The Gift Journal

Privacy & Legal

Privacy Policy

The Gift Journal is designed as a private, local-first journal. Your gift ideas, hints, people, occasions and history are not used for advertising, behavioural tracking or a shopping profile.

Last updated: 29 August 2026

1. Who this policy covers

This policy explains how The Gift Journal handles information when you use the app on iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch or Mac, and when you use this website or contact us for support.

The privacy contact for The Gift Journal is privacy@thegiftjournal.app. General support is available at support@thegiftjournal.app.

2. Information the app handles

Your journal

The app stores the information you choose to add, such as People, birthdays and other Occasions, Ideas, Hints, Context notes, preferences, Wishlist items, gift history, budgets, fulfilment details, links and photos. The journal is stored locally on your device first.

Private iCloud sync

When private iCloud sync is available for your setup, The Gift Journal synchronises journal data through your private iCloud/CloudKit database. CloudKit is the sync and recovery layer; the journal remains usable locally when the network or iCloud is unavailable. The Gift Journal does not require a proprietary account for core use.

Contacts

If you choose to import a person from Apple Contacts, the app asks for the relevant system permission and lets you select the contact information you want to bring into your journal. Contact information is used to create or enrich the Person record you requested; it is not automatically attached to support reports.

Camera, photos, microphone and speech recognition

If you use photo capture, image selection or voice/dictation capture, the app asks for the Apple permissions needed for that feature. Camera and photo access are used for journal images. Microphone and speech-recognition access are used to turn dictated Ideas and Hints into text. You can manage these permissions in Apple system settings.

Purchase and trial state

Purchases are handled through Apple’s StoreKit and the App Store. The app uses verified entitlement information to recognise the 14-day trial and one-time Full Unlock across supported Apple devices. The Gift Journal does not receive your payment-card details.

3. Tracking, advertising and analytics

The Gift Journal does not include behavioural advertising, advertising tracking or third-party advertising/analytics SDKs. Its Apple privacy manifests declare no tracking domains and no collected-data types.

The app uses Apple-required-reason APIs for app preferences and file metadata needed for normal app features such as settings, shared app-group preferences, backups, restores and file validation. These APIs are not used for advertising or cross-app tracking.

4. Notifications, widgets and Apple Watch

Notifications, widgets and Apple Watch views use privacy-minimised data for the job they perform. By default, these surfaces do not receive the full private Gift or Hint record merely to show an upcoming occasion or readiness state.

Apple Watch Idea/Hint capture is stored in a durable Watch outbox and then committed to the canonical journal on iPhone before synchronising with the rest of your journal. Occasion reminders use Apple’s normal iPhone-to-Watch notification routing.

5. Sharing, exports and backups

Selective Private Sharing

When you deliberately share a Wishlist, occasion plan or selected suggestions, The Gift Journal shows you the curated projection before it is shared. Private Hints, Context, notes, history, prices and surprise-planning information are excluded by default unless you explicitly choose to include a field in the share.

Once you choose a destination in Apple’s sharing interface, the selected content is handled by that destination and its privacy practices.

Backups and Portable Journal Export

Backup, restore and Portable Journal Export are user-directed data-ownership features. Full Backup is designed for lossless recovery into The Gift Journal. Portable Journal Export v1 contains documented, meaningful journal data and referenced assets while excluding internal CloudKit revisions, deletion tombstones, entitlement state, diagnostics and other implementation-only state.

Files you export are under your control after you save or share them. Protect exported archives as you would any other private personal record.

6. Support & Feedback

If you choose Report a problem, Suggest an improvement, Report a correction or contact us by email, the app can prepare a message containing the text you deliberately enter plus app version/build and broad platform/OS information.

Sync diagnostics are included only when you explicitly enable them. The app does not automatically attach Person names, Gift or Hint text, URLs, photos, Contacts data, journal databases or your iCloud account identifier to a support message.

Email is transmitted through the mail service you choose. Messages you send to us may be retained as needed to answer your request, maintain the support conversation and protect the service from abuse.

7. Your controls

  • Edit or delete journal records: use the app’s normal editing and deletion controls.
  • Device and cloud deletion are separate: clearing a device is distinct from deleting the private cloud copy, so one action is not silently treated as the other.
  • Permissions: manage Contacts, Camera, Photos, Microphone, Speech Recognition and Notifications through Apple system settings.
  • Backup and export: create a full backup or Portable Journal Export to keep an independent copy of your data.
  • Trial expiry: existing journal data remains readable and searchable, and backup, restore and export remain available. Trial expiry does not delete your journal.

8. Data protection and retention

The Gift Journal uses Apple platform sandboxing and device protections, validates imported files and stored image data, and uses atomic local writes plus safety copies around risky operations. Corrupt or unreadable sources are preserved for recovery rather than silently replaced with an empty journal.

Your local journal remains on your device until you remove it through the app or the operating system. Data synchronised with private iCloud remains subject to your iCloud account and the app’s deletion controls. The app may keep limited local safety copies for recovery and prunes them according to its preservation rules.

9. Apple services and other recipients

The app relies on Apple platform services where you choose or need them, including iCloud/CloudKit for private sync, StoreKit/App Store for purchases, system permissions, notifications, Contacts, speech services, Mail and the Share Sheet. Apple’s handling of information through those services is governed by Apple’s own terms and privacy policies.

The Gift Journal does not sell your journal data and does not provide it to advertising networks.

10. This website

The website package does not include advertising scripts, behavioural tracking or third-party analytics scripts. The site itself does not need an account to be read. Standard server logs may still be created by the web host as part of delivering, securing and maintaining the website.

11. Changes to this policy

If the privacy behaviour of The Gift Journal changes, this page will be updated so the published policy continues to describe the app accurately. The revision date at the top of the page shows when this policy was last updated.