Privacy Policy

1. Who is responsible

The controller for data processing on this website and in the Pixtore app is:

2. The Pixtore app

The app has no user accounts, and in this version no Pixtore server takes part in a backup. Your photos and videos are transferred directly from your iPhone to the storage you set up — a NAS, a Mac, a Windows PC or a router with a drive — on your home network. Pixtore only connects to storage at a local network address; to back up while away from home, you can use a VPN that connects your iPhone to your home network. We do not receive, store or see any of your media, metadata or file names. Should we later offer optional services that use infrastructure of ours, this policy will be updated before they become available, and such a service will only run if you switch it on.

Finding your storage. To list storage devices, the app searches your local network only (Bonjour and WS‑Discovery), which requires the iOS Local Network permission.

Search. Recognising objects and text in your photos happens entirely on your iPhone; your photos are never uploaded for analysis. To let you search by place, the app sends the location coordinates of your photos to Apple’s geocoding service, which returns the city, region and country. Apple Maps and the same service are used when you view a photo’s location. If your originals are stored in iCloud Photos, the app downloads reduced-size copies from iCloud for analysis. These requests are handled by Apple under Apple’s Privacy Policy; we never receive them.

Open and Locked modes. In Open mode, your photos are saved on your storage as regular files you can browse. In Locked mode, they are encrypted on your iPhone before they leave it. Encryption keys are generated on your iPhone and kept in iCloud Keychain, so your other devices signed in to the same Apple Account can read your backups. Locked mode requires iCloud. The master key is never written to your storage and never transmitted to us. Face ID or your device passcode is required to change encryption settings or rotate the key. Whether data is also encrypted on its way across your home network depends on your storage’s SMB settings.

To keep one backup folder per Apple Account, the app reads an app-specific account identifier from iCloud; it is used only between your iPhone, Apple and your storage.

Storage connection. The storage address, user name and password are kept in the Keychain on your iPhone and synced to your other devices signed in to the same Apple Account through iCloud Keychain, which is end-to-end encrypted. A storage that arrives this way is listed on your other device but backs up nothing until you choose it there. None of this is sent to us.

No analytics, no tracking, no advertising. Pixtore uses only Apple system frameworks and no third-party libraries.

If you have turned on “Share With App Developers” in iOS settings, Apple may share crash reports with us through App Store Connect, subject to Apple’s privacy terms.

3. This website

When you visit this site, the web server records technical access data (IP address, time, requested page, browser type) in server logs to deliver the page and keep it secure. This data is not merged with other sources and is deleted after a short retention period. The legal basis is our legitimate interest in operating a secure website (Art. 6 (1) f GDPR).

Email enquiries. If you write to us, we use your details solely to answer your request and delete them once the matter is resolved, unless statutory retention periods apply. The legal basis is our legitimate interest in handling your enquiry (Art. 6 (1) f GDPR).

This website does not use cookies at all — neither for tracking nor for advertising.

Storage in your browser. To remember the language you picked and the platform tab you opened in the setup guide, this site stores two entries in your browser’s local storage. They stay on your device, are never transmitted to us or to anyone else, and contain no identifier that could recognise you. You can remove them at any time by clearing this site’s data in your browser. Because they hold nothing but a display preference you chose yourself, no consent is required (§ 25 (2) no. 2 TDDDG).

4. Sharing with third parties

Your personal data is not passed on, sold or otherwise transferred to third parties unless this is necessary to provide a service you have requested or we are legally obliged to do so.

5. Data security

We take all necessary security measures to protect your personal data against unauthorised access and misuse. Our procedures are reviewed and updated regularly.

6. Your rights

You have the right at any time to request information about the data we hold about you, to have it corrected or deleted, to restrict its processing, to data portability and to object to processing. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority. To exercise your rights, contact us at info@phinik.de.

7. Changes to this policy

We reserve the right to amend this privacy policy at any time. Changes will be published on this page.