Privacy Policy

PocketChan talks directly to 4chan and keeps everything else on your device. We cannot see what you read or what you post, because none of it reaches us. The only thing that ever reaches us is a message you deliberately send through the contact form on this site.

From the app, none. PocketChan has no sign-up, no login, and no user profile. We operate no analytics, advertising, attribution, or crash-reporting SDK, and we do not create a device identifier or advertising ID.

The one exception is the contact form on this website, which only receives what you type into it and only when you choose to send it. It is described under “The contact form” below.

The app saves the following locally so it can work between launches. It never leaves your device, is included in your own encrypted device backups if you use them, and is deleted when you delete the app:

• Favorite boards and favorite threads.
• Watched threads and their unread reply counts.
• Threads you have saved for offline reading.
• Recently visited threads, for as long as you choose to keep them.
• Unsent reply drafts, and a record of the posts you have made so you can find them again.
• Your filters: hidden posts, hidden threads, blocked poster IDs, and keyword filters.
• App settings such as theme, accent color, text size, refresh interval, and media preferences.
• Cookies set by 4chan when you complete its verification, so that posting works.
• A temporary cache of 4chan API responses, which you can clear at any time from Settings.

You can erase any of it from within the app. History, watched threads, filters, hidden content, and the cached API responses each have a clear action in Settings, and saved threads, favorites, and your list of posts can be removed item by item. Deleting PocketChan removes all of it at once.

While you browse, PocketChan requests content from 4chan's own public endpoints. Reading is restricted to these hosts:

• a.4cdn.org for board, catalog, and thread data
• i.4cdn.org for images and video
• s.4cdn.org for spoiler and placeholder images
• boards.4chan.org for a board's rules, when you open them

Those requests carry your IP address to 4chan, exactly as visiting the site in a browser would. 4chan's handling of that data is governed by its own privacy policy and terms, which we do not control. Opening an external link hands you off to your browser, where that site's policies apply.

PocketChan can post replies to 4chan on your behalf. When you submit one, the following is sent to sys.4chan.org and becomes publicly visible on 4chan:

• Your comment text.
• Any name, options, or tripcode you entered.
• Any image or video you attached.

4chan receives your IP address with the post and applies its own rules, logging, and moderation to it. Once a post is public, removing it is up to 4chan, not us.

Verification is handled by 4chan's own captcha, which loads boards.4chan.org inside an in-app sheet. Solving it sets 4chan cookies, which are stored on your device by the system and sent with your post so that 4chan accepts it, in the same way a browser session would. Your browser's identifying details are passed along with the post for the same reason. We do not see or store any of it.

Drafts stay on your device until you choose to submit them, and are never uploaded anywhere. Attaching a file uses the system file picker, so PocketChan only ever reads the file you pick.

You can clear the 4chan cookies at any time by clearing the app's stored data or by deleting PocketChan.

PocketChan asks for access to your photo library the first time you save an image or video from a thread, and uses it for nothing else. The permission is add-only: the app can write the file you asked it to save, and cannot read your existing photos.

PocketChan displays user-generated content hosted by 4chan. We do not host, create, or moderate that content, and it may be offensive or explicit.

You can hide a post, mute a thread, block a poster ID, or filter by keyword at any time. For anything else, see the support page.

This website has a contact form. Using it is entirely optional, and the app never sends anything to it on its own. When you submit it, these are transmitted to a message relay that forwards them to the developer:

• The subject, category, and message you wrote.
• Your email address, but only if you choose to fill in that field. It is optional, it is used for nothing except replying to you, and leaving it blank still sends the message.
• Anything you choose to put in that message, so avoid including sensitive details you do not want to send.

As with any web request, the relay and the networks it passes through receive your IP address and browser user agent, and may log them for security and abuse prevention. Messages are used only to answer you. They are not used for marketing, and are not sold or shared. They are kept only as long as needed to deal with what you wrote about.

The form is protected by Google reCAPTCHA, which checks that you are not a bot. reCAPTCHA collects hardware and software information from your browser and sends it to Google for that purpose, and is governed by Google's own privacy policy and terms of service. It runs only on the contact page, and on no other page of this site.

PocketChan is not directed at children and is age-rated accordingly on the App Store. The app collects nothing, so we do not knowingly collect information from anyone, including children, and we ask that children do not use the contact form.

If this policy changes, the updated version will be posted here with a new “last updated” date. Material changes will also be noted in the app's release notes.

Questions about this policy, and requests about a message you have sent us, can go through the contact form.