Privacy Policy

This policy explains what Ouch Now (the macOS app) and this website do with personal information. In summary: your reminders and calendar data are stored only on your Mac. We do not operate servers that receive them, and we do not track your activity.

1. Who is responsible

Hantus Chen (legal name: CHEN TING HAN), an individual developer in Japan ("we", "us"), is the controller of the personal information described here (the "personal information handling business operator" under Japan's Act on the Protection of Personal Information, "APPI"). Privacy contact: [email protected].

2. What stays on your Mac (we never receive it)

• Your reminders, routines, types, effects and settings are saved only on your Mac: in Ouch Now's folder (~/Library/Application Support/Ouch Now, which also keeps backup copies from up to 10 recent launches where something changed) and its preferences file (~/Library/Preferences/com.hcdesign.ouchnow.plist).
• The app contains no analytics, advertising or tracking code, and sends us no usage data or crash reports.
• Update checks: about once a day (and when you choose Check now), the app downloads a small file from updates.ouchnow.app to see whether a new version exists. The request carries only what any web request does (your IP address) and the app's name and version, with no ID that identifies you or your Mac. You can turn this off in Settings → General.

3. Calendars (only if you connect one)

You can connect a Google account (Google Calendar) or a personal Microsoft account (Outlook.com) to get alerts before your meetings. When you do:

• What the app asks for: read-only access to your calendars, plus your email address (and, for Microsoft, your basic profile), used only to show which account is connected. Google: calendar.readonly, email, openid. Microsoft: Calendars.Read, email, profile, openid, offline_access.
• How it's used: the app reads your calendars' names and colours, and your events (title, time, whether it repeats, location, notes, video-call link, a link to open the event, and your reply), to list upcoming meetings and alert you before they start. It also receives each event's guest list, but keeps only the number of guests, not who they are. It saves each calendar's ID to remember which calendars you turned on. It never creates, changes or deletes anything in your calendar.
• Where it goes: your Mac talks directly to Google or Microsoft. Event data is kept only on your Mac and is never sent to us or anyone else.
• Your sign-in: a long-lived sign-in token (a "refresh token") is saved in a private file on your Mac that only your macOS user account can read; short-lived access tokens are kept only in memory.
• How long: the app keeps an account's events only until they end. Copies can remain in the app's local backups (up to 10 recent launches where something changed) until newer ones replace them, or until you delete them.
• Stopping: choose Disconnect in Ouch Now's Settings to delete the sign-in and that account's events from the app (for Google, the app also asks Google to cancel its access), or remove access anytime in your Google Account or Microsoft account.

Also available, under the same rules:

• Apple Calendar: if you allow it, the app reads the calendars already on your Mac through macOS (you can turn this off anytime in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Calendars). Nothing leaves your Mac.
• Calendar links and files (ICS): if you add a calendar's link (for example a work calendar), your Mac downloads it directly from that address to keep it up to date; an imported .ics file is read once from your Mac. The link and its events stay on your Mac. Treat a private calendar link like a password: anyone who has it can read that calendar.

Ouch Now's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. We do not use Google user data for advertising, do not sell it, do not allow humans to read it, and do not use it to develop, improve or train AI or machine-learning models.

4. Information we do receive

Trial and license checks: to prevent the free trial from being restarted and to keep each license active on one Mac at a time, the app sends our license server (license.ouchnow.app) an anonymous device identifier. It is a one-way hash of the Mac's hardware ID, specific to Ouch Now; it cannot be converted back into the hardware ID or matched with other apps. It is sent once when the trial starts, when a license key is entered (together with the key), and, while a license is active, about once a day to confirm the license is still assigned to this Mac. No personal information, reminders or usage data are sent. The server stores the identifier with the trial's start date, and with the order once a license key is entered.

We use this information only for these purposes, never sell it, and never use it for advertising.

5. Who else handles it

• Paddle.com (United Kingdom), our reseller and Merchant of Record, collects your payment and billing details directly under Paddle's Privacy Policy.
• Google (United States) provides our email (Gmail).
• Cloudflare (United States) hosts this website, our domain and app updates, and may keep basic server logs such as IP addresses for security (Cloudflare's Privacy Policy).
• Professional advisers (such as a tax accountant) and authorities, when the law requires it.

Some of these are outside Japan and your country. They protect data under their own policies and recognised safeguards (such as the EU Standard Contractual Clauses); the United Kingdom has an adequacy decision from both Japan's Personal Information Protection Commission and the EU. You can ask us for more information about these countries' privacy rules and the measures these companies take.

6. How we keep it safe

We keep the information above only in password-protected accounts, on devices with encrypted disks, limit it to what's needed, and delete it when it's no longer needed. Only the developer has access.

7. This website

This site uses no cookies, analytics or trackers of its own. When you click Buy, the site loads Paddle's checkout, which may use cookies needed for the payment and to prevent fraud, as described in Paddle's Privacy Policy. After a purchase, the thank-you page sends the order's Transaction ID to our license server to show your license key; the restore form sends the email and Transaction ID you enter, only to look up your key.

8. Your rights

Because the app keeps your data on your Mac, you control it: to remove everything, quit Ouch Now and delete the app, its folder ~/Library/Application Support/Ouch Now (including its backups) and its preferences file ~/Library/Preferences/com.hcdesign.ouchnow.plist. For information we hold (section 4), you can ask us to tell you what we have, correct it, delete it, limit or stop its use, give you a copy, or object to its use, and you can withdraw any consent. Email [email protected]; we reply within one month. You can also complain to a data protection authority, such as Japan's Personal Information Protection Commission or the authority where you live.

9. Children

Ouch Now is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect their information.

10. Changes

If this policy changes, we'll update this page and the date at the top. Significant changes will also be mentioned in the app's release notes.