Privacy policy

1. Data we collect

Your account

You sign in with Google. We receive your name, email address and profile picture from Google, and keep them with your account. If you turn on two-step verification, we keep its secret and backup codes, encrypted.

What you give Shadow

• Your conversations: the messages you write and Shadow's replies.
• Files you attach to a message, and files you keep in My Files (including files Shadow creates for you).
• What Shadow reads while doing a task you asked for: the text or page images of a document on your Mac, or the text and screenshots of a web page in Chrome (sections 11 and 12), and web pages it looks up for you.
• Bug reports you send from Bapbong: your description and marked-up screenshots, and — only if you choose to attach them — the document and the app's recent logs.

Sign-in and device information

Each time you sign in and use our services we record your IP address, your browser or app (its user agent), the time, and — for the desktop app and the Chrome extension — a random id for that installation. From the IP address we derive an approximate city and country, shown to you in Settings › Device sessions; this lookup runs on our own servers, using the DB-IP database.

Usage and safety records

• For each reply: which AI model was used, how many tokens it took, its cost and timing.
• Security events such as sign-ins, sign-outs and account changes, with the IP address and user agent.
• Messages our automated safety checks flag as possible abuse, with a short excerpt of the message (see section 3).
• Server logs of requests and errors, which can include your user id and parts of what was processed.

We do not collect payment information: Shadow Garden does not take payments online.

2. How we use it

• To provide the products: sign you in, keep your conversations and files, and do the tasks you ask for.
• To apply your settings, such as which folders and websites Shadow may use.
• To keep our services safe: to detect and prevent abuse, fraud and unauthorised access, and to enforce our rules.
• To fix problems: to investigate errors and the bug reports you send us.
• To manage capacity and costs, such as usage limits for your plan.
• To comply with the law and respond to lawful requests.

We do not sell your personal data, use it for advertising, or use your conversations or files to train AI models. We do not send marketing emails.

3. AI and automated processing

• Answers come from AI models run by other companies. To reply, Shadow sends your conversation — including files, document text, pages and screenshots it has read for you — to the provider of the AI model that answers (such as OpenAI, Anthropic or Google). An AI model may also help decide how Shadow carries out a task.
• Web searches. When Shadow searches the web for you, the search query goes to our search provider.
• Safety checks. Messages are checked automatically for signs of abuse. A flagged message is recorded, and repeated or serious abuse can limit what Shadow will do for an account or suspend it. If you think this happened to you by mistake, contact us and a person will review it.
• Mistakes. AI output can be wrong. Check important results before relying on them.

4. Who receives your data

We require our service providers to use your data only to provide their service to us.

5. How long we keep it

We may keep data longer where the law requires it, or to establish or defend legal claims.

6. Where data is stored

Your data is stored on Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure. Some of our providers — AI model providers, our search provider, Cloudflare and Google — may process data in other countries. When data is transferred out of Vietnam, we do so as Vietnamese personal data protection law requires and take reasonable steps to make sure it stays protected.

7. How we protect it

• Data travels over encrypted connections (HTTPS and secure WebSockets); stored files are encrypted.
• Sign-in tokens are stored only as one-way hashes; two-step verification secrets are encrypted.
• The desktop app and the Chrome extension sign in with short-lived tokens that can only do their own job — the extension's cannot read or change your account.
• Staff access is limited by role; reading conversations is logged.

No system is perfectly secure. Keep your Google account safe, turn on two-step verification, and tell us at once if you suspect unauthorised access.

8. Cookies and local storage

• A sign-in cookie (up to 7 days) and a security token that protects forms (24 hours).
• Short-lived cookies (5 minutes) that hold a sign-in step together.
• Your display preferences, such as the theme, in your browser's local storage.

We use no advertising or analytics cookies, on the web app or on this website.

9. Your rights and choices

You can ask us to:

• access the personal data we hold about you, and get a copy of it;
• correct data that is wrong or incomplete;
• delete your conversations, files or whole account — we do this on request while self-service deletion is being built;
• withdraw your consent or object to a use of your data — some features may then stop working.

Write to support@shadowgarden.app from the email address of your account. We confirm your request within 2 working days and complete it within 30 days at most — sooner where the law sets a shorter time — and may ask you to confirm who you are. You can also end any signed-in device in Settings › Device sessions, and choose which folders and websites Shadow may use.

People in the European Union, the EEA or the United Kingdom

We process your data to provide the service you asked for (contract); to keep it secure and working and to prevent abuse (legitimate interests); where you consent, for example when you attach a document to a bug report (consent); and to meet legal obligations. You also have the rights to data portability and to restrict processing, and to complain to your data protection authority.

People in Vietnam

Under the Law on Personal Data Protection you have the rights to be informed about how your data is processed; to consent, refuse or withdraw consent; to view and correct your data; to ask us to provide, delete or restrict it; to object to processing; to complain, denounce or sue and claim compensation; and to ask for protective measures. We complete requests within the times set by Decree 356/2025/ND-CP — for example, 10 days to let you view or correct your data and 20 days to delete it — and tell you the reason if we need longer.

10. Data breaches

If a breach of personal data is likely to harm you, we will tell you. We will also notify the authorities as the law requires — in Vietnam, the Ministry of Public Security's Department of Cybersecurity and High-Tech Crime Prevention and Control (A05), within 72 hours of discovering the breach.

11. Bapbong for Mac

• Your documents stay on your Mac. Bapbong opens, edits and saves them locally, and keeps recovery copies on your Mac.
• When you use Shadow in the app, your messages and the names and locations of the documents and folders you have open are sent to our servers and the AI model, with the text you have selected. Shadow reads a document — its text or page images — only in folders you allow (Off, Read, Ask or Auto, per folder); that content then becomes part of your conversation.
• While you are signed in, the app stays connected to our servers, so that Shadow — also from the web — can reach your Mac when you ask it to; over this connection Shadow can see the names of the documents and folders you have open. Each request carries the installation's random id and a user agent that includes your Mac's name.
• Updates: the app checks updates.shadowgarden.app for a new version, which sees your IP address, the app's version and your platform.
• Crash log: kept on your Mac only; sent to us only if you attach logs to a bug report, with your home folder, computer name, email addresses and tokens removed.
• Other AI apps: if you connect Bapbong to another AI app (such as Claude or Codex), what that app reads goes to it and its provider under their privacy policies, not to us.
• The app's sign-in token is kept in your Mac's Keychain.

12. Shadow for Chrome

• Only the tabs you share. Shadow works in tabs you put in Chrome's “Shadow” tab group, when you ask it in the chat. There it reads the page's visible text and structure, its address and title, and — when it needs to see the page — a screenshot of the visible part. Text you cannot see is left out.
• Never reads or fills password, payment-card or one-time-code fields; never pays or downloads.
• The extension also sends the address and title of each tab in the group, whether you are using the browser at the moment (window focus; active, idle or locked — not what you do), its version and a random install id.
• Each new site asks you first; banking, email and sign-in sites stay off until you turn them on in Settings › Shadow in Chrome. Sending, posting, deleting or agreeing to anything is asked about every time.
• Sign out in the extension, or in Settings › Device sessions, to disconnect a browser at once. Removing the extension deletes what it stored in your browser (its sign-in tokens and install id).
• The use of information received from the extension adheres to the Chrome Web Store User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

13. Children

You must be at least 13 to use Shadow Garden. If you are under 18 — or under the age of majority where you live — you need a parent's or guardian's permission. We do not knowingly collect data from children under 13; if you believe a child has given us data, contact us and we will delete it.

14. Changes to this policy

We publish changes on this page with a new effective date before they apply. If a change is significant, we will take reasonable steps to let you know.

15. Contact

For questions, requests or complaints about your data, write to Shadow Garden at support@shadowgarden.app.