Pocket Familiar Privacy Policy
This policy applies to the Pocket Familiar iPhone app and its optional connection to a user-owned Companion desktop installation. Sin & Sarah is an independent business registered in Ontario, Canada. We do not sell app data, use it for advertising, or track people across apps or websites.
What Pocket Familiar handles
- Profile and presentation data: the companion display name, selected familiar, status presentation, and related preferences.
- Conversation and interaction data: messages you write, companion replies returned by your paired desktop, read state, Touch interactions, and optional Care messages or reminders.
- Pairing and delivery data: opaque installation, device, pairing, and encryption-key identifiers; delivery cursors and duplicate-prevention records; and short-lived encrypted envelopes needed to move events between your phone and desktop.
- Notification data: notification permission state, an Apple Push Notification service token when notifications are enabled, and Live Activity tokens and bounded status facts when you use those features.
Where data goes
Pocket Familiar stores protected app data on your iPhone. When you choose to pair, it sends end-to-end encrypted events through the private gateway on your own Tailscale network to your own Companion desktop installation. The gateway routes encrypted envelopes and the minimum opaque identifiers needed for delivery; it cannot read the protected message content.
Your desktop remains the model and memory authority. If you configure a third-party AI provider in Companion, the desktop may send conversation content to that provider to create a reply. The provider processes that data under the terms and privacy policy for the account you chose. Pocket Familiar does not receive or store your model-provider API key.
Notifications and Live Activities
Notifications are optional and are requested only after an explicit action. Apple processes push tokens and push delivery. A remote fallback alert contains no reminder text; richer content remains protected and appears after the app syncs. Your iPhone settings, including Focus and notification previews, control how alerts appear. Live Activity tokens and bounded status facts are used only to provide the Live Activity you requested.
What we do not collect for the app
Pocket Familiar includes no advertising SDK, third-party analytics SDK, or cross-app tracking. It does not request Contacts, Location, Photos, Health, Microphone, or Camera access, and it does not process payments. Sin & Sarah does not receive your paired conversation content in the normal customer-owned workflow. We receive content only if you deliberately send it to us for support.
Service providers
- Apple distributes the app and, if enabled, routes notifications and Live Activity updates.
- Tailscale provides the private networking software you independently install and control.
- Your chosen AI provider processes messages sent by your desktop Companion to produce replies.
- Netlify hosts this policy and the support page and may process ordinary web-server request data when you visit them.
Each provider has its own terms and privacy policy. We do not authorize these providers to use Pocket Familiar data for our advertising or cross-app tracking.
Retention, deletion, and revoking access
- On iPhone, use the app's unlink control to retire the encrypted phone channel. Deleting the app removes its local app container; iOS manages any remaining system notification settings.
- On the paired computer, use Companion's Disconnect iPhone control to revoke the phone connection. Conversation data already synchronized to that computer remains under the computer owner's control until they clear or remove it.
- Encrypted gateway queues, delivery records, and device bindings are controlled by the customer-owned installation. Use the app's Unlink control or Companion's Disconnect iPhone control before deleting either app; deleting only the iPhone app does not guarantee that an already-synchronized desktop copy or gateway binding is removed.
- You can disable notifications at any time in iPhone Settings and change Care permission in Companion.
If you contact us for support, we keep the correspondence only as long as reasonably needed to resolve the request and meet legal or recordkeeping obligations. You may request access, correction, or deletion of information we hold by emailing hello@sinandsarah.com.
Children
Pocket Familiar is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13.
Security
We use device-protected storage, private-network routing, short-lived pairing secrets, and end-to-end encrypted event envelopes. No system can guarantee perfect security. Do not share a pairing QR, pairing link, recovery credential, API key, or unredacted support screenshot.
Changes and contact
If this policy changes, the date at the top changes. Material changes will be stated plainly. Questions or privacy requests can be sent to hello@sinandsarah.com.