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Privacy Policy

Your keystrokes stay on your Mac. · Last updated: 27 June 2026

This policy explains exactly what Charm touches, the few network requests it makes, what this website stores, and your rights under the UK GDPR. Charm is built so that your writing stays on your own computer: corrections run on-device, with no account and no cloud.

The short version

  • The app keeps everything on your Mac. No telemetry, no account, no cloud. Your text, and everything Charm learns, never leaves your computer.
  • Corrections run on-device. The AI model runs locally on your Mac; your keystrokes are never sent anywhere for correction.
  • No cookies, no third-party requests. This website sets no cookies, and loading a page makes no requests to any third-party server. Our fonts and our analytics are self-hosted.
  • Self-hosted, cookieless analytics. We count page views with our own self-hosted Umami, which cannot identify you and sets no cookie. You can opt out on this page.
  • Two small local items. The site saves your light/dark theme choice and a first-touch attribution record in your browser's local storage. Neither is a cookie, and neither tracks you across other websites.

Who is the data controller?

The data controller for any personal data we hold about you is:

TJH/CO LIMITED (trading as THEODORE HQ)
A company registered in England and Wales
Company number: 16589593
Registered office: Fairway House, Links Business, Fortran Rd, St. Mellons, Cardiff, CF3 0LT, United Kingdom
Email: support@theodorehq.com

Given the small scale and low-risk nature of our processing, we are not required to appoint a Data Protection Officer, and have not appointed one. You can raise any data-protection question with us at the email above.

What Charm does

Charm is a macOS app that corrects spelling, fixes grammar, and predicts your next word in real time, across your Mac apps. It reads the text you are typing through the macOS Accessibility and Input Monitoring permissions, and corrects it inline. It does this entirely on your Mac.

What Charm stores on your Mac

All text processing happens locally on your Mac, and stays there. Charm does not collect, store, or transmit your text to any server. Your keystrokes never leave your computer.

On your Mac, Charm keeps your settings, the words you add to your personal dictionary, the corrections it learns from you, and your word-frequency data, so it can get better the more you write. Your licence key and activation ID are stored in the macOS Keychain, encrypted by the operating system. None of this is ever transmitted off the device, and removing Charm removes its stored data.

Charm uses a local AI model (Gemma 2 2B or Qwen 2.5 3B, 4-bit quantised via Apple MLX). There is no cloud correction mode, no API key field, and no external service integration of any kind for text processing.

Does Charm make any network requests?

Only a few, and none of them carry your text or what you type.

  • Model download. On first launch, Charm downloads its AI model once from the public mlx-community repositories on Hugging Face. After that download completes, no further network activity is required for corrections.
  • Update checks. About once an hour Charm checks our appcast for a new version. The request contains your current Charm version and your macOS version, so we can serve the right update. It carries no unique identifier and is verified by Apple's Sparkle framework. You can turn update checks off.
  • Licence checks. Charm talks to Polar.sh, our licensing provider, in three situations: once when you activate your licence, periodically to revalidate it (at most every seven days), and if you deactivate it to move Charm to another Mac. Each call sends only your licence key and a device label (your Mac's local name). After activation, Charm caches the result and runs offline for up to seven days.

What personal data do we hold, and on what basis?

The law requires us to name a lawful basis under Article 6 of the UK GDPR for each category.

  • Your purchase email and licence record. Held so we can deliver and verify your licence. We receive your email from Polar.sh, the Merchant of Record that processes your purchase. Lawful basis: contractual necessity (Art 6(1)(b)).
  • Newsletter subscription (the same email). Used to send occasional product updates about Charm. You opt in at checkout via an unticked box (never pre-ticked), and every email has a one-click unsubscribe. Lawful basis: consent (Art 6(1)(a)), given by ticking the opt-in box at checkout.
  • Licence-activation records. A timestamp, country and the IP address of an activation request, used to detect fraud and licence abuse. These are held by Polar as part of the licensing service. Lawful basis: legitimate interests (Art 6(1)(f)).
  • Support emails. If you email us, we hold the message to help you. Lawful basis: legitimate interests (Art 6(1)(f)).

How long do we keep it?

  • Purchase email and licence record: while your licence is active, plus seven years after your last purchase, to meet HMRC tax-record requirements (Schedule 11 of the VAT Act 1994 and corresponding income-tax rules).
  • Newsletter subscription: until you unsubscribe, plus thirty days while we process the unsubscribe.
  • Licence-activation records: twelve months from activation, then deleted.
  • Support emails: two years, then deleted, unless you ask us to keep them for an open issue.

Cookies and storage on this website

No cookies, no third-party trackers, no advertising scripts, no fingerprinting. Our web fonts and our analytics are self-hosted, so loading a page makes no third-party requests at all. The only things this website stores on your device are two small first-party items, both kept in your browser's local storage (not cookies), described below.

Theme preference. If you switch the site between light and dark, we save that choice as a single charm-theme value so the site remembers it next time. Under PECR (as amended by the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025) this is covered by the "appearance" exception for storage that adapts how a site looks to your preference, so no consent banner is needed. Clearing this site's data removes it.

First-touch attribution record. We save a small record of the page you first landed on, the site that referred you, any campaign tags in the link you arrived through, and a first-visit timestamp (stored as a few ta_ values). We use it only to understand which links lead to purchases if you later buy Charm. It is not a cookie, it stays in your own browser, it is never shared with anyone else, and it is never used to track you across other websites. Storing it for aggregate insight falls under the PECR "statistical purposes" exception; the underlying processing relies on our legitimate interests (Art 6(1)(f)) in understanding how people find Charm. You can remove it at any time by clearing this site's data or using any standard content blocker.

Website analytics

To understand which pages people find useful, this website uses one cookieless, privacy-friendly analytics tool: Umami, which we self-host on our own server at analytics.theodorehq.com. Charm the app contains no analytics of any kind; this is the website only. Umami records aggregate, non-identifying information such as page URL, referrer, country, and browser or device type. It sets no cookie, does not fingerprint your device, does not follow you across other websites, and cannot identify you.

Under PECR (as amended by the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025), storage or access whose sole purpose is aggregate statistics to improve the service falls under the "statistical purposes" exception, so no cookie banner is required. That exception is conditional on us giving you clear information (this section) and a simple, free way to opt out (the button below). Turning an IP address into a country, briefly, relies on our legitimate interests (Art 6(1)(f)) in understanding aggregate site traffic. Retention: aggregate figures indefinitely; raw event records for twelve months.

Any standard content blocker (uBlock Origin, Ghostery, Brave's shields) also stops analytics automatically.

Who handles your data, and international transfers

We keep suppliers to a minimum. Where one is based outside the UK, an approved UK transfer safeguard is in place:

  • Polar.sh (United States) is our payment and licensing provider and the Merchant of Record (the legal seller) for your purchase. For the data it collects at its own checkout (your email, country and payment details) it acts as a separate, independent controller under its own privacy policy; for anything it handles on our behalf it acts as our processor. Card details are handled by Polar and its payment processor, Stripe, and are never received by us. See Polar's data-processing addendum and privacy policy.
  • Vercel (United States) hosts this website. Vercel is certified under the UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, and its data-processing agreement also incorporates the UK International Data Transfer Agreement.
  • Apple iCloud runs our support@theodorehq.com mailbox. For UK and EU users this is controlled by Apple Distribution International Limited in Ireland (within the EEA), with Standard Contractual Clauses for any onward transfer.
  • Hugging Face (United States) hosts the public repository from which the Charm app downloads its on-device AI model once, on first launch. This is a public file download; no personal data we control is transferred.
  • Self-hosted analytics (Umami) runs on a server we control, in the United Kingdom, so your analytics data is never shared with a third-party analytics company and is not subject to a restricted transfer.

You can ask us for more detail on any of these safeguards at support@theodorehq.com.

Crash reports

Charm does not send crash reports, diagnostics, or telemetry automatically. Nothing about a crash leaves your Mac unless you choose to send it. If macOS itself shows a "Send to Apple" dialog, that is Apple's standard system, not us, and you control it in System Settings > Privacy & Security > Analytics & Improvements.

Your rights under UK GDPR

  • Access - ask for a copy of the data we hold (Art 15).
  • Rectification - correct anything inaccurate (Art 16).
  • Erasure - ask us to delete your data, subject to the HMRC retention above (Art 17).
  • Restriction - pause our processing while a dispute is resolved (Art 18).
  • Portability - receive your data in a structured, common format (Art 20).
  • Object - object to processing based on legitimate interests, including marketing (Art 21).
  • Withdraw consent - unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time (Art 7(3)).
  • No automated decisions - we make no automated decisions about you (Art 22).

To exercise any of these, email support@theodorehq.com. We respond within thirty days, free of charge.

Complaints

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your personal data, please tell us first so we can put it right. Under section 164A of the Data Protection Act 2018 you can complain to us directly by email at support@theodorehq.com. We will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days, investigate it, and tell you the outcome. Tip to reach us fast: include the words "Privacy complaint" in the subject line; we flag every email containing that phrase so it goes to the front of the queue.

You also have the right to complain to the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO): Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. Helpline: 0303 123 1113. ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint. You can contact the ICO at any time, though we would appreciate the chance to resolve things for you first.

Children

Charm is a general-purpose productivity tool and is not directed at children under 13 (the UK age of digital consent under section 9 of the Data Protection Act 2018). We do not knowingly collect any personal data from anyone under 13. If you believe we hold such data in error, email us and we will delete it promptly.

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy we will update the date at the top, and email anyone on the customer list a plain-English summary of what changed at least fourteen days before it takes effect. We will not start collecting more from existing users without notice.

Contact

For any questions or concerns, email support@theodorehq.com. Every message is read by a person on our team. See also our Terms of Service.

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