Privacy & Security

Updated

The Short Version

Recall never connects to the internet. Your screenshots, the text extracted from them, and all metadata stay on your Mac. There are no accounts, no analytics, no telemetry.

What Recall Accesses

ResourceWhy
~/DesktopWatches for new image files to index
~/ScreenshotsWatches for new image files to index
App Sandbox (read-only)Required to read image files in watched folders
Spotlight metadataReads kMDItemCreator to identify the source app of each screenshot

Recall requests folder access through the standard macOS Files and Folders privacy control. If access is denied, Recall shows a prompt in the onboarding screen and continues without indexing the inaccessible folder.

Where Data Is Stored

Recall stores its database at:

~/Library/Application Support/com.kwilio.recall/recall.sqlite

This SQLite database contains:

  • File paths to indexed screenshots
  • Capture timestamps and file sizes
  • OCR text extracted from each screenshot
  • Auto-assigned tags
  • Source app names
  • Image dimensions
  • Archive status

The database never leaves your Mac. Recall does not sync it to iCloud or any other service.

On-Device Processing Only

OCR (text recognition) and image classification both use Apple’s Vision framework, which runs entirely on-device. No image data is sent to Apple or to any third party as part of Recall’s normal operation.

No Accounts or Analytics

Recall has no sign-in, no user accounts, and no analytics SDK. It does not collect crash reports, usage statistics, or any other telemetry.

Revoking Access

To stop Recall from accessing your Desktop or Screenshots folder:

  1. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Files and Folders
  2. Find Recall in the list
  3. Toggle off the folders you want to restrict

Recall will stop watching those folders immediately. Existing indexed entries remain in the database until you delete them from within the app.

Removing Recall Completely

To remove all data Recall has stored:

  1. Quit Recall
  2. Delete the app from /Applications
  3. Delete the database folder: ~/Library/Application Support/com.kwilio.recall/
  4. Optionally: remove the login item in System Settings → General → Login Items