CloakmarkPrivacy Policy
Who we are
Cloakmark ("the app", "we", "us") is published on the App Store by The Caporale Group, LLC. Cloakmark is a trademark of Operational Legitimacy IP LLC. You can reach us at support@cloakmark.com.
Information we collect
None. Cloakmark has no user accounts, no analytics, no advertising, no tracking, and no servers that receive your content. We don't collect your name, email, location, contacts, device identifiers or usage data.
Your photos and videos
- Choosing media: Cloakmark uses Apple's system photo picker. The app can only see the specific photos or videos you choose, never your whole library.
- Processing: Face detection, text detection, redaction and watermarking all happen on your device using Apple's built-in frameworks. Nothing is sent over the internet.
- Saving: With your permission, Cloakmark adds the protected copy to your Photos library. It asks for "add only" access, which lets it save new items but not read your existing library.
- Originals: Your original photos and videos are never changed or deleted.
- Metadata: Protected copies are saved without location (GPS), camera details or embedded thumbnails.
Information stored on your device
Cloakmark keeps a small amount of information on your device only, to make the app work:
- Your settings, such as watermark text, logo, protection level and cover style.
- An optional watermark-lock PIN, stored only as a one-way cryptographic hash.
- Protection certificate records: date, counts of items removed, protection level, watermark text and a SHA-256 fingerprint of each protected file. The fingerprint can't be used to recreate the photo.
This information stays on your device, is included in your own device backups if you use them, and is deleted when you delete the app. You can also delete individual certificates in the app.
Face recognition (People)
People is an optional feature. You can use it to keep chosen people visible in your photos, or to hide only specific people. It is off until you add someone.
- Consent first: Before you add the first person, Cloakmark explains how face data is used and asks you to agree. The date you agreed is stored on your device.
- Permission for each person: Each time you add someone, you must confirm that you are that person, their parent or legal guardian, or that you have their permission to create a faceprint of them. The date of that confirmation is stored with the person, on your device.
- Mistakes are possible: Face matching runs only on your device and can make mistakes. Cloakmark never receives your photos or face data. Always review each photo before you share it.
- What is created: For each photo you choose for a person, Cloakmark creates a faceprint: a set of numbers that describes the face, made with Apple's built-in Vision framework. The faceprint is not a photo. The sample photos themselves are not kept.
- Where it lives: Faceprints and names are stored only on your device (iPhone or iPad), with iOS file protection, and are excluded from iCloud and device backups. They are never uploaded, sent to us, or included in certificates or exported photos and videos. They are shared with nothing except Cloakmark's own share extension (the "Cloakmark" option in the iOS Share menu) on the same device, so photos protected from the Share menu follow your People choices. For that, a copy is kept in a private area of the device's keychain that only Cloakmark can read, is limited to this device, and is never synced to iCloud or included in backups.
- How it is used: Only to decide which faces to hide when you protect a photo or video.
- Deleting it: Removing a person deletes their faceprints. Settings › People › Delete All Face Data erases every faceprint at any time. Both also erase the share extension's copy immediately. Deleting the app deletes your face data: the app's files are removed, and the share extension's keychain copy can no longer be read by anything and is erased automatically if Cloakmark is ever installed again, before it can be used.
Face data (biometric) retention and destruction policy
This section is our written policy for the face data created by the optional People feature. It applies to every version of Cloakmark that includes People.
- What is created: faceprints, which are sets of numbers derived from the photos you choose when you add a person. A faceprint is not a photo. Cloakmark does not keep the photos you choose for this.
- Purpose: only to decide, on your device, which faces to keep visible and which to hide in the photos and videos you protect. Faceprints are never used for any other purpose.
- Never collected, sold or shared: faceprints are never sent to us or to any third party. We do not collect, receive, buy, sell, lease, trade or otherwise profit from face data, and we have no servers that could receive it.
- Where it is stored: only on your device, in Cloakmark's own protected storage, and in a device-only keychain area shared with nothing except Cloakmark's own Share extension on the same device. It is excluded from iCloud and device backups.
- How long it is kept: until the first of these happens: you remove the person; you tap Settings › People › Delete All Face Data; you withdraw your consent (Delete All Face Data also withdraws it); or you delete the app.
- Destruction: removing a person or deleting all face data destroys the faceprints immediately, including the Share extension's copy. In every case, face data is destroyed no later than when the app is deleted: the app's files are removed by iOS, and the keychain copy can no longer be read by anything without the app and is erased at the first launch of any later install, before it can be used.
- Our copies: we retain no face data, because we never receive any.
Clean Up My Feed
If you import old photos from Photos or from an Instagram or Facebook data download, the files, dates and captions are read and processed on your device and are never uploaded. Cloakmark keeps protected copies, original dates and captions in an on-device Repost Kit until you remove them.
Sharing
We don't share any information with anyone, because we don't have any. When you choose to share a protected photo, video or certificate using the iOS share sheet, it goes only where you send it, under that service's own privacy policy.
Children
Cloakmark is designed to help parents and organizations protect children's privacy. It collects no personal information from anyone, including children under 13.
Your rights
Because we don't collect or hold personal data, there is nothing for us to access, correct, export or delete on our side. Everything Cloakmark stores is on your device and under your control.
Changes to this policy
If this policy changes, we'll post the new version on this page and update the effective date above. If a future version of the app ever collects data, we'll explain what and why before it happens.
Contact
Questions? Email support@cloakmark.com.