Last updated: October 2026
DriveShelf is designed to respect your privacy completely. The short version: your catalog stays on your Mac — and in your own iCloud if you turn on sync between your Macs and your iPhone — and we never see any of it.
None. DriveShelf sends nothing to us, and we have no access to your data. Your catalog leaves your Mac only if you choose to sync, and then it goes into your own iCloud account. There are no accounts and no sign-in.
DriveShelf makes no network connections to us — we have no servers receiving your data, no analytics, and no advertising. If you turn on sync, each Mac's catalog goes into your own iCloud Drive, and your other Macs signed in to the same Apple ID and the DriveShelf iPhone app read it from there. That sync is handled entirely by Apple's infrastructure, governed by Apple's own privacy policy; we never see or receive that data ourselves. Syncing is opt-in — nothing leaves your Mac until you click Sync Now on the home screen or turn on Sync automatically. Stop Syncing on the home screen removes this Mac's drives from your other devices.
The only other time DriveShelf goes online is when you choose DriveShelf ▸ Check for Updates…. It asks Apple's App Store which version of DriveShelf is current. That question carries DriveShelf's App Store ID and your Mac's region, nothing about you or your drives, and it's never sent unless you choose that menu item.
To catalog a drive, or your home folder through Add This Mac, DriveShelf asks your permission to read it. That access is used only to record file names, paths, sizes, dates and Finder tags (with their colors) into your local catalog. DriveShelf never copies, stores or uploads the contents of your files, never writes to your drives, and never changes your tags. The only file data it reads is for the read-speed test: part of one large file, read to time the drive and then thrown away.
Questions about this policy? Email director@easyliving.film.