Privacy Policy

Last updated: June 20, 2026

ThinkScribe processes all data locally on your device. We do not collect, store, or have access to your audio, transcripts, or any personal data. Period.

1. Overview

ThinkScribe ("the App") is a native application for Mac (Apple Silicon), iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. The App provides speech-to-text transcription, AI-powered summarization, and meeting intelligence features — all of which run entirely on your device using Apple's Neural Engine and local machine learning models (such as WhisperKit, Parakeet TDT, ThinkScribe AI (powered by Qwen), and Apple Foundation Models).

This Privacy Policy describes what data the App accesses, how it is used, and your rights regarding that data.

2. Data We Do NOT Collect

ThinkScribe does not collect, transmit, or store any of the following:

  • Audio recordings or microphone input
  • Transcription text or AI-generated summaries
  • Personal identification information (names, emails, phone numbers)
  • Usage analytics or telemetry
  • Device identifiers or IP addresses
  • Location data
  • Crash reports (unless you opt in via system preferences)

3. Data Stored on Your Device

The following data is created and stored locally on your device, within the App's sandboxed container or your chosen export locations:

  • Transcripts: Text generated from your audio, stored via SwiftData in the App's local database.
  • Audio files: Recordings captured during sessions, stored in the App's documents directory.
  • AI model caches: Whisper and LLM model weights downloaded for on-device inference.
  • User preferences: Settings and configuration stored in UserDefaults.
  • Search indexes: Local indexes built for fast transcript search.

You have full control over this data. You can delete individual transcripts from within the App, or remove all data by deleting the App.

Optional iCloud Sync: ThinkScribe offers an optional "Sync Across Devices" feature that is turned OFF by default. When you choose to enable it, your transcripts, summaries, collections, and speaker profiles are synced across your own Apple devices using Apple's first-party CloudKit service and your personal iCloud account. This data is end-to-end encrypted through your iCloud account — Apple cannot read it and we, as the developer, have no access to it. Audio recordings are never synced and always remain on your device. No data is sent to us or any third party; CloudKit communicates only with Apple's iCloud servers, and you can disable sync at any time in Settings.

4. Permissions

ThinkScribe requests the following permissions:

  • Microphone: To capture audio for transcription. Audio is processed locally and never transmitted.
  • System Audio Recording (Mac only): To capture system audio from applications (e.g., Zoom, Teams) via CoreAudio process taps. No screen content is involved — only audio streams.
  • Accessibility (Mac only): To enable global keyboard shortcuts for quick recording access.

5. Third-Party Services

ThinkScribe does not use any third-party analytics, advertising, tracking, or AI services. The App does not contain any SDKs that transmit user data to external servers. No audio, text, transcripts, or personal data is ever sent to OpenAI, Google, Hugging Face, or any other third-party service.

The only outbound network activity the App performs is downloading open-source machine-learning model weights (such as Whisper, Parakeet, and Qwen) from public model repositories on Hugging Face during initial setup. These are one-way downloads of static model files — no audio, text, transcripts, or any user content is uploaded to these services as part of this process. Hugging Face acts as a static file host (functionally equivalent to a public release asset on GitHub), not as an AI service. After models are cached locally, the App functions entirely offline.

Analytics: ThinkScribe does not use any third-party analytics or crash-reporting SDKs. The only diagnostics used are Apple's own privacy-preserving frameworks (such as MetricKit and the aggregate performance and usage metrics that App Store Connect provides to all developers). These contain no transcripts, audio, or personally identifiable information — only anonymous, aggregated counts and durations — and are processed on-device or within Apple's aggregated reporting pipeline. We never receive analytics that can identify you or reveal your content.

6. In-App Purchases

ThinkScribe uses Apple's StoreKit 2 framework for in-app purchases. Purchase transactions are handled entirely by Apple and are subject to Apple's Privacy Policy. We do not have access to your payment information.

7. Children's Privacy

ThinkScribe is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect any data from children, as we do not collect data from any users.

8. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes will be reflected on this page with an updated "Last updated" date. As ThinkScribe does not collect user data, we have no way to notify you directly of changes — please check this page periodically.

9. Contact

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at support@thinkscribe.ai

Your Privacy

We use cookies to analyze website traffic. The ThinkScribe app itself never uses tracking cookies—your audio and transcripts always stay 100% locally on your device.