Owl Scanner Privacy Policy
This policy explains what Owl Scanner collects, where it goes, and your rights over it. We have written it as a list of plain questions so you can find what you need quickly.
What does Owl Scanner do?
Owl Scanner is an iOS app that checks links, emails, phone numbers, and images for known scams, breaches, and AI-generated content. Most checks happen on your device. The ones that need outside help send the minimum data required, over HTTPS, and never anything we do not need.
What data does Owl Scanner collect?
The short answer: only what is needed to answer the question you just asked.
| Data | When | Where it goes | Stored? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scanned URL or QR code | When you scan or paste a link | URL safety partners (multi-source verification) | Locally on your device for up to 5 most-recent scans (free) or unlimited (Pro). Never on our servers. |
| Email address (one-shot) | When you tap “Check email” in My Safety | A breach data partner, contacted directly from your device | Not stored. Discarded after the response. |
| Email address (Owl’s Watch) | When you sign up for daily breach monitoring (Pro) | Our Cloudflare database, EU and US edge | Stored, indexed by an account ID, until you delete it or your account. |
| Password (truncated hash) | When you tap “Check password” | Have I Been Pwned, Pwned Passwords k-anonymity API | Never sent in full. Only the first 5 characters of a SHA-1 hash leave your device. |
| Phone number | When you tap “Check phone” | A phone reputation partner, contacted directly from your device | Not stored. Discarded after the response. |
| Image bytes | When you use Spot Fake or Screenshot OCR | Spot Fake provenance: our Cloudflare Worker. Spot Fake AI detection (Pro): an image authenticity partner. Screenshot OCR: stays on your device. | Not stored. Worker keeps a 1-hour anti-abuse cache keyed by SHA-256 hash, never the image. |
Device identifier (identifierForVendor) |
Every Cloudflare Worker call | Sent as X-Device-ID header, only to our Worker |
Used solely for per-device rate limiting, not for tracking. Reset when you delete the app. |
We do not collect: location, contacts, photo library metadata, browsing history outside the app, advertising identifiers, behavioral analytics, or anything we can use to follow you across apps or websites.
Does Owl Scanner track me?
No. We declare NSPrivacyTracking = false in our App Store privacy manifest. We do not use tracking SDKs, do not request App Tracking Transparency permission, and do not share data with advertising networks.
Who are the third parties Owl Scanner uses?
Owl Scanner sends data to outside services only when needed to answer a specific question. Each service receives the minimum data required for that one check.
Named processors that handle data on our behalf
- Apple — processes payments for Owl Scanner Pro through the App Store. Apple’s privacy policy applies to that transaction; we never see your card or bank data.
- Cloudflare — hosts our edge proxy, database, key-value store, and scheduled jobs. Owl’s Watch account records and monitored emails are stored in Cloudflare’s database, indexed by an account ID, with EU and US edge replication.
- Brevo — delivers Owl’s Watch breach digest emails (Pro only). Brevo sees the destination email and the digest content, used solely for delivery.
- Have I Been Pwned — powers the on-device password exposure check via the Pwned Passwords k-anonymity API. Only the first 5 characters of a SHA-1 hash leave your device; the full password and full hash never do.
Categories of one-shot lookup partners
For checks where the answer comes back instantly and the input is discarded, we describe the recipients by category instead of naming each one. We do this to keep our threat-intelligence sources from being telegraphed to bad actors. Each category contains reputable, established providers under standard data-processing terms.
- URL safety partners — multi-source verification of links and QR codes.
- Breach data partner — the one-shot email breach lookup.
- Phone reputation partner — the phone-number scam / fraud lookup.
- Image authenticity partner (Pro only) — AI image detection. The free tier performs only on-device and provenance checks.
- Auxiliary network proxy — forwards a small subset of requests when the upstream provider blocks our primary egress. The proxy does not retain the data.
We do not pass your data to any of these for advertising, profiling, or sale. If you have a regulatory or research need to see the full list of upstream providers in a given category, email privacy@hucortex.com and we will share it under reasonable confidentiality.
Where is my data stored?
- On your device (encrypted at rest by iOS): scan history, feature flags, your Owl’s Watch session token (in Keychain).
- On our infrastructure (only Owl’s Watch users): your account record, the emails you chose to monitor, and a hash of the most recent breach result. Stored in Cloudflare D1 with edge replication in the US and EU.
- In transit: every network request uses HTTPS / TLS.
How do I delete my data?
- Scan history: Settings → Recent scans → Clear All. Or uninstall the app — everything local goes with it.
- Owl’s Watch account: from inside the app, sign in, tap the menu in the top right of the Watch card, and choose “Delete account”. This removes your account record and every monitored email from our database. Or email privacy@hucortex.com from the address tied to the account and we will delete it within 30 days.
- Photos sent for Spot Fake checks are not stored — there is nothing to delete server-side.
Does Owl Scanner sell or share my data?
No. We do not sell personal data. We do not share data with advertisers, data brokers, or analytics platforms. The only parties that receive your data are the lookup providers listed above, and only for the specific check you asked for.
Children’s privacy
Owl Scanner is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect data from children under 13. If you believe we have, email privacy@hucortex.com and we will delete it.
How long do you keep data?
- Free tier: nothing kept on our servers. Local scan history on your device is capped at the 5 most-recent entries.
- Pro tier (Owl’s Watch): the account record and monitored emails stay on our servers so monitoring can resume if you subscribe again. If you stop opening the app entirely, we email you after six months, pause monitoring a month later, and remove the addresses two months after that. Deleting your account removes everything straight away, and we honour emailed deletion requests within 30 days.
- Edge caches: anti-abuse caches (URL hashes, image SHA-256) expire automatically within 24 hours.
Your rights (GDPR / CCPA)
You have the right to access, correct, delete, restrict, or port your personal data. To exercise any right, email privacy@hucortex.com. We will respond within 30 days.
California residents: we do not “sell” or “share” personal information as those terms are defined in the California Consumer Privacy Act.
EU residents: our Cloudflare Worker is reachable in the EU, and data we store is replicated to the EU edge. We rely on Standard Contractual Clauses for any US transfers.
Subscriptions and payments
Owl Scanner Pro is sold by Apple through the App Store. Apple handles your payment and we never see your card or bank data. Apple’s privacy policy applies to that transaction. We receive only an opaque entitlement signal from StoreKit telling us your subscription is active.
Auto-renewal. Guardian Owl Pro is an auto-renewable subscription. Your subscription automatically renews at the end of each billing period (monthly or yearly) unless you cancel at least 24 hours before the renewal date. Your Apple ID account will be charged for renewal within 24 hours before the end of the current period at the same price you originally subscribed at.
Managing or cancelling your subscription. You can view, change, or cancel your subscription at any time in iOS Settings → [your name] → Subscriptions. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period — you keep Pro access until then and are not charged again.
What happens when Pro expires. When a subscription lapses or is cancelled, Pro features (daily breach watch, AI verdicts, unlimited history, AI image analysis, and photo scanning) become unavailable. Your scan history stays on your device and is never uploaded. Saved emails for Owl’s Watch stay on our servers so monitoring resumes if you subscribe again. If you stop opening the app entirely, we email you after six months, pause monitoring a month later, and delete the addresses two months after that. You can remove any address, or delete your account and everything attached to it, from inside the app at any time. Core security features (QR scanning, URL checks, one-shot breach and phone checks) remain free with no interruption.
Refunds. Refund requests are handled by Apple. Visit reportaproblem.apple.com to request a refund.
Data we retain from your subscription. We receive and store an anonymised entitlement record (subscription status, expiry date) from StoreKit for the duration of your subscription. We do not store payment card details, transaction IDs, or billing addresses — Apple retains those for tax and regulatory purposes under their own privacy policy.
Security
We use HTTPS everywhere, store our session tokens in iOS Keychain, hold our API keys server-side (never in the app binary in a way that’s exploitable), and rate-limit every endpoint. We rotate keys on a scheduled basis and after any suspected exposure. The most recent rotation was 27 April 2026.
Changes to this policy
If we make material changes, we will update the “Last updated” date and, for users with an Owl’s Watch account, send a notice to the email on file at least 14 days before the change takes effect.
Contact
- General privacy questions: privacy@hucortex.com
- Data access / deletion: privacy@hucortex.com
- Mailing address: HuCortex Inc., #205, 1500 29 St SE #105, Calgary, AB T2Z 3W9, Canada