VoxDeck does not sell your data or use it for advertising. All data collected is used solely to provide the app's features - flashcard study, hands-free audio study mode, AI-assisted answer grading, and AI-assisted card generation.
1. Overview
VoxDeck is a flashcard study application built around an Anki-style deck structure, with a hands-free study mode designed for use while driving or exercising. In this mode, VoxDeck reads your flashcard questions aloud and can listen to your spoken answer to grade how close it is to the correct one. To perform that grading, VoxDeck transmits a transcript of your spoken answer to an external third-party large language model (LLM) provider, Groq, Inc. ("Groq"). VoxDeck also offers an optional AI card-generation feature: when you supply a question and an explanation, VoxDeck sends that text to the same external provider to suggest answer options you can turn into cards. This Privacy Policy explains what data we collect, why we collect it, how it is stored, and your rights regarding that data. By creating an account and using VoxDeck, you agree to the practices described in this policy.
2. Data We Collect
- Account Credentials - Your email address and password are required to create an account and are managed by Firebase Authentication (email/password sign-in). Your password is never stored by VoxDeck directly - it is handled entirely by Firebase's secure authentication infrastructure, which stores only a hashed credential. Your email is used for login and for password-reset emails.
- Deck and Card Content - The flashcard questions and answers, deck names, and creation timestamps you create are stored in Google Firestore under your account. This is not local-only: it syncs to our cloud database so your study material is tied to your account.
- Study Progress and Scheduling Data - Review history (timestamp and duration of each review), spaced-repetition scheduling state, and AI grading verdicts (correct / partial / incorrect) are stored in Firestore under your account.
- App Preferences (Local Only) - Your text-to-speech reading speed, voice choice, and auto-advance settings are stored locally on your device and are never uploaded to our servers.
- Text-to-Speech Audio - In hands-free study mode, VoxDeck reads your flashcard questions aloud using Apple's on-device AVSpeechSynthesizer. This happens entirely on your device - no audio or text is transmitted anywhere for this feature.
- Speech-to-Text (Your Spoken Answers) - When you answer aloud, VoxDeck uses Apple's Speech framework to transcribe what you say. On devices that support it, this transcription happens entirely on-device. On older devices that do not support on-device recognition, your speech audio may instead be processed by Apple's speech recognition servers, subject to Apple's own privacy practices. Regardless of device, VoxDeck itself never stores your raw audio - audio is discarded immediately after transcription. The resulting text (the "transcript") exists only in memory during your study session, is shown on-screen, and (if you use AI grading) is transmitted off your device to VoxDeck's grading service and then to Groq, as described below. It is never written to Firestore or saved to any file.
- AI Answer Grading (Transcripts Sent to an External LLM Provider) - When you use hands-free grading, VoxDeck sends the card's question text, the card's correct-answer text, and your spoken-answer transcript to VoxDeck's grading service (hosted on Cloudflare Workers). That service then forwards all three - including the full text of your spoken-answer transcript - to a third-party large language model (LLM) provider, a separate company whose servers operate outside VoxDeck's infrastructure and are not controlled by VoxDeck. Your transcript therefore leaves VoxDeck's systems and is processed on that external provider's servers to generate the grading verdict. That provider is Groq, Inc., a US company that operates the Groq LLM inference service; its handling of this data is governed by its own privacy policy at groq.com/privacy-policy and its customer/API terms. No account identifier, email address, or session token is included in this request. Only the resulting verdict (correct / partial / incorrect) and how long you took to answer are saved to your account afterward - VoxDeck does not retain the transcript once grading is complete, though Groq may retain it according to its own policies. Note: if you choose to write personal information into a flashcard's question or answer text, or speak personal information as your answer, that text is included in this request and sent to Groq, since VoxDeck cannot distinguish personal from non-personal content.
- AI Card Generation (Your Question and Explanation Sent to Groq) - VoxDeck offers an optional feature that helps you build cards: you enter a question and an explanation, and VoxDeck sends that text to its generation service (hosted on Cloudflare Workers), which forwards it to Groq, Inc. Groq returns three suggested answer options; you choose one or more, and VoxDeck saves the resulting card(s) to Firestore under your account. The question and explanation text you provide leaves VoxDeck's systems and is processed on Groq's servers, subject to Groq's own privacy and data-retention practices (groq.com/privacy-policy). No account identifier, email address, or session token is included in this request. VoxDeck does not retain your input once the suggestions are returned, though Groq may retain it according to its own policies. As with grading, if you type personal information into the question or explanation, that text is sent to Groq, since VoxDeck cannot distinguish personal from non-personal content. This feature is only used when you choose to invoke it.
3. How We Use Your Data
- Account credentials are used for authentication and account access
- Deck and card content is used to display your study material and read it aloud
- Study progress and scheduling data is used to run spaced-repetition scheduling and show your review history
- Text-to-speech audio processing happens on-device solely to read questions aloud
- Speech-to-text transcription is used solely to capture and display your spoken answer, and, if you use AI grading, to send that transcript to VoxDeck's grading service and on to Groq for scoring
- AI grading data - including your spoken-answer transcript, which is sent to Groq - is used solely to score how close your answer was to correct
- AI card-generation input - the question and explanation text you enter, which is sent to Groq - is used solely to produce suggested answer options for cards you choose to create
We do not use your data for advertising. We do not sell your data to third parties. We do not use your data to build advertising profiles. Firebase Analytics and Firebase Ads are both disabled in our configuration.
4. Third-Party Services
- Google Firebase - Your account credentials and app data (decks, cards, review history) are stored in Google Firebase infrastructure (Authentication and Firestore). Firebase is subject to Google's privacy policy at policies.google.com/privacy.
- VoxDeck Grading & Generation Service (Cloudflare Workers) - Our backend, hosted on Cloudflare, receives your AI grading and AI card-generation requests and relays them to Groq. It keeps API credentials server-side and does not store the content of these requests.
- Groq, Inc. (LLM Provider) - When you use AI grading, your spoken-answer transcript together with the card's question and correct-answer text is sent by our service to Groq. When you use AI card generation, the question and explanation text you enter is sent to Groq. Groq is a separate US company operating its own servers outside VoxDeck's control, and it processes this text to generate the grading verdict or the suggested answer options. These transfers happen each time you use the respective feature. Groq's handling of that data, including any retention or use for its own purposes, is governed by its own privacy policy at groq.com/privacy-policy and its customer/API terms.
- Apple Speech & AVFoundation Frameworks - Text-to-speech always runs on-device. Speech-to-text runs on-device where supported, and otherwise via Apple's speech recognition servers, under Apple's own platform terms.
5. Data Sharing
Your data is not shared with third parties except as described in Section 4. In particular, when you use AI answer grading, your spoken-answer transcript (along with the card's question and correct-answer text) is disclosed to Groq outside VoxDeck's infrastructure for the sole purpose of scoring your answer; and when you use AI card generation, the question and explanation text you enter is disclosed to Groq for the sole purpose of suggesting answer options. VoxDeck has no social or deck-sharing features - your decks, cards, and review history are otherwise visible only to you.
6. Data Retention
Your account data - including deck content, card content, and review history - is stored in Firestore and persists for as long as your account exists, including after you sign out of the app on a device or uninstall it, since this data lives in the cloud rather than only on your device.
Locally stored preferences (reading speed, voice, auto-advance settings) are removed automatically when you uninstall the app.
You can permanently delete your account and all associated data at any time by emailing hivrasupport@gmail.com with a deletion request from the email address on your account. Deletion removes your account credentials, decks, cards, and review history from Firestore and is irreversible.
7. Your Rights
You have the right to:
- Access the data stored under your account by contacting hivrasupport@gmail.com
- Request correction of inaccurate data
- Request deletion of your account and all associated data at any time by emailing hivrasupport@gmail.com
- Sign out of your account at any time via Settings
- Withdraw microphone or speech-recognition permission at any time via iOS Settings → Privacy → Microphone / Speech Recognition → VoxDeck (note: hands-free answer capture will not function without these permissions)
8. Children's Privacy
VoxDeck is intended for users 13 years of age and older. We do not knowingly permit users under 13 to create accounts. If you believe a user under 13 has created an account, contact us at hivrasupport@gmail.com and we will delete the account.
9. Data Security
We use Firebase Authentication for credential management, with passwords stored only as secure hashes by Firebase and never handled in plaintext by VoxDeck. Your Firestore data is scoped to your individual account. All network communication - with Firebase, with our grading and generation service, and from that service to Groq - occurs over HTTPS. However, no method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security of your data.
10. Changes to This Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we do, we will update the effective date at the top of this page. Continued use of the app after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy. For significant changes, we will make reasonable efforts to notify users.
11. Contact
For privacy questions, data requests, or concerns: hivrasupport@gmail.com