Privacy

What is indexed?

Linked local folders and Capture imports: image/video paths, EXIF-style metadata when present, OCR text, derived tags, embeddings (when the pack is available), and structured Markdown/JSON records. Originals are not copied by default.

Where is it stored?

Vault database and derived artifacts live under ~/Library/Application Support/PhotoKB/. The on-disk directory name remains PhotoKB for compatibility; the product display name is BlobberVault.

What leaves the device?

Default Strict Local: no image, thumbnail, crop, or embedding leaves the device during indexing.

Optional OpenAI query planning (when you enable it) sends metadata-only planning prompts — never your image bytes as a default vision upload. Optional Hugging Face model downloads are user-initiated weight fetches.

Which AI providers or models?

• On-device OCR / tagging / Ask packs shipped or downloaded for local use.
• Optional SmolVLM weights via in-app download (not baked into the DMG).
• Optional OpenAI metadata-only planning with a Keychain-stored key.
• Semantic CLIP / faces extras are not claimed as DMG freeze features.

How do I delete vault data?

Use in-app delete / reset flows where available, or remove the Application Support PhotoKB directory. Uninstalling the .app does not always wipe Application Support — delete that folder when you want a clean slate.

Where are exports?

Markdown and JSON exports go to locations you choose in Export flows (typically a folder you pick). They are ordinary local files under your control.

Telemetry / analytics?

Desktop app: no metrics SDK in the default build. Nothing leaves your Mac unless you opt into features that explicitly call a cloud API (e.g. OpenAI tagging).

This website: each page load (and Download click) sends a small beacon to our AWS Lambda counter — no cookies. Unique visitors use a hashed client IP (salt kept server-side; raw IPs are not stored in the counter table). Aggregate counts are published to public S3 site-stats.json for the hero and /stats. Completed DMG transfers are also estimated from S3 access logs (may lag). Optionally, when configured, we may also use Plausible. Never GitHub Release counters — the repo stays private.

Download email (optional): before a DMG download you may leave an email for release notes. It is stored in our DynamoDB lead list for product updates only — never sold. You can always continue without providing an email.

Contact form: messages (email, optional name, message) are stored in our DynamoDB so we can reply. Your email is also added to the same private lead list as optional download emails. Do not send secrets or vault data. Never sold.

Local MCP residual risk

Optional photokb-mcp / Collections fleet is a localhost developer surface — not bundled in the DMG. Tokens and slice caps are managed in Settings → Local MCP. Keep BlobberVault running while agents query; treat MCP like any local API you enable.