Privacy Policy

BottleWise is built by JDC Applications. This policy explains what information the app uses, why, and the choices you have. We keep data collection to the minimum needed to make the app work.

Information we use

BottleWise is designed to work with as little personal information as possible.

• Photos you scan. When you point the camera at a wine list, bottle or shelf — or choose an existing photo from your library — the image is sent through our relay to Anthropic’s Claude API to read the text and identify the wines. We do not store the image. See “How your scans are processed” below.
• Your taste profile. The answers you give in the flavor quiz, the wines you save and the ratings you give them are stored on your device and used to personalize your recommendations. A short text summary of your profile, which can include the names of wines you have saved, is sent along with each scan so the recommendations can be matched to your taste.
• A device verification record. To stop anyone other than the genuine BottleWise app from using our relay, the app proves to our server that it is a real, unmodified copy running on an Apple device. Our server keeps a small record of this, described under “Device verification” below. It contains no personal information.
• Purchase information. If you subscribe, your purchase is handled entirely by Apple through the App Store. We never see your payment details. So that subscribers get unlimited scans, the app sends our server Apple’s signed proof of your subscription, which our server checks and then discards without storing it.
• Scan counts. To apply the monthly free-scan allowance, the app records the date and type of each successful scan on your device, and our server keeps a matching count. See “The free-scan allowance” below. Neither contains anything about what you scanned.

BottleWise does not request or use your location. It contains no analytics, advertising or crash-reporting software, and it sends no diagnostic data to us. If you have chosen to share crash reports with developers in your iOS privacy settings, Apple may provide us with anonymous crash reports; that is handled by Apple, not by the app.

How your scans are processed

When you scan, the app sends the image — together with the text summary of your taste profile described above — to a relay server operated by JDC Applications and hosted by Cloudflare. The relay confirms the request comes from a genuine copy of BottleWise, forwards it to the Claude API operated by Anthropic, PBC, and passes the result straight back to your phone.

The relay does not store your photos, your taste profile or your results, and we do not keep request logs. To keep the service running we can watch basic information about requests as they happen — such as the type of request, which AI model handled it, whether it succeeded and how long it took — but we never see or record their content, and we don’t save this information.

Anthropic processes each request to return your results and may retain it for a limited period under their own policies. How Anthropic handles this data is described in their privacy policy at anthropic.com/legal/privacy.

We do not use your photos, scans or taste profile to train AI models.

Because the whole photo is sent, we encourage you to avoid capturing people, faces or other personal details in your scans.

IP addresses

Like any internet service, our relay receives your IP address with each request. We use it only briefly, to limit how many requests can be made in a short time and so prevent abuse. We do not store IP addresses or use them to locate or identify you. Cloudflare, which hosts the relay, processes network traffic including IP addresses under its own privacy policy.

Device verification

The first time you open BottleWise, it creates a cryptographic key stored in your phone’s secure hardware and asks Apple’s App Attest service to confirm that the app is genuine. Apple receives the information it needs to do this under Apple’s privacy policy. After that, the app periodically proves it still holds the key, so our relay can tell genuine requests from anyone else’s.

Our server stores, for each installation of the app:

• a random identifier for the key, created on your phone;
• the key’s public half, used to check the app’s signatures;
• a counter, used to stop old requests being replayed;
• whether the installation was set up in Apple’s development or production environment;
• when the record was created and when it was last used.

This record is not linked to your name, email address, Apple ID, phone number or anything else about you, and we don’t use it to track you or combine it with other information. It is used only to confirm requests come from genuine BottleWise and to block abuse.

Records are deleted automatically once they have not been used for 90 days. The only exception is an installation we have blocked for abuse, whose record is kept so the block stays in effect. Deleting the app, or using Delete My Data, removes the key from your phone; the next time you use BottleWise it creates a new, unrelated one.

The free-scan allowance

BottleWise includes a number of free scans each month. So that the allowance can’t be reset by changing the phone’s clock, editing the app’s data or reinstalling it, our server keeps count too.

For each free scan, our server records which installation it came from (the random verification identifier described above), a random identifier for the scan itself, when it happened, whether it was a wine-list or bottle scan, and whether it was refunded. A scan is refunded when it doesn’t produce a usable result, so only successful scans count. These records never include your photo, your results or anything about what you scanned, and they are deleted after 60 days. Scans by subscribers, and by test versions of the app (unless a tester turns on quota testing), are not recorded.

To confirm whether the app is a test version or an App Store copy, the app sends our server Apple’s signed record of how it was installed. Our server checks it and does not store it.

So that reinstalling the app doesn’t reset the allowance, we use Apple’s DeviceCheck service. It lets us store two bits of information about your device on Apple’s servers, along with the month they were last set. We use them only to record roughly how much of that month’s free allowance the device has used. They contain nothing else, only we can read them, and we ignore them once the month is over. We never store the temporary token the app uses to reach them. Apple handles DeviceCheck under its privacy policy.

Test versions of the app

If you are testing a pre-release version of BottleWise (through Apple’s TestFlight), then when you finish setting up your taste profile, the app sends our server any wine names you typed that BottleWise didn’t recognise, so we can add them to the wine list. Only the name itself is sent, along with whether the app could partly match it, and our server keeps a count of how often each name has been sent. Nothing identifies you or your device: it isn’t linked to the verification identifier, your IP address or anything else. A name is deleted once it hasn’t been sent for 90 days. The copy of BottleWise available on the App Store never sends these.

What we do not do

• We do not sell your personal information.
• We do not share your information with advertisers.
• We do not build advertising profiles about you.
• We do not track you across other apps or websites.
• We do not collect analytics or usage statistics, and we do not use advertising identifiers. The only identifier we keep is the per-installation verification identifier described under “Device verification”.

Where your data lives

Your taste profile, saved wines, ratings, scan history and free-scan count are stored on your device only. They are not uploaded to us and are not backed up to any service we control. Deleting the app removes all of it.

The only information our server keeps is the device verification record and the free-scan counts described above. Neither contains anything about you or your wines. Test versions of the app also send the unrecognised wine names described under “Test versions of the app”, which are not linked to you or your device.

Our relay also keeps short technical logs, for up to 7 days, so we can find and fix problems. For each request they record which part of the service was used, whether it worked, how long it took, and the first few characters of the device verification identifier. They never include your IP address, your location, your photos or your results.

Scan photos are held in memory only for as long as it takes to send them and show you the result. The app never writes a scanned image to storage.

Your choices

• You control camera and photo library access in your device’s Settings, under Privacy & Security.
• BottleWise can send you a notification when a scan finishes while you are in another app. These are local notifications generated on your device; nothing is sent to us. You can turn them off in Settings.
• In the app, under Settings → Your Data, Delete My Data permanently removes your saved wines, ratings, taste profile and scan history from the device, resets its device verification key, and restarts the taste quiz. It asks you to confirm twice, because it cannot be undone. It does not reset this month’s free-scan allowance.
• You can delete individual saved wines or scan history entries by swiping them away.
• You can manage or cancel your subscription in your Apple account settings.

Children

BottleWise is about wine and is intended for adults. It is not directed to children, and we do not knowingly collect information from anyone under the age required to purchase alcohol in their region.

Changes to this policy

If we update this policy, we will revise the date at the top of this page. Significant changes will be communicated within the app.

Contact

Questions about privacy? Email us at privacy@jdcapplications.com.