Privacy Policy — PubMinder

Last updated: May 2026

Overview

PubMinder is a research-paper reader that aggregates preprints and journal articles from public scientific databases and generates AI summaries. This policy explains what data the app uses and why.

Data We Do Not Collect

PubMinder does not:

Collect or store any personally identifiable information
Track you across other apps or websites
Share any data with advertisers or data brokers
Require account creation or sign-in

Data That Stays on Your Device

The following information is stored locally on your iPhone only and never transmitted to us:

What	Where stored	Why
Selected subjects and keyword filters	UserDefaults	Remembers your preferences between sessions
Saved articles	UserDefaults	Lets you access bookmarked papers offline
Onboarding completion flag	UserDefaults	Skips the welcome screens on relaunch
Feed size setting	UserDefaults	Controls how many articles to fetch
PubMed search queries	UserDefaults	Saves your saved searches
Groq API key	iOS Keychain (encrypted)	Authenticates requests to Groq on your behalf
NCBI API key	iOS Keychain (encrypted)	Optional higher-rate PubMed access

API keys are stored in the iOS Keychain — an encrypted, device-bound store that is excluded from iCloud backups.

Third-Party Services

PubMinder connects to the following external services on your behalf:

Scientific Databases (read-only, no authentication)

bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) — preprint RSS feeds
medRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory / BMJ) — preprint RSS feeds
arXiv (Cornell University) — preprint Atom feeds
PubMed / NCBI E-utilities (National Institutes of Health) — journal article search and abstracts

These are publicly accessible APIs. PubMinder sends only the subject/search queries you configure. No personal information is transmitted.

AI Summarization

Groq (groq.com) — if you supply a Groq API key, PubMinder sends the text of scientific abstracts to Groq's API to generate 2–3 sentence summaries. Your API key is transmitted to Groq over HTTPS. Groq's own privacy policy applies: groq.com/privacy
Apple Intelligence (on-device) — if your device supports Apple Intelligence (A17 Pro or later, iOS 26+), PubMinder can summarize abstracts entirely on-device using Apple's Foundation Models framework. No data leaves your device via this path.

Children's Privacy

PubMinder is intended for researchers, students, and anyone interested in scientific literature. It does not knowingly collect data from children under 13.

Changes to This Policy

If this policy changes materially, we will update the "Last updated" date above. Continued use of the app constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

Contact

Questions about this privacy policy? Email: genome.school@gmail.com