Privacy policy
Last updated: 2026-09-22
Controller under the GDPR: Balane GmbH · Balanstraße 84 · 81541 Munich · Germany Commercial register: HRB 301320, Amtsgericht München · VAT ID: DE455102718 Represented by the managing director Jonas David Höttler support@balane.tech
Balane Mind is a local-first app for macOS. Your notes are made on your Mac, stored there encrypted, and stay there. There is no account, no sign-in and no provider server the app talks to.
1. What the app stores — and where
Everything you write is yours: titles, texts, earlier versions, topics, areas, times, the relations you draw yourself, people you name, and pictures you attach to a note. It lives in an encrypted database inside the app's private folder on this Mac, together with the search index, drafts and attachments.
This content is not transmitted to the provider. There is no server that could receive it.
2. Where the vault file lives — and what happens if you put it in a cloud
The vault starts out in the app's private folder on this Mac. You can instead keep it as one single encrypted file at a place you choose (Settings → “The file”), for instance in a folder that iCloud Drive or another service synchronises. On opening, the device takes what is new there; on locking, it writes back. The work still happens on the device.
If you put the file in a synchronised folder, your service carries it, not the provider of this app. That service sees a file whose content is unreadable to it: titles, texts, pictures and times are already encrypted inside it, and the key is not in the file. Whatever the service keeps besides — file name, size, timestamps, your account with them — follows their terms, not this policy. Without that step the vault does not leave the device.
One exception worth knowing: at the protection level “Open” the file is expressly not protected. Its key is derived from a constant in the program, so that the file can be passed on and any Balane Mind will open it. Whoever has the file reads it. The app says so where you choose that level; in a synchronised folder it holds just the same.
Sync through OneDrive, which the app mentions elsewhere, is not switched on in this release.
3. Key, Touch ID and recovery key
The key to your vault lives in the macOS keychain — the operating system's own store — where the app deposits it. If Touch ID is switched on, it unlocks access to that key; the app never sees biometric data: Apple merely confirms that an unlock happened.
When the vault is created, the app generates a recovery key and shows it to you once. It is neither transmitted to the provider nor kept anywhere the provider could read it. If it is lost together with access to the device, nobody can open the vault again, the provider included.
4. Text analysis happens on the device
The app arranges notes by closeness of words and suggests topics while you write. That computation runs entirely on your Mac, using classical methods over the words in your own texts. There is no language model built in or connected, no content analysis at any service and no request going out — not even an anonymised one.
5. The sample space
On first launch a sample space can be opened. Its content is invented and part of the app. It is not stored, and nothing about you is collected while it is shown.
6. Import and backup
Notes can be imported from a file you choose yourself; the app reads it locally and creates only what you confirm. A backup writes your collection, encrypted, to a place you choose. Both happen on your device; the provider takes no part in either and learns nothing about them.
7. Network
The app opens no network connection of its own. It loads no fonts, checks nothing online and reports nothing. If the vault file lies in a synchronised folder, the operating system or your cloud service carries it — the app itself only writes to a file (section 2).
8. No analytics, no telemetry
The app contains no analytics, tracking or crash-reporting libraries. No usage data is collected, aggregated or otherwise.
9. Your rights
Because the provider collects no personal data through the app, requests for access, rectification or erasure directed at the provider will generally have no subject matter. For email or form support requests, the general privacy policy of this website applies: https://www.balane.app/en/privacy
You can delete your local data by removing the app and deleting its container — on macOS ~/Library/Containers/app.balane.mind/. The vault key sits in the keychain and is removed with it.