Privacy Policy
Last updated 16 September 2026
What we collect
Nothing. Not usage data, not crash reports, not advertising or device identifiers, not your documents, not the details found on them.
The app contains no code that uploads a file. The one thing it talks to the internet for is Apple's own in-app purchase system, which checks whether your subscription is active and carries nothing about your documents. You can verify this yourself: turn off Wi-Fi and mobile data and watch every feature — finding details, removing them, preparing and saving the copy — keep working.
Your documents
You open a document from Files, Photos, the camera or another app's share sheet. Blackout reads it into memory and never writes back to it: the original is untouched, and every result is a new file that you share or save yourself. When you finish, or cancel, the document is gone from the app. There is no library, no cache and no cloud copy.
What the scan finds
To find the details a stranger shouldn't get, the app reads the document on
your device using Apple's own frameworks: pattern matching with checksums for
account, routing, card and ID numbers, Apple's data detector for phone numbers
and addresses, its language tagger for names, and Vision for text on scans and
for faces and barcodes in pictures. Nothing is sent anywhere to be analysed.
The findings exist only while you review them, are shown to you masked
(•••-••-4821), and are discarded when the copy is prepared.
The "hidden data" the app removes — the file's author, dates and tools, comment authors, attachments, scripts, and the camera and location details inside embedded photos — is likewise shown to you and then discarded. It is never stored.
The share log
The one thing Blackout keeps between uses is the share log: for each copy you prepare, the document's name, the recipient's name you typed, the date, and counts of what was hidden and removed. It holds no document, no picture of one, and no path to one. It lives only on your device, is never synced or uploaded, and you can clear it at any time from the log itself.
Camera and photos
If you scan a document, the camera captures it and the scan is prepared on your device. If you choose photos, only the images you pick are read. Neither is uploaded anywhere. You can decline both permissions and the rest of the app works normally.
Purchases
The Pro subscription is handled entirely by Apple. We never see your payment details. Whether the subscription is active is verified on your device from a record the App Store signed — there is no entitlement server, so we do not know who subscribes and could not tell you if asked.
Apple's own data collection
Apple may collect information about App Store downloads and purchases under Apple's privacy policy. That is between you and Apple; we receive only anonymous, aggregated sales totals that identify nobody.
What the App Store shows
The app's App Store listing reports Data Not Collected. Every category — contact info, identifiers, usage data, diagnostics, user content — is answered "not collected", because none of it is.
| Category | Collected | Why not |
|---|---|---|
| Contact info | No | No account, no forms |
| User content | No | Documents never leave the device; the share log holds names and counts, on device only |
| Identifiers | No | No advertising or analytics identifiers |
| Usage data | No | No analytics of any kind |
| Diagnostics | No | No crash reporting service |
| Location, contacts, health, financial | No | Those APIs are not used |
Third-party code
None. The app has no dependencies outside Apple's own frameworks, so there is no partner collecting data on our behalf — the usual reason an otherwise private app has to answer "yes" on a privacy label.
Children
The app is rated 4+ and collects no data from anyone, of any age.
Changes to this policy
If this policy ever changes, the updated version will appear here with a new date. Since the app collects nothing today, a change would most likely mean a new capability was added — and it would be described plainly rather than buried.
Contact
Questions about privacy, or anything else: