retained after account deletion as required by law or for legitimate compliance purposes:

  • Financial transaction records (billing amounts, dates, payment method type) — retained for a minimum of five years under Australian taxation law, and used to resolve billing disputes if they arise. These records do not contain full card numbers or CVVs.
  • An audit record of the deletion request itself (date requested, date verified, IP address, and the email address used for verification) — retained for compliance purposes. This record contains only what is necessary to demonstrate the request was processed lawfully.

Records that reference your account but contain no information that identifies you (such as the existence of a closed subscription or notifications you previously received) may be retained in anonymized form for operational and statistical purposes. These records cannot be used to identify you after deletion.

Reversibility

Once we have actioned your deletion (within 30 days of verifying your request), the deletion cannot be reversed. If you change your mind before then, please contact us as soon as possible.

9. Cookies

We use the following categories of cookies:

  • Session and authentication cookies: maintain your login state across page visits.
  • Security cookies: CSRF tokens used to protect live feed and form submissions from cross-site request forgery.
  • Analytics cookies: Google Analytics collects aggregate, anonymised traffic data (pages visited, session duration, referral source) to help us understand how the service is used.
  • Advertising cookies: Google AdSense and the Facebook pixel place cookies to serve relevant advertising and measure ad performance. These third parties operate under their own privacy policies and may track your activity across other websites.

You can manage or disable cookies through your browser settings. Disabling cookies may affect your ability to log in or use the live feed.

10. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy at any time. The updated policy will be published on this page with a revised date. If you object to any change, you should stop using the service.

11. Contact Us

For any questions about these terms or our privacy practices, please contact us at admin@cfsscan.com.