Privacy Policy for Foldy

A. Settings, Folders and Widget Setups

The app saves its settings on your device: the language, theme, folder defaults, how folders open, what a tap on a widget does, and whether the widgets refresh themselves. It saves each folder you make (its name, layout, shape, colours, borders, icon pack and the items in it), each custom item you add (Sections 2D to 2F), which folders are placed as widgets and at what size, the sidebar’s apps and look, and any drafts and undo history while you edit. All of this lives in the app’s private storage, which other apps cannot read, and is not uploaded by the app.

B. Your Installed Apps and Their Icons

To let you pick apps for a folder, Foldy asks Android for the apps that appear in your launcher, and for apps that offer shortcuts (direct dial, bookmarks, tasks and the like). It does not ask for the list of every installed package. It reads each app’s name and icon on your device and keeps copies of the icons, at the sizes the widgets need, in its private storage so widgets draw quickly. The picker also remembers its sort and filters. Starter templates refer to roles such as “camera” or “messages”, which the app resolves to your own phone’s apps. The list of your apps and the icons never leave the phone, and are not used for anything but drawing your folders, the sidebar and the picker.

C. Icon Packs

With Foldy Pro you can apply an icon pack installed on your phone (Nova or ADW format) to all folders or to one. Foldy reads the pack’s icons from that app’s resources, on your device, and keeps copies of the ones it uses in its private storage. Nothing about your icon packs is sent anywhere.

D. Contacts

A folder can hold a contact, to open, call or text them. When you open the Contacts source in the picker, the app asks for permission to read your contacts. It then lists, on your device, the contacts that have a phone number: their names, first phone numbers and photos. For each contact you add, the app keeps the name, number, contact key and a small copy of the photo in its private storage. Tapping the contact on a widget opens your contacts app, your phone app with the number ready to dial, or your messages app with the conversation open. Foldy never places a call or sends a message by itself, and never asks for call or SMS permissions. Contacts you did not add are not kept. Nothing from your contacts leaves the phone through the app.

E. Websites You Add

A folder can hold a website. When you add one, Foldy fetches its title and an icon once, over an encrypted connection (HTTPS) where the site offers one: it reads the first part of the page you typed for its title, and asks Google’s favicon service (www.google.com/s2/favicons) for an icon of that site, then the site’s own icon file if Google has none. The website and Google see the address you typed (for Google, the site’s domain), your device’s IP address and a plain “Foldy” browser identifier. No account, advertising ID or anything else from the app is sent. The title and icon are kept with that item on your device, and you can rename it or give it your own picture instead. Tapping the item on a widget opens the site in your browser, which handles it under its own privacy policy. Google handles what it receives under the Google Privacy Policy.

F. Pictures You Pick

A folder can have a picture as its background, and any item can have a picture as its icon (with Foldy Pro). You pick these with Android’s own picker, which hands the app only the picture you choose. The app cannot see the rest of your photos and asks for no photo or storage permission. A copy of each picture you pick is kept in the app’s private storage and is not uploaded.

G. Notification Dots (Notification Access)

With Foldy Pro, the icons in your folders can show dots with the number of unread notifications. For that, Foldy needs Android’s notification access, which you give on its own settings page; the free version never asks for it. With access, the app counts the notifications each app currently has, on your device, and keeps only those counts, by app, in its private storage. It skips its own notifications and ongoing ones such as music players or downloads. It does not read, keep or send the title, text or any other content of your notifications, and the counts never leave the phone.

H. The Sidebar (Display Over Other Apps)

The Sidebar tab adds a thin handle at the edge of the screen that a swipe pulls out into a floating column of apps. To draw it over other apps, Foldy asks for Android’s Display over other apps permission, and runs a small foreground service that, as Android requires, shows a quiet notification while the sidebar is on. The sidebar shows only the apps you chose and its look, saved on your device. It does not see, read or record what is on screen underneath it. Apps you open from it can open as floating mini windows or full screen, which Android handles. On phones that stop background apps, the tab offers to open Android’s battery or autostart settings for Foldy; it changes nothing there itself.

I. Foldy Pro Purchase (Google Play Billing)

Foldy Pro is an optional one-time purchase made through Google Play Billing. It removes the ads and unlocks everything the free version limits: more widgets and sidebar apps, every icon shape, icon packs and custom pictures, borders and Samsung blur, notification dots and the time, battery and memory shown on widgets, and the sidebar’s designs. Google handles the payment, and WidgetVibes never receives your card or payment details. The app keeps, on your device, a small record of the purchase: that Pro is owned, Google Play’s order number and purchase token, and whether a payment is still pending. It asks Google Play for your purchases when it starts and when you come back to it after a while, so a purchase follows your Google account to a new phone and a refund is noticed. If Google Play cannot be reached, the record stands and Pro keeps working offline. Google Play gives developers order information, such as an order number, country and amount, under Google’s own terms, for things like refunds and taxes. The order number is shown to you on the purchased screen.

J. Advertising and the Advertising ID (Google AdMob)

Without Foldy Pro, the app shows ads from Google AdMob: a small banner at the top of the app’s screens, and now and then a full-screen interstitial. Ads appear only inside the Foldy app, never on your widgets, in a folder opened over the home screen, or in the sidebar. Your first visit is ad-free, so setting up your first folders meets no ad; ads start from the second visit, where a visit is opening the app, or returning to it after half an hour away. An interstitial is shown only at a natural break, such as switching tabs or leaving Customize, after about twenty taps in a visit, and never within three minutes of the last one. To keep to these rules, the app keeps a small ledger on your device: how many visits there have been, when the app was last on screen, taps since the last interstitial, and when it showed. The ledger holds no identifier and is not sent anywhere.

Before the first ad, the app checks your ad consent with Google (Section 3) and starts the Google Mobile Ads SDK. When the SDK runs and an ad is requested or shown, Google may collect your device’s advertising ID, IP address, device and app information, ad interactions, diagnostics, and an approximate location inferred from your IP address. Google uses this to deliver, measure and personalise ads (where you allow it) and to prevent fraud. On Android versions that have them, the SDK may also use Android’s own ad privacy features (topics and attribution), which you control in Android’s settings. This data goes to Google, not to WidgetVibes. The app itself learns only whether an ad loaded and was shown. Once you own Foldy Pro, the ads SDK is not started and no ads are loaded. Development builds show Google’s test ads, never real ones.

K. Backups: Your Own Backup File, and Android Backup

Back up or restore in Settings saves one file with your folders, your custom items (website addresses, and the names and numbers of contacts you added), your settings, which folders were placed, and the icon files they use, including pictures you picked. You choose where the file goes with Android’s file picker: a folder on the phone, or a cloud drive, which then holds it under that provider’s privacy policy. The file never includes the Foldy Pro record or the ad ledger. WidgetVibes never receives the file. Restoring reads a file you choose and lets you replace, keep or skip folders that already exist.

Separately, if Android backup is on, Android copies the app’s saved data to your Google account, encrypted by Google, so it comes back on a new phone. That data is what Section 2A describes, with the cached icons and widget drawings left out as cache. Backup is carried out by Android and Google under the Google Privacy Policy. WidgetVibes cannot see your backups. You can turn backup off in Android’s settings.

L. App Updates (Google Play)

Update app in Settings asks the Play Store whether a newer version of Foldy exists and, if you agree, lets Google Play install it. This uses Google Play’s in-app updates library and is handled by Google Play, which sees the app’s package name, installed version and where it was installed from. Leave a review opens Foldy’s page in the Play Store; the app never sees your rating or review.

M. Support Emails and Bug Reports

Report bugs / issues in Settings opens your own email app with a short form. The form already has the app version, your Android version and your phone’s name filled in. Nothing is sent unless you send the email yourself. We use what you send, including any screenshots, only to answer you and to fix the problem.

N. What Never Leaves Your Phone

The following are read and used only on your phone. Foldy never sends any of them to WidgetVibes, Google AdMob or anyone else:

• Your installed apps, their names and icons, and which of them you put in folders or the sidebar.
• Contacts, including the names, numbers and photos of the people you add.
• Pictures you pick for backgrounds and icons.
• Notification counts, and nothing else about your notifications.
• Icon packs and their icons.
• Device readings shown on widgets with Foldy Pro: the time, battery level and free memory.
• Your folders, settings and sidebar, and what you set up in them.

The only copies of any of it that can leave the phone are the backup file you save yourself and your own Android backup (Section 2K), both under your control and neither readable by WidgetVibes. Foldy has no accounts, no analytics, no crash reporting and no server of its own. It does not track your location, read your notifications’ content, or sell any data.