Privacy policy
Last updated 30 September 2026
RoomCaption turns speech into live captions that people read on their own phones and computers. This policy covers the RoomCaption app and the services it uses. It explains what we handle, why, how long we keep it and who else handles it for us.
In short
- You don't need an account to use the app.
- Your voice goes straight from your device to our speech-recognition service provider to become captions. RoomCaption doesn't store it.
- Captions and replies shared in a room are end-to-end encrypted. Our servers can't read them.
- We don't keep your conversations on our servers.
- There are no ads, no tracking and no analytics in the app.
1. Microphone and audio
- The app uses the microphone only while captions are running. You can stop captions at any time, and your device shows when the microphone is in use.
- While captions run, your device sends the audio directly to our speech-recognition service provider in the United States. The provider turns it into captions and, if you turn it on, a translation.
- The audio doesn't pass through RoomCaption's own servers, and we don't store it.
- Our servers only give your device a key that expires within a minute, which it uses to connect to the provider.
- The provider's published policy says it doesn't store audio or transcripts from live recognition and never uses them to train its models. We have asked it to confirm this in writing.
2. Camera
- The app uses the camera only to scan a QR code to join a conversation.
- The picture is read on your device. It isn't sent anywhere or saved.
3. Shared rooms
- When captions are shared, captions and typed replies are encrypted on the device before they reach our relay. The relay passes them on but can't read them.
- The relay sees only what it needs to run the room: when messages arrive and how large they are.
- It keeps up to the last 100 encrypted captions so people can rejoin. Everything in a room, including its six-digit code, is deleted when the room ends or after six hours, whichever comes first.
- Anyone with the QR code, invite link or six-digit code can join. Share them only with people you want in the conversation.
- To stop people guessing codes, the relay counts wrong code attempts per network. It stores the count under an ID derived from the network address, never the address itself, and deletes it after 10 minutes.
- People who join don't need an account, and we don't ask for their names.
4. Captions on your device
- We don't keep captions or transcripts on our servers.
- Anything the app saves stays on your device. Deleting the app removes it.
5. Free trial without an account
- To limit free trials per network, we count trial starts by a keyed hash of your IP address, never the address itself.
- The counts are deleted within two days.
- The trial doesn't use your name, email, contacts or any device identifier.
6. Error messages
- Our servers don't keep logs of the requests your app makes.
- They record only short error messages, such as a service failing to answer, to help us fix problems. These messages contain no captions, codes, names or network addresses.
- They are kept for up to 7 days.
7. Accounts
- The first version of the app has no sign-in. This section will describe accounts before sign-in comes to the app.
8. When you contact us
- If you email us, we use your email address and message only to answer you and to fix the problem.
- We delete support emails within 12 months after the matter is closed.
9. Who else handles information for us
| Category | What they receive | Country |
|---|---|---|
| Speech-recognition service provider | Audio while captions run | United States |
| Hosting and network provider (servers, rooms, email forwarding) | Encrypted room messages, trial counts, error messages, emails you send us, IP address in transit | United States and European Economic Area; global network |
| Our email provider | Emails you send us | United States |
| Apple and Google | Downloads and updates of the app, under their own privacy policies | — |
The current list of providers is available on request at privacy@roomcaption.com.
10. What we don't do
- We don't sell personal information.
- We don't share it for advertising.
- The app has no advertising, tracking or analytics code, and it doesn't ask to track you.
11. Security
- Everything between the app and our servers is encrypted in transit.
- Room content is also end-to-end encrypted, as described in section 3.
12. Your choices and rights
- You can stop captions at any time.
- You can turn off microphone or camera access in your device's settings.
- Without an account, we hold almost nothing that identifies you. Trial counts are hashed and deleted within two days.
- You can ask what we hold about you, or ask us to correct or delete it, by emailing privacy@roomcaption.com.
- If you're not satisfied with our answer, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (https://www.oaic.gov.au).
13. Changes
- When this policy changes, we update this page and the date at the top.
- We change it before any new use of personal information begins.
14. Contact
- privacy@roomcaption.com
- RoomCaption is run by Jimmy Ji, Sydney, Australia.