Privacy Policy

The short version

The Browser has no accounts, no ads, no analytics, no trackers, and no telemetry. We — the developer — never receive, store, sell, or share any of your data, because the app contains no analytics, advertising, attribution, or crash-reporting code of any kind. Almost everything happens on your device.

What we collect

Nothing. The developer runs no accounts and operates no servers that receive your data. We cannot see your browsing, searches, bookmarks, or settings, because none of it is ever sent to us — there is nowhere for it to go.

What stays on your device

Your browsing history, bookmarks, reading list, open tabs, favourites, quick links, settings, start-page layout, saved passwords, and any downloaded on-device AI models live only on your device — and, if you turn on iCloud Sync, in your own private iCloud. They are never sent to us or anyone else. Saved passwords and any AI provider keys you enter are held in the device Keychain, not in plain settings.

Requests you initiate

Like every web browser, The Browser makes network requests to fetch the things you ask for. These go directly from your device to the service involved and never pass through us:

• Web pages load from the sites you visit.
• Searches — and, if you enable them, search suggestions — go to the search engine you choose. Suggestions are always off in Private tabs.
• Site icons (favicons) are fetched from each site itself where possible; when a site offers none, the address is sent to Google’s public favicon service to find one.
• “Ask the Browser” searches the web to answer you: it queries Mwmbl, DuckDuckGo, Ecosia and Wikipedia — and Brave Search if you add a key — then fetches the result pages it cites so it can read them.
• Voice search sends your recording to Apple’s speech recognition. It stays on your device where the device supports on-device recognition, and goes to Apple’s servers where it does not.
• Translation downloads language packs from Mozilla’s servers the first time you use a language pair.
• On-device AI models are downloaded from Hugging Face when you choose to install one.
• Browser extensions are downloaded from addons.mozilla.org or the Chrome Web Store when you install one.
• The optional start-page photo picker sends your search term to Openverse — and, as a fallback, Wikimedia Commons — to find freely-licensed images.
• Any content blocklist you add is fetched from the URL you provide.

AI features

On-device AI — summaries and “Ask about this page” using a downloaded model or Apple Intelligence — runs entirely on your device. No page content leaves it, so it works even in Private tabs. If you point The Browser at an AI server you run yourself (Ollama, or another OpenAI-compatible endpoint), the text of the page is sent to that server — including from Private tabs, because that address is yours rather than a third party’s. Optional cloud AI works only if you add your own provider API key; then, and only then, the text of the page you ask about is sent directly from your device to that provider to generate a reply. We never receive or see it, and cloud AI is automatically disabled in Private tabs.

Translation

Page translation runs on your device. It uses Bergamot, an offline open-source engine bundled with the app, and falls back to Apple’s on-device translation where that is available. The first time you use a language pair, Bergamot downloads that language pack from Mozilla’s servers; after that it works offline. The text of the page itself is never sent anywhere. The optional developer API fallback ships inert and does nothing unless a key is supplied.

Private tabs

Private tabs record no history and no search suggestions, are kept out of the normal on-disk browsing cache, and disable cloud AI — for browsing that leaves no trace on your device. An AI server you host yourself is not treated as cloud AI and stays available in Private tabs, so page text is still sent to the address you configured.

Content blocking

The built-in ad and tracker blocker and the cookie-consent handling run locally in the browser engine to strip ads, trackers, and consent pop-ups as you browse. Any blocklist you add is fetched from the URL you provide.

Data deletion

Clear your history, cache, and cookies any time in Settings ▸ Clear Browsing Data. Deleting the app removes its on-device data, including downloaded AI models. AI provider keys and saved passwords are held in the device Keychain, which iOS can preserve across deleting and reinstalling an app — remove them in Settings first if you want them gone for good.

Browser extensions

You can install Firefox and Chrome extensions. They are downloaded from addons.mozilla.org or the Chrome Web Store at your request. An extension runs inside the browser with the permissions its manifest asks for and can see the pages you give it access to — it is third-party code, and we neither review nor vouch for it. Remove one at any time in Settings ▸ Add-ons.

Third-party services

The services you choose to use — the sites you visit, your search engine, Google’s favicon service, the sources “Ask the Browser” searches, Apple’s speech recognition, Mozilla’s translation packs, Hugging Face, the extension stores, Openverse/Wikimedia, and any cloud AI provider you key in — each have their own privacy policies and terms, which govern how they handle the requests your device sends them. The open-source components bundled in the app are listed under Settings ▸ About ▸ Open-Source Licenses.

Children

The Browser is not directed to children under 13 and does not knowingly collect personal information from anyone.

Changes

If this policy changes, the updated version ships inside the app with a new date. Because we collect nothing, there is no historical data for a policy change to expose.

Contact

Questions about your privacy or the app? Email thebrowser.ai@proton.me.