Legal

Privacy policy

Effective date: July 4, 2026

This policy is short because the truthful answer to "what data do you collect?" is: none. Caveau has no servers, no accounts, and no analytics. We wrote this page to be read, not skimmed past.

1. The summary

Caveau is an iPhone app that encrypts your photos and videos on your device. We do not collect, receive, store, transmit, sell, or share any personal data. None. The app's only network activity is Apple's StoreKit, for the single in-app purchase. Everything below is detail on that one sentence.

2. What we collect

Nothing. Specifically, Caveau does not collect or have access to:

  • Your photos, videos, or anything derived from them (thumbnails, search indexes, face groupings, text recognized in images);
  • Your password, recovery key, or recovery-key shares;
  • Your name, email address, phone number, contacts, or location;
  • Device identifiers, advertising identifiers, or IP addresses;
  • Usage analytics, crash reports, or telemetry of any kind.

There is no Caveau account to create, and there are no Caveau servers for data to reach. This is not a configuration choice you have to find in Settings — it is how the app is built, and the open-source client lets anyone verify it.

3. Where your data lives

Your photos and videos are encrypted on your iPhone using libsodium's XChaCha20-Poly1305 authenticated encryption, with keys derived from your password using Argon2id and protected with the device's Secure Enclave. The encrypted vault, its search index, face data, and album structure all remain on your device.

We never hold your encryption keys, so even in principle we cannot decrypt your vault — there is no "admin access," no master key, and nothing we could hand over in response to a legal request, because nothing exists outside your phone.

4. Data you choose to move

Two features move data off your device, both only at your explicit request:

  • Encrypted backups. You can export a portable backup file and store it wherever you choose (for example iCloud Drive, a computer, or a USB drive). The file is encrypted before it leaves the app; whoever stores or intercepts it cannot read it without your password or recovery key. Where you keep that file is governed by that storage provider's terms, not ours — but the contents remain unreadable to them.
  • Sharing and export. When you share a photo or use full export, the decrypted files go where you send them. Shared photos have EXIF metadata and GPS location stripped by default.

5. Payments

Caveau's one-time lifetime unlock is purchased through Apple's App Store. Apple processes the payment under its own privacy policy. We never see your name, email, billing address, or payment details. Apple provides developers only aggregated, anonymized sales reporting.

6. Device permissions

  • Photo library — requested so you can import photos and videos into the vault, and so Caveau can (only if you ask) delete originals from the system library after import. Caveau reads only the items you select.
  • Face ID — unlocking with Face ID uses Apple's LocalAuthentication framework. Biometric data is handled entirely by iOS and the Secure Enclave; Caveau never sees or stores your face data.

Caveau requests no network, location, microphone, contacts, or tracking permissions. Its App Store privacy label is "Data Not Collected."

7. Analytics and third parties

Caveau contains no analytics, no advertising SDKs, no crash-reporting services, and no third-party code that communicates with anyone. This website is static, sets no cookies, and runs no analytics either.

8. Children

Caveau does not knowingly collect data from anyone, including children, because it collects no data from anyone at all. The app is rated for the App Store's general audience requirements.

9. Legal requests

If we receive a legal demand for user data, we can only respond truthfully: we do not have any. We hold no photos, no keys, no metadata, no logs, and no means of identifying who uses the app.

10. Changes to this policy

If this policy ever changes, we will update this page, change the effective date above, and note the change in the app's changelog. Because the app cannot phone home, no change to this policy can retroactively affect data — there still won't be any.

11. Contact

Questions about privacy: support@getcaveau.app.