Last updated: 20 August 2026
The short version. Cicada has no servers. I never receive your data, and there is no account to create. Everything you log lives on your iPhone, and — if you have iCloud turned on — in your own private iCloud account, which I cannot access.
The app itself contains no analytics, no tracking, no advertising, and no third-party code. Apple gives me anonymous download and usage totals, as it does for every app on the App Store — never anything that identifies you.
Cicada is an independent app built by one person. You can reach me at hello@trycicada.com.
Everything below is stored locally on your device. If you are signed into iCloud, it also syncs to the private database of your iCloud account so it can appear on your other devices. Apple's CloudKit private database is not visible to app developers — I have no way to read it.
| Data | Why |
|---|---|
| Interactions you log — who, when, type, optional duration, who reached out first, and any note you write | This is the app. It's what produces your history and insights. |
| Which contacts you choose to track | Cicada only tracks the people you explicitly pick. |
| A city you optionally set for a contact | Powers the "friends nearby" feature. |
| Your settings | Reminder timing and nearby radius. |
If you grant contacts access, Cicada reads names, organisation names, phone numbers, and postal addresses from your address book. This happens entirely on your device, and only to show you a list of people to choose from, display their names, and suggest a city when you set where someone is based.
Your contacts are not uploaded, copied to any server, or shared with anyone. Cicada stores a reference to the people you choose to track, not a copy of your address book.
You can decline contacts access and still use Cicada by adding people manually.
Location is optional. If you grant it, Cicada uses your location only while the app is open — there is no background location tracking, and the app never asks for "Always" access.
Location is requested at deliberately coarse accuracy (roughly kilometre-level), which is all that's needed to tell whether you're in the same city as someone.
Two things you should know, because they involve Apple:
Both are handled by Apple under Apple's privacy policy. Cicada does not store a history of where you have been — only the city you deliberately assign to a contact.
If your device supports Apple Intelligence, Cicada can summarise the notes you've written about a person and suggest things to follow up on. This runs on-device using Apple's built-in model. Your notes are not sent to me, to Apple, or to any other service for this feature.
Cicada can notice when a phone call ends so it can offer to log it. iOS does not give apps access to your call history, and Cicada cannot see who you called — only that a call happened, its direction, and how long it lasted. You choose who to attribute it to, or ignore the prompt entirely.
Cicada cannot read your messages. No app can.
These buttons hand off to the relevant app with the phone number filled in. At that point you're in that app, under its own privacy policy — WhatsApp is owned by Meta, and the others are Apple's.
Because Cicada is sold through the App Store, Apple gives me anonymous, aggregated statistics — things like how many people downloaded the app and roughly how many keep using it. This comes from Apple, not from anything inside Cicada, and it is grouped into totals before I see it. I cannot identify you in it, and it tells me nothing about who you log or what you write.
This is standard for every app on the App Store, and you can turn it off for all apps under iOS Settings › Privacy & Security › Analytics & Improvements.
You can delete any individual interaction, or clear a person's entire history, inside the app. Deleting Cicada from your iPhone removes everything stored locally. If iCloud sync is on, you can remove the synced copy through iOS Settings › your name › iCloud › Manage Account Storage.
Because I never hold your data, there is no request to send me — deletion is entirely in your hands.
Cicada is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect information from them.
If this policy changes in a way that affects how your data is handled, I'll update this page and the date at the top. If Cicada ever gains analytics of its own, that would be described here before the version containing it ships.
Questions about any of this: hello@trycicada.com.