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ByteViewer

Privacy

Your sites stay on your phone.

ByteViewer is a thin shell around WebKit. This page lists exactly where data goes, checked against the code of version 1.2.0. Last updated 10 October 2026.

What the app stores

  • Your site list and its options are saved on the device, and mirrored to an App Group so the widget can read them. Cached site icons live in the same container.
  • That data is part of normal device and iCloud backups. Nothing syncs between devices through iCloud.
  • No account, no sign-in.

What the app sends

  • The websites you open, loaded in a WebKit web view with a Safari user agent. They see what they would see in Safari.
  • When you add a site or change its address, a short lookup of its HTML, icons and theme colour, made with a throwaway session that carries no cookies.
  • GitHub, only if you tap the link to the project.
  • Nothing else: no analytics, crash reporting, update checks, ads or third-party SDKs. The widget makes no network requests.

Cookies, logins and private mode

  • All sites that are not in private mode share one persistent WebKit data store, like a single browser profile. Logins carry over between your saved sites. That store is separate from Safari.
  • A site in private mode gets a fresh, non-persistent store every time it opens and loses it when it closes. Its icon and theme colour are still cached.
  • Each saved site has a Clear cookies and site data action that removes records for its domain and subdomains from the shared store.
  • Face ID or passcode lock is enforced per site and re-locks when the app goes to the background. The page stays loaded behind a blurred overlay.

Permissions

Camera, microphone and location are only used when a site asks and you accept the WebKit permission prompt. Face ID is used only for the per-site lock.

This website

  • We may use PostHog to understand how the site is used: pages viewed, device type and approximate region. It is used to improve the site, not to build a profile of you.
  • We do not run third-party advertising or sell visitor data.
  • Downloads come from GitHub, which has its own privacy policy.

Contact

Questions about privacy go to hello@byteknotlabs.com or GitHub Issues. ByteViewer is made by ByteKnot Labs.