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Privacy

What stays on your Mac, what leaves it only when you choose, and exactly when each of those happens.

Nota has no account and no server of its own for your voice. You choose which models process your recordings and text. The formal version is our privacy policy.

What stays local

  • Speech processing with a local model, after the model is downloaded.
  • History, Notebook notes, recordings, modes and settings stored by the app.
  • API keys and your licence in the macOS Keychain on this Mac. Nota does not sync them through iCloud Keychain.
  • AI text processing with a configured AI running locally, such as local Ollama. Apple’s on-device Notebook AI needs macOS 26 and available Apple Intelligence.

Speech recognition and AI cleanup are separate choices. Selecting a local speech model does not automatically make a cloud rewrite or Notebook Tidy request local.

What can leave your Mac

  • Cloud speech models: recorded audio goes directly to that provider on your key.
  • Rewrite, Smart Dictation and Voice Edit: text goes to the AI you selected. A mode can also include its enabled clipboard, selected-text or screen context.
  • Notebook Tidy and titles: the note's text goes to the selected AI when that target is a cloud provider.
  • AI apps/MCP: an app receives the text you allowed and may send it to its own services. See AI apps.
  • Model downloads, licence activation and update checks: contact the relevant download, activation or update service.

Nota does not relay your speech or AI requests through its own transcription server. Your chosen providers and destination apps have their own terms.

Password fields

In Settings › Privacy, Don't dictate into password fields protects standard password fields. Nota checks before ordinary dictation starts and again before delivery; it can refuse to record or paste there. Custom fields may not identify themselves as password fields to macOS.

A recording requested by an AI app returns text to that app instead of pasting into the focused field, and uses its own consent controls. Review those permissions separately.

Local-only apps

  1. Download a local speech model suitable for your language.
  2. Open Settings › Privacy › Local only apps.
  3. Add the apps where you want ordinary dictation to use local speech and local AI, or no AI cleanup.

The recorder shows a lock for a local-only session. A cloud speech choice can be replaced by a ready local model; if none is suitable, Nota refuses the start. Voice Edit with cloud AI is refused in a local-only app.

This setting protects those dictation sessions. Notebook's speech and Tidy targets, sharing, exported folders and the behaviour of other apps remain separate choices.

Hide sensitive details from cloud AI

Enable Hide sensitive details from cloud AI in Privacy settings and choose the categories to mask: email addresses, phone numbers, card numbers, IBANs, and key-like tokens. Matching text becomes placeholders before the AI request, and the originals are restored in the answer on your Mac.

This shared text protection applies to AI text requests, including Notebook Tidy. It does not remove sensitive speech from the raw audio sent to a cloud speech model, and cannot guarantee that every private detail is recognised. Use a local speech model when the recording itself must stay local.

See where a request went

History's information can show the destination of speech and AI processing, along with masking information for the request. The speech model and rewrite model are separate destinations. Notebook has its own model information and does not expose exactly the same History inspector.

iCloud and Markdown folders

Your dictionary can sync through your private iCloud database. Notebook has no built-in cloud sync. If you choose a Markdown export folder inside iCloud Drive, macOS can sync those files; Nota writes them one-way and does not import external changes. Sharing or exporting a note creates another copy under your control.

Permissions and deletion

Screen context, system audio for calls and calendar hints have optional permissions. See Permissions. Call recording starts only after you choose to start a note.

  • Delete dictations or configure cleanup in History.
  • For complete removal of a Notebook note and its stored recording files, delete the whole note. Exported or shared copies must be removed separately.
  • Remove provider keys in Models › Providers, or revoke an AI app's permission under Settings › AI apps.