Privacy Policy

epi-plate is a nutrition and cooking app built around a simple principle: your information is yours. This policy explains what data the app handles and — just as importantly — what it does not.

Information you create in the app

Recipes you save or import, shopping lists, favorites, notes, and star ratings are stored on your device. If you have iCloud enabled, this content syncs across your own devices through Apple's iCloud (CloudKit) using your personal iCloud account. It is stored in your private iCloud database — epi-plate has no access to it, and it is never sent to us or to any third party. epi-plate has no accounts and no sharing service of its own. When you share something from the app, such as a shopping list or a cheat sheet, you do it through the standard iOS share sheet, and what you send, and to whom, is your choice.

Importing recipes

• From a link: your device fetches the web page you provide directly from that website and reads the recipe from it on your device. The page address is not sent to us. Like any web request, that website can see your device's IP address, and the recipe's photos are fetched directly from wherever the site hosts them.
• From a photo: text recognition runs entirely on your device. Photos are not uploaded to us.
• Recipe optimization (where available) uses Apple's on-device intelligence. It runs locally on your device and sends nothing to us.

On-device intelligence

Some features use Apple's on-device intelligence (Apple Intelligence) where your device supports it — including optimizing an imported recipe's steps for nutrition, composing a new recipe from ingredients you pick, reading a recipe from a photo, and answering your cooking questions. In every case this processing runs locally on your device. Your recipes, questions, and photos are not sent to us or to any third party for this, and nothing about you is used to train any model. Where your device does not support these features, the app simply offers a non-AI version or omits them.

Camera and photos

epi-plate asks for camera access for two things: scanning a product's barcode, and taking a photo to use in the app, for example to import a recipe from a photo. Camera images are processed on your device. When you choose a photo from your library, Apple's photo picker gives the app only the photos you select, not your whole library.

Scanning a product

If you use the product scanner, the app reads the product's barcode and looks it up in public, open product databases — the Open Food Facts family (Open Food Facts, Open Products Facts, and Open Beauty Facts). Only the barcode number is sent — a product identifier, not anything about you — so the database can return that product's information for the app to display. We don't send your name, account, or any personal detail. Like any web request, those servers can see your device's IP address. The look-up result may be cached on your device (up to about 1,000 products) so re-scanning the same item works offline; that cache stays on your device until you delete the app. We may use other public product databases in the same way over time.

Subscriptions

epi-plate is a paid app with a free trial. After the trial, an auto-renewing subscription keeps the app unlocked; the trial length and price are shown on the subscription screen before you subscribe. Purchases are processed by Apple through the App Store. We never receive your payment card or billing details, only Apple's confirmation of whether your trial or subscription is active, which your device uses to unlock the app. Subscription management, billing, and refunds are handled by Apple in your App Store account settings.

Information we do not collect

epi-plate does not collect your name, email address, phone number, precise or coarse location, contacts, photos library, browsing history, or any advertising identifier. We do not build a profile of you. If you email us for support, we will of course see the contents of your message and your email address, used only to respond to you. The feedback links in Settings pre-fill your app version, device model, and iOS version at the bottom of the email; you can see and edit it before you send.

Third-party services

Apple provides iCloud storage/sync and App Store subscription processing on your behalf; Apple's handling of that data is governed by Apple's Privacy Policy (www.apple.com/legal/privacy). When you scan a product, the app contacts the open Open Food Facts product databases with the barcode, as described above. When you import a recipe from a link, your device fetches that web page directly from the website you chose. In each case only the minimum needed, a barcode or the page you asked for, is requested. Those servers can see your device's IP address, as with any web request, but we send no name, account, or other personal detail, and we never receive any of it. Some screens link to outside websites, such as certification programs and research papers; opening one takes you to that site, and its own privacy policy applies.

Your choices and control

• You can delete any recipe, list, or note inside the app at any time.
• In Settings, Reset all data deletes your saved and imported recipes, shopping list, favorites, collections, ratings, recipe customizations, and profile from the app on your device. A few display preferences and the product look-up cache stay until you delete the app. To also remove the copies in your iCloud account, clear the app's data in your iCloud settings.
• You can manage or cancel your subscription anytime in your App Store account.

Children

epi-plate is intended for a general audience and is not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

Changes to this policy

If we make material changes to this policy, we will update the date above and, where appropriate, note the change in the app. Continued use of the app after an update means you accept the revised policy.

Contact

Questions about this policy or your data? Email privacy@epi-plate.com.

This policy applies to the epi-plate iOS app.