Privacy Policy
The ScanToPDF Local app does not collect, transmit, or store any of your information. There is no account, no server, and no analytics in the app. Everything it does happens on your device.
This website is a separate thing from the app, and it is an ordinary website — what that means is set out at the end. Nothing on this site can see anything inside the app, and nothing in the app reports to this site.
The short version. Your scans, the text recognised in them, and the PDFs you create never leave your device unless you deliberately share them. We cannot see them. We have no way to see them, because the app contains no code that sends anything anywhere.
What the app collects
Nothing. The app has no analytics, no crash reporting, no advertising software, and no network code of any kind. This is verified by an automated test that fails the build if network usage is introduced into the app.
That is the claim that matters, it is the one we are asked about on both app stores, and it is not softened anywhere below. The website section at the end is about the website only.
What stays on your device
| Data | Where it lives |
|---|---|
| Scanned page images | Your device's private app storage |
| PDFs you create | Your device's private app storage |
| Recognised text, and the search index built from it | A database on your device |
| Whether you have purchased Pro, and how many free scans you have used | Your device's secure storage |
Your operating system already encrypts app storage at rest. Deleting a document removes it; uninstalling the app removes everything.
Text recognition happens on your device
Reading the text in your documents is done by on-device recognition models that ship with the app. Your pages are not uploaded for processing. The app works completely in airplane mode, which you are welcome to verify.
Camera and scanning
On Android, the scanning interface is provided by a Google Play Services component that runs on your device and returns the captured pages to the app. On iOS it is provided by the system document scanner. These are parts of your operating system, governed by your device maker's own terms; the app receives only the finished images.
When information does leave your device
Only when you choose. There are exactly three cases:
- Sharing. When you share or export a document, your operating system's share sheet hands the file to whichever app you pick. What happens next is governed by that app's privacy policy, not ours.
- Feedback. If you send feedback, the app opens your own email application with a message you can read and edit first. Your email provider sends it, not the app. The message contains the app version and your platform only — never your documents.
- Purchases. Payments are handled entirely by the App Store or Google Play. We never see your payment details. We receive no personal information from a purchase.
What we cannot do
Because the app sends us nothing, we hold nothing from it — there is nothing for us to hand over, sell, lose in a breach, or produce in response to a request. We also cannot recover your documents for you if you delete them or lose your device — that is the trade, and we think it is the right one.
The only thing we could ever hold about you is aggregate website traffic, described below. It contains no documents, no scans, no text from them, and nothing that identifies you.
Children
The app is not directed at children and collects no information from anyone, including children.
Your rights
Laws such as the GDPR and the CCPA give you rights over personal data a company holds about you — to access it, correct it, or have it deleted. We hold no personal data from the app, so there is nothing to request. Your data is in your hands: delete a document in the app, or uninstall it, and it is gone.
Website traffic figures are aggregate counts, not personal data, so they cannot be traced back to you and there is nothing individual to access or erase. Ask us anyway if you would like to know exactly what is measured — the answer is short.
This website
Everything above is about the app. This section is about the pages you are reading, and the two are completely separate: the website cannot see anything in the app, and the app never contacts the website.
A website is a web server, and a web server sees requests. Ours is behind Cloudflare, which records the ordinary things any host records — which page was requested, when, the rough region it came from, and the browser type. We look at those counts to see whether anyone reads these pages. We may also use a privacy-preserving analytics service for the same purpose. If we do, it will be one that measures page views in aggregate rather than following individuals.
What this site does not do, and what we are committing to here:
- No advertising or marketing trackers, and no data sold or shared for advertising.
- No cross-site tracking, and no profile built about you.
- No accounts and no sign-in, so there is nothing to link a visit to.
- Nothing about your documents. They are not on this site and never were — the app has no way to send them here.
As of the date at the top of this page these pages load no scripts at all and fetch nothing from a third party — no analytics tag, no webfont, no images. You can confirm that with View Source. If that changes, this section changes with it.
Changes
If this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it and the new version appears here. If we ever added anything to the app that transmitted your information, we would say so plainly and in advance — not quietly amend a document nobody re-reads. Website analytics is the one thing this policy already permits without a further announcement, and it is fenced by the four commitments above.
Contact
Questions about this policy, or about the app: support@ethertech.dev