Privacy Policy

1. Our approach

Gloss is a reading app. The books and documents you import, and the information you create while using them, such as reading progress, settings and saved results, are stored on your device. Features that work on your device process your books there and do not upload book content to our servers.

Gloss does not require an account, shows no ads, and does not use third-party analytics or advertising trackers. We do not sell your personal information or use it for cross-app or cross-site advertising.

When you open Gloss, the app contacts our servers to verify the installation and keep your purchases and allowances up to date. It also contacts them when you use an online feature, such as cloud translation, or buy or restore a purchase. Reading itself never requires this.

2. Information we collect and why

Content you use with online features. When you use an online feature, such as cloud translation, the app sends our servers the text that feature needs and the related settings, and a third-party service provider may carry out the processing. To keep reading smooth, the app may send text near your current position before you reach it. We process this content only to provide the feature you are using. We do not keep your books on our servers, do not write book content to logs, and do not use your content to train models.

Cached results. To make online features faster and more reliable, our servers may keep their results, such as translations. Cached results are not used to build a profile of you and are deleted automatically after a period without use. Some, such as translations, are organized by content rather than by user, so identical requests from different users may reuse the same result.

Device verification. To confirm that requests come from a genuine installation of Gloss, prevent abuse and keep your access to the service, the app uses Apple’s device verification service and exchanges a device key and access credentials with our servers. We keep the resulting device identifier and its status. The app also sends Apple’s signed record of your download of Gloss, which includes an identifier Apple assigns to your Apple account for this app. Whether or not you buy anything, we keep it to recognize the same user across reinstalls and devices, provide free allowances once per user and restore purchases. This information does not contain your book content.

Purchases. Payments are processed by Apple; we never receive your card or other payment details. To grant, restore and reconcile what you have bought and to handle refunds, we receive and keep transaction information from Apple, such as transaction identifiers, the item purchased, purchase and expiry dates, and renewal and refund status.

Usage. To track free and purchased allowances, avoid charging you twice and resolve problems, we record how much of an online feature you use, when, and the result. These records do not contain book text.

Technical and security information. Like any online service, our servers and network providers process technical information such as IP address, request time, the service endpoint called and the response status, in order to deliver data, protect against attacks and abuse, troubleshoot and keep the service reliable.

Diagnostics. If you choose in your device settings to share analytics with app developers, Apple provides us with crash reports and similar diagnostics under its own terms. We use them only to fix problems.

When you contact us. We use your email address and what you tell us only to respond to you.

3. How we share information

We share only what is needed to provide Gloss, with these categories of service providers:

• Cloud infrastructure providers, which host our servers, databases and backups.
• Email providers, which handle messages you send to our support address.
• Network delivery and security providers, which speed up and protect connections to our servers. Communication between the app and our servers is encrypted in transit, but these providers process the requests and responses passing through them, including content sent to online features and the results.
• Language and AI service providers, which carry out online features, such as translation, on the content sent to them and return the result. We use only providers whose terms do not allow them to use that content to train their models.
• Apple, which provides device verification, payments, subscription management and optional diagnostics, and handles that information under Apple’s privacy policy.

These providers may process information only on our instructions or to provide their services. Otherwise, we disclose information only when required by law, when necessary to protect the safety of users or the public, or to protect our legal rights. If we are involved in a merger, acquisition or sale of assets, information may be transferred as part of it and will remain subject to this policy.

File sources you import from, such as cloud storage services, and your device backups are handled by those services under their own terms.

4. How long we keep information

We keep information only as long as needed for the purposes above:

• Content on your device stays there until you delete it in the app or remove the app.
• Cached results are deleted automatically after a period without use.
• Purchase and allowance records are kept for the long term, for as long as you may use or restore your purchases, refunds or disputes may arise, and laws such as tax and accounting rules require.
• Device verification information is kept for the long term, to keep the service secure and to restore purchases.
• Usage records are kept as long as needed for billing, reconciliation and resolving problems, then deleted, except for the parts that form purchase and allowance records, which are kept as described above without details derived from your content.
• Technical logs are kept up to a time or size limit and deleted automatically on a rolling basis.
• Backups of our database exist for disaster recovery and are deleted on a rolling schedule. Deleted information may remain in a backup until that backup expires.

5. Where we process information

Gloss is available worldwide. Our servers and the providers that carry out online features are located mainly in the United States, and our network providers may process data in other countries. Your information may therefore be transferred to and processed outside the country or region where you live, where data protection laws may differ. Where the law requires it, we rely on safeguards such as standard contractual clauses offered by our providers and obtain any consent required for such transfers.

6. Security

We protect information with measures appropriate to the risk, including encryption in transit, access controls, separation of credentials, removal of sensitive details from logs and encrypted backups. No system can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

7. Your choices and rights

Online features are optional; you can keep reading and using the features that work on your device without them. Deleting a book in the app deletes its related content on your device. You can cancel a subscription in Apple’s subscription settings. Deleting books or removing the app does not delete our purchase and verification records, and does not cancel a subscription.

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to know whether we process your information and receive a copy; correct inaccurate information; request deletion; restrict or object to certain processing; receive a portable copy; withdraw consent; ask us to explain how we process information; and complain to your data protection authority. We will not discriminate against you for exercising these rights.

To make a request, email support@mounlab.com. Because Gloss has no accounts, we may ask for details such as the date of a purchase to find the relevant records and verify the request. We will respond within the time required by applicable law. We may be unable to delete information we must keep to meet legal obligations, resolve disputes or maintain your purchases, and we will tell you why. Cached results that are organized by content rather than by user cannot be searched or exported by user. Please do not send passwords, access credentials or book content by email.

8. Additional information for certain regions

European Economic Area, United Kingdom and Switzerland. MounLab is the controller of the information described in this policy. We process it on these legal bases: performing our agreement with you (providing the features you request and granting and restoring purchases); our legitimate interests in keeping the service secure, preventing abuse and keeping it reliable, within what you would reasonably expect; complying with legal obligations, such as keeping financial records; and your consent where the law requires it, which you may withdraw at any time without affecting earlier processing.

United States. In the past 12 months we have collected the categories of information described in section 2: identifiers (device identifier, app store account identifier, IP address), commercial information (purchase records), internet or other electronic network activity (technical and usage information), and the content you choose to use with online features. We use them only for the purposes in section 2, and we do not sell or share personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising or use sensitive personal information to infer characteristics about you. Residents of states with privacy laws, including California, may exercise the rights in section 7, including through an authorized agent, by emailing us.

Mainland China. Providing Gloss requires transferring the information described in this policy outside mainland China, mainly to the United States, to the categories of providers in section 3, for the purposes in section 2. You may exercise your rights in respect of these overseas recipients by contacting us at support@mounlab.com. Where the law requires your separate consent for such transfers or other processing, we ask for it before the processing takes place. If you are under 14, please use the online features of Gloss only with the consent of a parent or guardian.

9. Children

Gloss is not directed to children under 13, or a higher age where local law requires, and we do not knowingly collect their personal information without the consent required by law. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us and we will delete it.

10. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time and will show the new effective date on this page. If a change materially affects your rights or how we use your information, we will notify you in an appropriate way before it takes effect where the law requires, and ask for your consent again where needed.

11. Contact us

MounLab
Email: support@mounlab.com