Privacy Policy
- Effective date:
- August 13, 2026
- Applies to:
- Lachlan for iOS
- Published by:
- ND Enterprises LLC
The short version
Lachlan has no accounts. We don’t know your name and there’s no way to contact you.
We can’t see which apps you block — Apple’s Screen Time API doesn’t let us.
What you type to the AI mascot is sent to a third-party AI provider to generate his reply. They don’t keep it and don’t train on it — but we keep a copy, for 12 months, so we can see how he’s working and make him better. Turn on Private mode and the mascot switches to Apple’s on-device AI instead, and nothing you say to him leaves your phone. Details in Section 5.
We do collect product analytics — how you move through setup, what features you use, and how often you unlock — to understand how the app is used and improve it. This is tied to a random per-install ID, not to your name. Private mode turns this off too. Details in Section 8. We use no crash reporting, no advertising, and no cross-app tracking.
Beyond the mascot and analytics, the only other information that leaves your device is what’s needed to process a subscription purchase, handled by our payments provider and Apple.
Private mode is one switch that does three things: it stops analytics, moves the mascot onto your phone, and means we keep no copy of what you say to him.
The long version follows.
1. We have no accounts
There is no sign-up, no login, no email collection, and no user account. There is nothing that identifies you by name and no way for us to contact you.
The app talks to three services of our choosing: a third-party AI provider for the mascot’s dialogue (Section 5), our analytics provider (Section 8), and our payments provider (Section 7). Apart from those and Apple’s own systems, Lachlan makes no other network requests.
2. What you tell Lachlan during setup
During setup, Lachlan asks for:
- Your first name
- Your age
- Roughly how many hours a day you feel you lose to your phone
- What you do (your occupation)
- Why you want to cut back — a free-text answer
All of this is stored on your device, in a private container shared between Lachlan and its extensions (group.ndenterprises.Lachlan), and Lachlan uses it to talk to you like he knows you.
What we send to analytics: your age, hours, occupation, and your free-text “why” are included in the analytics described in Section 8 (unless you’ve turned analytics off). Your first name is not part of what setup sends. People are often candid in the “why” field — if you’d rather it stay on your device, turn on Private mode before finishing setup.
What goes to the AI provider: your first name, occupation, and your “why” are included in the briefing Lachlan gets before each conversation, so he can talk to you like he knows you (Section 5). None of this is sent in Private mode.
About your first name. Lachlan uses it when he talks to you, so it appears in his replies — and we keep those replies (Section 5). So your first name can end up in the conversations we store, even though we never ask for it directly. If you’d rather it didn’t, use Private mode.
3. We cannot see which apps you block
This is worth stating plainly, because most people assume otherwise.
When you choose which apps to block, iOS presents Apple’s own picker. Your selection is returned to Lachlan as a set of opaque tokens — not app names, not bundle identifiers, not icons. iOS deliberately withholds that information from us.
The practical result: we do not know, and cannot know, which apps you chose. Not “we choose not to look” — the operating system does not give us the option. Your selection is stored on your device in that same form and is never transmitted.
4. Screen time measurement
To set the mascot’s mood, Lachlan measures how much total time you’ve spent in the apps you selected today — for example, crossing 30 minutes, one hour, two hours, four hours.
This is measured on your device by iOS and recorded on your device. It’s an aggregate duration only, tied to the tokens described in Section 3, which means it isn’t linked to any app we can name. It never leaves your device, and it resets daily.
5. The AI mascot
Lachlan’s dialogue is generated by an AI model. Which one depends on your Private mode setting.
Private mode off (the default). Your messages are sent to a third-party AI provider to generate his reply. What we send is:
- The message you typed
- The situation he’s reacting to — the name and reason you gave the schedule or hard lock, how many times you’ve unlocked today, and how much time is left on a running block
- Your setup answers, so he can talk to you like he knows you: your first name, occupation, and your reason for cutting back
We do not send which app you’re trying to open — Apple hides that from us entirely (Section 3), so Lachlan genuinely doesn’t know. We instruct the provider not to retain the conversation, and it is not used to train any model.
We do keep a copy. What you type and what Lachlan says back are stored on our servers, against the same random identifier as everything in Section 8 — never your name or email. We read them to see how he’s working and to make him better: whether he’s too easy to talk around, whether he’s too harsh, whether his replies land. They are not used to train any AI model and are not sold or shared. We keep them for 12 months, then they’re deleted automatically (Section 10).
Private mode on. Lachlan switches to Apple’s on-device Foundation Models, running on Apple Intelligence hardware in your iPhone. Everything you type to him and everything he says back is generated and stays on your phone. Nothing is sent to us, to the AI provider, or to anyone else.
The app also falls back to the on-device model automatically when you have no internet connection, or if the AI provider can’t be reached. That’s about where Lachlan thinks, not about the copy we keep: unless Private mode is on, a conversation you have offline is still saved and sent to us once you’re back online. Only Private mode stops that.
Note that Apple’s on-device model needs a device that supports Apple Intelligence. If your iPhone doesn’t, Private mode will leave Lachlan unable to talk — see the support page for hardware requirements.
You can change this at any time in Settings → Private mode. It takes effect on your next conversation with him.
6. Notifications are local and optional
If you allow notifications, Lachlan sends you a heads-up five minutes before a scheduled block starts, so you’re not caught mid-scroll.
These are local notifications, scheduled and delivered entirely by your device. There is no push server, no Apple Push Notification Service registration, and no device token — nothing is sent to us and we cannot send you anything.
Notifications are entirely optional. Declining them does not affect blocking or unlocking.
7. Purchases
Subscriptions are processed by Apple and managed through our payments provider. Our payments provider receives the purchase-related data below; our analytics provider is covered separately in Section 8.
To validate your subscription and keep it working across your devices, our payments provider receives:
- Purchase and receipt information from Apple
- An anonymous app user ID generated for this purpose (not tied to any name or email)
- Your device’s Vendor Identifier (IDFV), device model, OS version, and country
Our payments provider does not receive your name, age, occupation, your reason for cutting back, your conversations with Lachlan, or anything about which apps you block. We do not send them user attributes or attribution data.
Apple handles the payment itself; we never see your payment details.
8. Product analytics
To understand how people use Lachlan and to improve it, the app sends usage data to our analytics provider. This is on by default. You can turn it off at any time in Settings → Private mode; when it’s off, the app stops sending new analytics immediately.
Private mode is one switch with three jobs: turning it on stops analytics, moves the mascot to the on-device AI, and means we keep no copy of your conversations with him (Section 5). There is no way to keep some and not the others.
Identifier. Analytics is tied to a random identifier generated on first launch and stored in your device’s Keychain. It is not your name, email, or Apple ID, and we can’t use it to contact you. Because it lives in the Keychain, it can persist if you delete and reinstall the app (see Section 10).
What we collect:
- Setup answers — your age, the hours you estimate, your occupation, and your free-text “why.” Your first name is not part of this.
- How you use the app — which setup steps you reach and complete, whether you grant Screen Time and notification permissions, when the paywall appears, and when a subscription starts.
- What you configure — the schedules and hard locks you create (including the names and reasons you type, and how many apps/categories each covers — never the app names themselves, which Apple hides from us per Section 3), and whether the always-on block list is enabled.
- Unlocks — each time Lachlan lets you back in, including how long for and your running count for the day.
- Basic technical data — your app version, iOS version, and when the app was last active.
- Your conversations with Lachlan — what you type and what he says back, kept for 12 months. See Section 5.
What we do not collect here: which specific apps you block (Section 3), and any payment details.
How to describe this honestly: this data is pseudonymous, not anonymous — it isn’t attached to your name, but the free-text fields can contain whatever you typed, and the identifier is stable. The stored conversations are the most personal part of this: they’re free text, they can include your first name because Lachlan uses it, and people say candid things to him. If that matters to you, use Private mode.
We do not use crash reporting, advertising, ad identifiers, or cross-app tracking, and we do not sell or share your personal information with data brokers. Lachlan does not access your location, contacts, camera, photo library, microphone, calendar, health data, or motion data — it doesn’t ask for these permissions, because it doesn’t use them.
9. Children
Lachlan is not directed at children and we do not knowingly collect information from them.
Although Lachlan uses Apple’s Screen Time framework, it operates in individual mode — a self-control tool for the person holding the phone. It is not a parental-control app and cannot be used to monitor another person’s device.
10. Deleting your data
Much of what Lachlan holds is stored on your device, and you control it directly:
- Reset in-app — clears your profile, your unlock history, and the mascot’s mood.
- Delete the app — removes the private container and everything in it, including your first name and your on-device conversation history.
What deleting the app does not reach: anything we’ve already received — the analytics in Section 8 and the stored conversations in Section 5. Those live on our servers, not on your phone.
Retention. Stored conversations are deleted automatically 12 months after they happen. You don’t have to ask.
Deleting sooner. The random identifier (Section 8) is stored in the Keychain, which iOS may preserve across app deletion and reinstall — so if you want to stop sending before deleting, turn on Private mode first. Everything we hold is tied to that identifier, not to your name; contact us at the address below and we’ll delete the data associated with it, conversations included. We’ll also help with subscription data held by our payments provider and Apple.
11. Changes to this policy
If this policy changes, we’ll update it here and revise the effective date above. If a change ever means data leaving your device in a new way, we’ll make that clear rather than burying it.
12. Contact
Questions about this policy, or about privacy in Lachlan:
ND Enterprises LLC
California, United States