Privacy Policy — Unlock Your English

The short version

Unlock Your English keeps what you do on your iPhone. Your words, texts, songs, progress and settings are stored only on your device. There is no account to create, no analytics, no advertising and no trackers — in the app and on this website — and the app has no server of its own, so I do not receive your data unless you choose to write to me. Speech recognition, reading text from photos, the on-device AI and the tutor's voice all run on your iPhone, and the recording of your voice is deleted at the end of each practice. If you turn on Block apps, the apps you choose and your schedules also stay on the device. A few features you choose to use involve Apple (identifying a song, searching and playing Apple Music, purchases) or open another company's page (Spotify, YouTube Music). Each one is explained below.

What stays on your device

• Everything you add and everything you do in the app: your words, phrases, flashcards, texts, songs (with the lyrics you bring), lists, training and test history, call history, reminders, scheduled calls, the questions the blocker asked you recently (so it does not repeat them), the status of your purchase and your settings. They are kept in files in the app's private storage, with iOS "Complete" file protection, so they cannot be read while the device is locked.
• Your voice while you practise. When an activity records you reading aloud, the recording is a temporary file in the app's Caches folder, which iOS keeps out of device backups. It is deleted when you finish the attempt, the review or the session. If the app is ever closed halfway, anything left over is deleted the next time the app opens. Some activities do not record a file at all.
• Block apps. If you turn on this tool (it is off by default), the apps, categories and websites you choose, your schedules, your unlock rules and the times of your unlocks are kept in a space the app shares on the device itself (an iOS App Group). It is shared so that the app's three extensions — the block screen, that screen's button and the schedule monitor — can read them. The apps you choose are stored as Apple's opaque codes, not by name. None of this leaves the device.
• No iCloud, no account. Unlock Your English does not use iCloud and does not back anything up by itself. As with any app, if you back up your iPhone (to iCloud or to a computer), iOS may include the app's data in that backup. That is a feature of your device and of Apple, not of Unlock Your English, and I have no access to it.

Permissions

iOS asks you the first time a feature needs one. You can refuse, and you can change your mind at any time in iOS Settings.

• Microphone — to hear you when you practise speaking or answer a spoken question to unlock an app, and to listen to a song you ask the app to identify.
• Speech Recognition — to turn what you say into text, on your iPhone.
• Camera — to point at a text and turn it into letters on the phone. The picture is not saved by the app.
• Apple Music — to search the catalogue for a song and play it while you follow the lyrics.
• Notifications — for the reminders and scheduled calls you set. They are scheduled on the device itself (local notifications); there is no push server.
• Screen Time — only if you turn on Block apps, so the app can put a block screen on the apps you choose, on your own device. It is not parental control.

What is processed on your device

• Speech. Recognition of what you say uses Apple's on-device speech engine. The first time you use a language, iOS may download that language's speech model from Apple; your voice and your texts are not part of that download.
• Reading text from images and PDFs. Photos you choose, text you scan with the camera and PDFs are read with Apple's text recognition, on the device. The image is read in memory and is not kept.
• On-device AI. Translating a phrase, correcting what you said in a test and checking whether a song is in English use the language model that Apple Intelligence runs on the iPhone itself, and only on devices where it is available and turned on. Nothing is sent to a server for this.
• The tutor's voice. The tutor speaks with the voices that iOS provides, synthesised on the device. Better voices can be downloaded by iOS, in the iOS Settings app → Accessibility → Spoken Content → Voices. The app downloads nothing itself; it only opens iOS Settings for you.
• Block apps. It uses Apple's Screen Time (Family Controls), with individual authorization, on your own device. iOS shows the block screen. iOS only tells the app when a schedule starts or ends and, during an unlock, when the chosen apps are still being used after a few minutes. The app receives only that signal — never which of the apps you opened or what you did in it — and receives no report of your screen time. To unlock, you answer English questions; spoken ones use the microphone and on-device speech recognition, as in the rest of the app.

What can leave your device — only when you use the feature

• Identifying a song. This uses Apple's ShazamKit. While it listens, iOS calculates a short audio signature (a fingerprint) of what is playing around you and sends it to Apple to be matched; the app receives the title and the artist. Unlock Your English does not record or keep that audio. This is the one case where something derived from the microphone leaves the phone, and it is handled by Apple under Apple's own terms and privacy policy.
• Apple Music. Searching the catalogue and playing a song are done by Apple Music (MusicKit), under your Apple account and Apple's terms. The title, artist or search text you use is sent to Apple for that.
• Spotify and YouTube Music. If you choose one of these, the app opens a search page on that service, with the title and the artist in the address, in your browser or in their app. From then on, that company's own privacy policy applies. The app sends them nothing else.
• Purchase and the free trial. Unlock Your English has one one-time purchase, made through the App Store, that opens everything; the 14-day free trial is a zero-price item in the App Store. They are processed by Apple; I never see your payment details. The app keeps the result (whether you bought it, and when the trial started) on the device.
• Feedback by email. In the app, under Settings → About and support → Send feedback, the app opens the Mail composer addressed to email (or, if Mail is not set up, a new message in your mail app). It adds a short block at the end: the app version, your iOS version, the interface language and the theme (including light or dark). You can read and edit all of it, and nothing is sent until you press Send. If you turn on "Attach diagnostics to feedback" (off by default), the technical log described below is attached too; the new-message fallback cannot carry an attachment. I receive your email address and whatever you write, and I use it only to reply to you — I do not add you to any list.
• Links. The Terms of use link opens Apple's standard terms, the Privacy policy link opens this page, and the rating link opens the App Store. They open in your browser or in the App Store.

The local technical log

Unlock Your English always writes a small technical log on the device, to find bugs. It contains event names and numbers (for example how long something took) — never your texts, what you said, your audio, the names of songs or which apps you block. Entries older than 7 days are removed when the app opens, and the file is capped at 512 KB. It is never sent automatically: it leaves the device only if you attach it to a feedback email, and you can read exactly what would be attached in the app, under Settings → About and support → View diagnostics. "Delete all data" removes it, as does deleting the app.

Reminders and calls

Reminders and scheduled calls are saved on the device and delivered as local notifications. Deleting all your data in the app also cancels the notifications that were already scheduled.

Deleting your data

In the app, under Settings → Privacy and data → Delete all data, the app removes everything it stored on the device: your progress, training and tests, words, phrases, cards, texts, songs and lists, reminders, calls and preferences, together with any temporary recording and the diagnostics log. It also deletes your Block apps choices (the apps, the schedules and the unlocks) and the blocker's recent questions, removes the block screen from the apps and stops the schedule monitoring. It cannot be undone. Your purchase belongs to your Apple account and is not affected; you can restore it from the App Store. Deleting the app removes everything stored on the device.

This website

This page sets no cookies and uses no tracking scripts or third-party services: even the fonts come from this site itself. It is served by the hosting provider I use, which may keep standard technical logs (such as IP addresses) to operate the service.

Your rights

Under the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (revDSG) and the GDPR you have rights of access, correction and deletion. Your data lives on your device, so you exercise them directly in the app: edit or delete anything at any time, or use Delete all data. I hold no data from the app about you; if you wrote to me, I hold your email address and your message, and you can ask me to delete them. For the services run by Apple (song identification, Apple Music, purchases, Screen Time), contact Apple.

Children

Unlock Your English does not ask for your age, has no account and sends me nothing by itself, so it collects no personal data from anyone, children included.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version will be published on this page with a new effective date. Material changes will be highlighted in the app's release notes.

Contact

Alpine Lynx · Switzerland · email