Privacy Policy

1. Developer and scope

This policy applies to the Fold Journal Android app, package app.foldjournal.app, developed by Anurag Saha ("Fold Journal", "we", "us" or "our"). Features described here may not be available in every build.

These data practices are separate from the Terms of Service. A local profile or app lock is not a cloud account and does not automatically synchronize journals to another phone.

2. Information stored on your device

• Journal and reading content: notebook titles, chapters, text, photos, drawings, stickers, formatting, bookmarks, highlights, dates, lists, imported eBooks and reading progress.
• Local profile: the name and local username you enter, and a salted password verifier rather than a readable password.
• Preferences and activity: modes, covers, fonts, orientation, widget choices, reminder settings, backup history and recent activity used for calendars and optional reminders. Local Pro-experience records also track whether the one-time allowance has been used, its session and elapsed-time state, and its creation allowances.

This content is kept in app-private storage or files you select for export or backup. Library calendars and calendar widgets use Fold Journal activity; they do not read your device's personal calendar. Notifications can display a notebook or book title, so consider your Android lock-screen privacy settings.

Optional local Pro experience

Where offered, the free experience requires your consent before a native 600-second timer starts. The ten minutes include time in the background; restarting the device ends the experience. Eligibility is recorded locally once per app installation, not as a permanent entitlement tied to a verified online identity. No account creation or payment is required.

The experience uses a separate app-private workspace for one new journal, one manually imported eBook and one list. It does not give the demo access to edit your original Base journals. Its content and timer/allowance records stay on the device; they are not sent to us for analytics.

When time ends, demo creations remain saved but locked; the timer does not delete them or your original journals. Demo contents are excluded from normal-library backups, restore, exports and sharing. Widgets, dual display, account setup and automatic file/folder synchronization are not included in the experience. Clearing app storage or uninstalling removes local demo content and its local eligibility records, along with other app-private data.

Aava in this experience is a prerecorded guided example, not live AI. Reading or confirming insertion of that example does not upload selected journal content or send a request to OpenAI. The live-Aava identity, provider and retention sections below do not describe this local example.

3. Selected files, backups and sharing

Android's system picker provides access to files and folders you select. Imports, PDF exports, manual backups, scheduled local backups and optional eBook folder synchronization use the locations and actions you choose. This policy does not mean automatic Google Drive backup is currently available.

Sharing a PDF or backup, opening an external link, or choosing a cloud storage provider sends information to that receiving app or provider under its own policies. Backup files and exported PDFs can contain private content and are not automatically protected by the app's local lock.

4. Optional Aava AI assistance

When Aava is available and you request help, the app sends your chosen scope of journal text and your instructions over HTTPS to Fold Journal's Cloudflare-hosted service, which forwards the request to the OpenAI API. Your selected scope may be selected text, a page or chapter you explicitly choose, or no page text. It does not silently upload the whole library.

OpenAI processes the submitted text to count input tokens and generate a response. Safety checks process your request instructions and the generated answer. A preview is shown before you confirm inserting or replacing journal content. Turning Aava off prevents further assistant use; local journaling remains available.

The Fold Journal service does not persist or deliberately log private journal text, request instructions or generated answers. It retains limited security and usage metadata described below. Our Responses API requests set store: false, which disables stored response retrieval; this is not a promise of zero retention by every provider.

Under OpenAI's published API data controls, API content is not used for model training by default. Default abuse-monitoring retention can include submitted content for up to 30 days, or longer for legal or safety needs. Model-specific caching and approved account controls may also affect retention. See OpenAI API data controls. We do not claim an approved Zero Data Retention arrangement.

5. Anonymous identity and app-integrity checks

Optional Aava uses Firebase Anonymous Authentication to create a guest identity without requiring Google Sign-In or a registration screen. Firebase receives identity and connection information needed for this service. Firebase App Check with Google Play Integrity processes app and device-integrity information to help verify genuine requests. These identity services are not sent your journal text by our integration.

The Aava backend verifies authentication and App Check tokens. It processes a hashed user identifier, app identifier, session and replay-protection records, request identifiers, usage counts and cost totals to enforce access and quotas. An incoming IP address is processed for network delivery and abuse prevention; our application stores a keyed hash for rate limiting rather than deliberately storing the raw IP in its usage ledger. Hosting providers may independently process network metadata.

Short-lived Aava session credentials are encrypted in native Android storage and kept out of journal backups. The current Base build does not initialize the Aava Firebase identity service. Where an optional online feature is enabled, its security and identity processing is necessary for that feature.

6. Optional Pro purchases

The current release displays locked Pro benefits and subscriptions coming soon; it does not accept a subscription purchase or charge for the local experience. That free ten-minute experience is separate from any future Google Play subscription trial.

When subscriptions are offered, Google Play processes payments. Fold Journal does not collect or store your payment-card details. Purchase and entitlement verification may process a purchase token, product or plan information, subscription state, expiry and an account-binding identifier. A purchase-token hash may be retained to prevent the same entitlement being linked to unrelated identities. This section does not activate subscriptions or change your plan.

7. Service providers and disclosures

• Cloudflare: hosts these legal pages and the Aava backend, processes network requests, and stores limited operational metadata in the backend ledger. See Cloudflare's Privacy Policy.
• Google and Firebase: provide Android/Play purchase services and optional Aava authentication and integrity checks. See Firebase privacy information and Google's Privacy Policy.
• OpenAI: processes the selected content and instructions needed for requested AI assistance and safety checks, subject to its API data controls linked above.
• Apps and storage providers you choose: receive files or links only through the export, sharing, import or online action you initiate.

Providers may process information in countries other than your own, subject to their applicable terms and safeguards. We do not share data with advertising networks or data brokers. We may disclose information we actually hold when legally required or necessary to protect rights, security or safety.

8. Retention and deletion

• On-device content: remains until you remove it, clear app storage or uninstall. Pro-experience creations remain locally saved and locked after the timer ends rather than being deleted automatically; normal-library backups do not include that separate workspace. Clearing app storage or uninstalling removes its local content and records. Exported files and backups may remain in shared storage or a provider you selected and must be deleted separately.
• Local profile: remove it through Settings → Local Account & Lock → Remove local profile. This intentionally keeps journals. Delete journals separately if you want to remove them too.
• Aava metadata: authentication challenges and sessions expire within minutes. Daily usage and replay records expire over the following days, with request-accounting records retained for up to eight days. Closed monthly cost totals expire after approximately four months. Purchase-binding records, if used, remain while needed to verify ownership and prevent fraud; they are reviewed when a valid deletion request is received. These records contain no journal text or generated answers.
• Provider records: Firebase guest identities and providers' operational or safety records follow their own retention rules. Clearing local app data or uninstalling does not by itself delete those remote records.

For a request concerning an optional online identity or metadata, contact us using the support address below. We may need reasonable verification to identify your records without receiving journal content or passwords. Where applicable law provides rights to access, correct, delete, restrict or object to processing, we will handle requests accordingly. Some security, purchase or legally required records may need to be retained.

9. Permissions and your choices

You can use core journaling without Aava or a cloud account, choose the content included in an AI request, decline an optional permission, turn reminders or Aava off, and control applicable Android permissions and notification visibility.

Device unlock is performed by Android; we receive the verification result, not your fingerprint, face template, PIN or device password. Notification permission supports optional reminders. Boot completion maintains enabled scheduled jobs. Vibration supports optional haptics. Internet access supports selected external or online actions. The app does not request contacts, device-calendar, microphone or location access for these features.

10. Security

We use Android private storage, atomic local saves, password hashing, HTTPS for online requests, server-side access checks and encrypted short-lived assistant sessions. These measures do not make all journal files, exports or backups encrypted, and no system can guarantee absolute security. Keep sensitive exports in a secure location.

11. Children

Fold Journal is a general-purpose app and is not directed specifically to children under 13 or the minimum age required in their country. Optional AI services must not be used in a way that violates applicable age or consent requirements. Contact us if you believe a child's information has been submitted to an online feature without appropriate authorization.

12. This website and policy changes

These static legal pages do not intentionally add advertising cookies or behavioral analytics. Cloudflare may process IP addresses, request times, browser details and security information to deliver and protect the site.

We may update this policy as features or legal requirements change. The effective date identifies the version. Material changes will receive appropriate notice or consent where required. A feature's appearance in this policy does not mean it has been enabled in your app.