PhotoView

Privacy Policy

Effective date: October 30, 2026

Detlev Voss (“we”, “us”, “our”) operates the PhotoView app for iPhone, iPad and Mac (the “App”). This policy informs you about our practices regarding the collection, use, and disclosure of personal data when you use the App.

PhotoView is a viewer for the photos, Live Photos and videos in your Photo Library. It does not import, upload or back up your media, and it does not run any server that receives your data. It changes your library only when you ask it to — Delete, Add to album, Remove from album, Favorite, New Album or New Folder — and those changes are written straight into Apple’s Photos system, where the Photos app shows them too. On the Mac the App can also show files and folders you open yourself. Everything you see in the App lives in Apple’s Photos system or in the files you chose — never on our infrastructure.

1. Access to Your Photos, Videos & Files

1.1 Photo Library Permission

When you first open a view that needs your library, the system asks you to grant the App access to it. The App works with either Full Access or Limited Access; with Limited Access only the items you selected are visible, and albums appear empty. You can change this at any time in iOS Settings → PhotoView → Photos, or on a Mac in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Photos.

Photo and video data is read on your device through Apple’s PhotoKit framework, and only while the App is open. Original files are downloaded from iCloud on demand by the system itself; the App makes no network requests of its own for your media.

The App writes to your library only for actions you trigger yourself: deleting items, adding them to or removing them from your own albums, marking them as favorites, and creating an album or folder. The App asks before it deletes anything, and deleted items move to Recently Deleted in the Photos app, where you can recover them. iOS and macOS do not let third-party apps write to shared iCloud albums, so the App cannot change those at all.

1.2 Metadata Overlay

The App reads the technical metadata already embedded in your files (EXIF, IPTC, TIFF, GPS, XMP packets and maker notes) and what Apple’s PhotoKit exposes (such as Live Photo identifiers or auxiliary-data flags for depth, HDR gain maps and portrait mattes). For a file you opened yourself on the Mac, it also reads an XMP sidecar file next to it, if there is one, and Finder attributes such as tags, comment and dates. This metadata is shown on screen only: the App neither sends it off your device nor writes it back into the original file.

1.3 Files You Open Yourself (Mac)

The Mac app can also show media that is not in your Photo Library: files and folders you choose with File → Open, and files you drag in from the Finder. macOS grants the App access to exactly those files and folders and to nothing else. So that they reopen after a restart, the App stores a security-scoped bookmark for each one, along with the ten most recently opened (Open Recent), in its own private container on your Mac. Removing an entry, or Clear Menu, deletes only that reference; the file stays where it is. Delete on such a file moves the file itself to the Trash. None of this leaves your Mac.

1.4 Map Display

If a photo contains GPS coordinates, you can open its location on a map. The App uses Apple’s MapKit framework for this: the coordinates are handed to MapKit on your device, and map tiles are fetched from Apple’s servers under Apple’s privacy policy. No location data is sent to us. The App never asks for your device’s own location and does not use Location Services.

1.5 AirPlay, External Displays and Slideshows

On iPhone and iPad you can show the current photo, Live Photo or video — or a running slideshow with its transitions — on an AirPlay receiver or a connected external display. Only the media appears there, never the toolbar or the metadata. The system handles the transmission, which goes directly from your device to the receiver; the App does not record, store or route this stream through any third-party service. On the Mac, the slideshow plays in a window of its own and does not drive an AirPlay receiver.

1.6 Sharing and Export

Sharing an item opens the system share sheet; on the Mac you can also drag an item to the Finder or another app, copy it, or open it in Quick Look. For this the App may write a temporary copy of the original into its own cache folder on your device. When it starts, it removes copies older than 30 days and keeps the folder under 2 GB. Where a shared file goes afterwards is your choice and subject to the terms of the app or service you picked. We never receive it.

2. Data Stored by the App

2.1 User Preferences

The App stores your preferences on your device using Apple’s UserDefaults mechanism:

By default these preferences stay on your device and leave it only through Apple’s standard backups (iCloud Backup, or an encrypted Finder or Time Machine backup), which are under your control. If you turn on Sync settings (see 2.2), the ones listed there are also synced across your own devices.

2.2 Optional iCloud Settings Sync

PhotoView does not create or use a CloudKit container of its own, and it never uploads your photos, videos or their metadata. The only data the App itself places in iCloud is your own preferences — and, apart from the trial status in 2.3, only if you turn on Sync settings in Settings → General. The choice is per device: turning it on on your iPhone does not turn it on on your iPad or Mac.

When it is on, these preferences are kept in your private iCloud key-value store (Apple’s NSUbiquitousKeyValueStore) so they stay the same across your devices: sort order; the overlay’s size, position, font size, width, background and color, and whether times show seconds; appearance; the default playback for Live Photos; the map style; the slideshow options; which metadata fields are shown; and your metadata presets, with their names and order. What tapping the photo shows and the viewer’s toolbar are synced only between iPhones and iPads, and the Mac’s separate metadata window only between Macs. This data lives in your personal iCloud account under Apple’s privacy policy and is never sent to us. The Pro unlock, the thumbnail size and the state of the review question are not synced.

Your photos and videos themselves are synced separately, by Apple’s Photos system. You can turn Sync settings off again at any time.

2.3 Trial Status in iCloud

The free 7-day Pro trial is one per Apple ID. So that reinstalling the App does not start a second one, the trial’s start date, end date and whether you declined it are mirrored into the same private iCloud key-value store, whether or not Sync settings is on. These three values are all that is stored for this purpose; they contain no personal data, stay in your own iCloud account and are never sent to us.

2.4 Backup & Restore File

Settings → General → Backup & Restore saves your settings, field choices and metadata presets as a single JSON file through the share sheet, and reads one back in. The file holds this platform’s preferences only — no photos, no metadata, no purchase information — and where you keep it is up to you.

2.5 No Account, No Server

The App does not require any registration or sign-in. We operate no server, database or logging infrastructure that receives data from the App.

3. Purchases and the Free Trial

The App offers a single one-time unlock, PhotoView Pro. It enables the professional metadata groups — Description, Location, IPTC, DNG, XMP, IPTC Extension, Canon and Nikon, plus Finder attributes on the Mac — and the map link that opens a photo’s location. Everything else, including browsing, viewing, favorites, organizing with multi-select and slideshows, is free. Before you buy, you can try every Pro feature free for 7 days: no card, no auto-renewal, one trial per Apple ID (see 2.3). Whether or not you own Pro, Settings → Support also offers Leave a tip, with three consumable tiers; a tip unlocks nothing.

All purchases are processed by Apple through StoreKit, and payment is handled by Apple under its terms and privacy policy. Because PhotoView is a Universal Purchase, buying on one platform unlocks it on the other. We receive only the anonymized purchase information needed to verify the entitlement (for example, a transaction receipt); we do not receive your name, email address, billing address or payment method.

4. Notifications

If you start the free trial, the App asks for permission to remind you one day before it ends. You can decline — the trial runs either way. The reminder is a single local notification, scheduled on your device and delivered by the system; nothing passes through a server, and we receive no notification data. You can turn notifications for PhotoView off at any time in the system settings.

5. Data We Do Not Collect

6. If You Write to Us

Contact in Help opens an empty message to support@advoss.de in your own mail app. Send feedback in Settings → Support, and the feedback offer that follows “Are you enjoying PhotoView?”, open one that is already filled in with the app version, build number, platform, system version and device model, so a bug report arrives with the details we would otherwise ask for. Nothing is sent until you send it, and you can change or remove any of it first. If you write to us, we receive your message along with what your mail account discloses (usually your email address and name), and we keep it only as long as answering you requires.

7. Third-Party Services

The App relies solely on Apple platform services: PhotoKit and PhotosUI for reading your Photo Library and, on your instruction, changing it; MapKit for the map; AVKit for video playback; AirPlay for external displays; UserNotifications for the trial reminder; Quick Look and the Finder integration on the Mac; and StoreKit for in-app purchases and the review prompt. Each is provided by Apple and governed by Apple’s privacy policy. The App is distributed exclusively through the App Store and the Mac App Store.

8. Data Storage and Security

Your photos, videos and their metadata are stored by Apple’s Photos system on your device and, if you have turned it on, in iCloud Photos. The App’s own preferences, its temporary export copies and the bookmarks for files you opened on the Mac are stored by the system in the App’s private sandbox. All of this is protected by Apple’s device encryption and iCloud security. We never receive or access this data.

9. Children’s Privacy

The App does not knowingly collect personal information from children. Because it transmits no personal data to us, it is suitable for users of all ages. It does, however, read the Photo Library and can delete items from it: parents and guardians may want to consider this before granting the Photos permission on a device a child uses.

10. Your Rights Under GDPR

All App data — your preferences and the trial dates — stays within Apple’s ecosystem: on your device and, where described above, in your own private iCloud account. We have no access to your preferences, photos, videos or metadata. So the following applies:

11. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes will be published here with an updated effective date. We encourage you to review it periodically.

12. Contact

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at support@advoss.de.