Privacy policy

This policy explains how the Offword app for Android (the "app") and the website offword.app handle information. Offword is operated by Offword, a sole proprietorship in the United States ("we", "us"). If you have questions, write to privacy@offword.app.

What the app collects

The app records audio when you ask it to and creates transcripts from that audio. This is the only personal content the app handles.

• Audio recordings and transcripts are created and stored on your device, in the app's private storage. They are not uploaded to us or to anyone else. We have no way to access them.
• Settings you choose in the app (for example, which microphone or recording mode to use) are stored on your device.

In the current version of the app there are no user accounts, no analytics or crash-reporting services, no advertising, and no third-party tracking code. We do not sell, rent, or share personal information, because we do not collect it.

Recordings may contain the voices and words of other people. Those recordings stay on your device under your control. Please read the recording consent section of our terms of use.

Permissions the app uses

Permission	Why
Microphone	To record audio when you start a recording. The app does not listen when you have not started one.
Notifications	To show an ongoing notification while a recording or transcription is running, and to tell you when an update is available. Android requires this notification for recording in the background.
Bluetooth	To connect to Bluetooth headsets and, in a future version, the Offword wearable, so they can be used as the microphone.
Internet	Only to download speech recognition models and to check offword.app for app updates. Audio and transcripts are never sent over the internet.

The app may also use standard Android permissions needed to keep a recording running in the background (a foreground service) and to run transcription when your phone is idle and charging. These do not give the app access to any additional personal information.

Update checks

The app periodically downloads a small file from offword.app that lists the latest version number. This is an ordinary web request. It does not include any identifier, account, device ID, or information about your recordings. Like any website, our hosting provider (Cloudflare) may briefly process technical data such as your IP address and the time of the request in order to deliver the file and protect the service from abuse. We do not use this data to identify you.

Speech model downloads

Speech recognition models are downloaded from GitHub, which hosts the open-source models. When the app downloads a model, GitHub receives an ordinary web request, including your IP address, as described in the GitHub Privacy Statement. No audio, transcripts, or identifiers are sent.

This website

offword.app does not use cookies, analytics, or advertising. Our hosting provider, Cloudflare, processes standard request data such as IP addresses to serve pages and protect against abuse. If you email us, we use your email address and message only to reply, and we delete correspondence when it is no longer needed.

How long data is kept, and how to delete it

Recordings and transcripts stay on your device until you delete them. You can delete individual recordings in the app at any time. Uninstalling the app removes all recordings, transcripts, settings, and downloaded models from your device. Files you export or share to other apps are then controlled by those apps, not by Offword.

Because we do not hold any of your data, there is nothing for us to delete on our side. If you would like confirmation, write to privacy@offword.app.

Children

Offword is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children. The app does not collect personal information from anyone, but if you believe a child has sent us information by email, contact us and we will delete it.

Pro features and the future

We plan to offer a paid tier called Pro. There is no cloud transcription in any tier: speech recognition always runs on your phone. The only Pro features that involve a cloud provider are limited to encrypted backup to your own Google Drive or iCloud account. Backups are encrypted on your device before upload, so the provider cannot read them, and they happen only if you turn them on.

Pro stores transcripts in an encrypted database on your device. The free tier stores them as plain text files in the app's private storage.

In the future we may offer an optional program to contribute audio to help improve speech models. It would be off by default and covered by a separate consent notice shown before you could join. Nothing changes for people who do not opt in.

Security

Recordings are kept in the app's private storage, which Android protects from other apps. App updates are signed with our key, and Android will not install an update signed with a different key. Model and update downloads use encrypted HTTPS connections. No method of storage is perfectly secure, so we recommend keeping a screen lock on your phone.

Your choices and rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, or delete personal information, or to object to its processing. Since your recordings live only on your device, you exercise these rights directly in the app. For anything else, contact us and we will respond within a reasonable time.

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we will post the new version on this page and update the effective date. If a change materially affects how your information is handled, we will also tell you in the app before it takes effect.

Contact

Offword, a sole proprietorship in the United States.
Privacy questions: privacy@offword.app
General support: hello@offword.app