Cheese — Privacy Policy

Document version: privacy-1.3
Effective date: 2026-10-07

Publisher: MYSTERY BOX FOR DEVELOPMENT AND INNOVATION - L.L.C - S.P.C ("we", "us", "our").
Contact: info@mysterybox.art

This policy sets out exactly what Cheese does with information. We've written it so you can check it: everything below describes something the shipped app actually does, and nothing below describes a capability the app doesn't have.

The short version

• We collect nothing. No account, no email address, no advertising, no telemetry, no device identifiers, and no analytics or crash reporting of our own.
• We run no servers that see your traffic. There's no backend. Your device connects to the relay network by itself.
• So we hold nothing about you. Not "we delete it quickly", not "we anonymise it". There is nothing for anyone to sell, subpoena, or lose.
• A small amount of technical state stays on your device and never leaves it.
• Connecting means your device has to talk to the relay network and a handful of public third-party services, all listed in §4. We don't see any of it.

Our App Store privacy label says "Data Not Collected", and it's true.

1. What we don't collect

We don't collect, receive, store, process, sell, share, or hand over:

• who you are — your name, email address, phone number, or any account, because Cheese has no accounts and no sign-in;
• your IP address;
• where you are;
• your browsing history, the sites and services you connect to, or your name lookups;
• what's in your traffic;
• device identifiers, advertising identifiers, or fingerprints;
• usage analytics, feature analytics, session data, or crash reports — apart from the anonymous reports Apple passes on if you've chosen to share them with app developers (§5).

There are no third-party analytics, advertising, attribution, or tracking SDKs in Cheese. In line with App Store Guideline 5.4, we don't sell, use, or disclose user data to third parties for any purpose whatsoever.

2. What stays on your device

Cheese keeps a little technical state on your device: in its own sandboxed storage, in a shared app group that only Cheese and its own extensions (the VPN and, on iPhone and iPad, the Control Center control) can read, and in the VPN configuration it adds to your device's settings. None of it is sent to us, and we have no way to read any of it.

Apart from that single most recent attempt, we deliberately don't keep a history of the networks you've joined, a record of which method worked where, a connection log, or any diagnostic file. An earlier draft of this policy described a hashed "connection memory" and an optional diagnostic log. Neither of those is in the app, and we've corrected this document rather than leave a claim standing that the code doesn't support.

On iPhone and iPad, deleting the app removes all of it.

On a Mac, deleting the app leaves its data behind, because that's how macOS works. To remove everything Cheese stored, quit Cheese and delete the app. Then, in Finder, choose Go › Go to Folder… and delete each of these folders:

• ~/Library/Containers/com.aalshaer.cheese
• ~/Library/Containers/com.aalshaer.cheese.tunnel
• ~/Library/Group Containers/group.com.aalshaer.cheese

If Cheese is still listed in System Settings › VPN, remove it there too.

3. The relay network belongs to other people

Cheese connects you through a global network of relays run by independent volunteers and organisations — thousands of them, all over the world.

• We don't operate a single relay, and no relay sends us anything.
• Traffic leaving the final relay toward a destination that isn't itself encrypted can be seen by whoever runs that relay. Use HTTPS, or another end-to-end encrypted protocol, for anything that matters.
• We have no affiliation with, sponsorship from, or endorsement by any of the organisations that maintain the network.

4. What your device connects to

To get you online — especially on a network that blocks this kind of traffic — your device may contact the following. Every one of these requests comes from your device. We don't route them, we don't see them, and we don't get the results.

4.1 Directory servers, relays, and bridges. Normal operation. These are the machines that carry your connection. The first one your device connects to can see your IP address, but not where your traffic is going.

4.2 The network's bridge-distribution service, run by the non-profit that maintains the relay network. Cheese asks it for fresh bridge addresses for the connection methods it supports, so it has working ones ready if your network starts blocking the usual routes. It asks each time Cheese starts, when you bring it back to the front (at most once every 30 minutes), and every six hours while Cheese keeps running. Cheese only starts this request while you're already connected, so it travels through the private route: the service sees a relay's address, not yours. If you happen to disconnect at the very moment a request is starting, that one request could go out directly instead, and the service would see your address. Apart from the technical details any app's web request carries, such as the app and system version, the request contains only the list of methods Cheese supports. It doesn't include your region, your address, or any identifier, and it uses a private session that saves no cookies or cache on your device. The service is covered by its own operator's privacy policy, not ours.

4.3 Volunteer-proxy infrastructure. If Cheese connects through volunteer proxies (the Snowflake option in Advanced settings, which Auto also tries when other methods fail), your device contacts the following directly, outside the private route:

• a content-delivery network (CDN) that passes Cheese's requests on to the system's broker, which matches your device with a volunteer. The CDN is reached through ordinary-looking web addresses, so it's harder to block;
• public STUN servers, run by a number of independent companies and organisations, which tell your device how it can be reached from the internet; and
• the volunteer's proxy itself, which then carries your connection into the network.

All of these can see your device's IP address, as any server you connect to can. So can the broker, which the network's maintainers run: your device's public address travels inside the connection request, so that the broker can pass it on to the volunteer. The CDN, the STUN servers and the proxies are run by third parties, not by us and not necessarily by the network's maintainers, and each is covered by its own operator's policies. We don't receive anything from any of them.

4.4 A signed-configuration endpoint (not currently used). Cheese is built to be able to download a small, cryptographically signed settings file — relay lists and method priorities — so it can keep working between App Store releases. In this version there is no endpoint configured, and no such request is ever made. If we turn it on, the request will carry no personal data and no identifier, we won't log anything identifying from it, and we'll update this policy and show it to you first.

4.5 Traffic that doesn't go through Cheese. A little traffic goes around the private route, straight from your device:

• Apple's operating systems send a small amount of their own system traffic outside every VPN, Cheese included. We can't change that.
• On iPhone and iPad, your mobile carrier's own services (Wi-Fi Calling, MMS picture messages, visual voicemail and carrier settings) go directly to your carrier, so they keep working. Your carrier handles that traffic just as it would without Cheese.
• On a network that offers only IPv6, Cheese asks that network's own name server about one fixed name (ipv4only.arpa) before connecting, to learn how the network reaches older IPv4 addresses. The question contains nothing about you or where you're going.

Everything else, including push notifications and traffic to devices connected directly to yours, stays inside the private route, and anything Cheese can't carry is stopped rather than sent outside it. That's also why printers, AirPlay receivers, network drives and other devices on your local network can't be reached while Cheese is connected, and why CarPlay, a computer connected by cable, and other accessories connected directly to your device may not work either.

5. Paying

Cheese is a single purchase made through Apple. Apple handles the payment; your card details and your Apple Account identity never reach us. Apple's handling of the transaction is covered by Apple's privacy policy. From Apple we get sales figures, which can't identify anyone.

If you've chosen to share analytics with app developers (in Settings › Privacy & Security › Analytics & Improvements on iPhone and iPad, or the same place in System Settings on a Mac), Apple also gives us crash reports and usage statistics for Cheese, in a form that doesn't identify you. We use them only to find and fix problems. You can stop sharing them there at any time.

6. Children

Cheese isn't aimed at children. Since Cheese collects nothing from anyone, it collects nothing from children either. We knowingly collect no personal data about any person of any age.

7. Your rights (GDPR, UK GDPR, CCPA/CPRA, and the rest)

We don't collect or hold personal data about you, so there's nothing for us to give you access to, correct, export, restrict, object to, or delete — there are no servers holding it. If you think we've got that wrong, write to us and we'll look into it and reply.

• We don't sell or share personal information, in the sense the CCPA/CPRA gives those words. We never have.
• No automated decision-making, no profiling.
• No international transfer of your personal data happens, because none is collected in the first place.
• If a lawful order ever compelled us to hand over user data, we'd have none to hand over.

The on-device data in §2 is yours alone. On iPhone and iPad it's gone when you delete the app; on a Mac, §2 explains how to remove it.

8. Security

We have no servers to breach and no database to leak. What's on your device sits in the app's sandbox and its app group, protected by iOS and macOS file protection. Traffic between your device and the network is encrypted in layers by the connection engine itself.

9. Changes to this policy

This policy has a document version identifier and an effective date. When we change something material, we'll show you the new version in the app and ask you to accept it again before Cheese will connect. Your acceptance is recorded on your device only (§2) and never reaches us.

We write this policy in English and translate it so you can read it in your own language. If a translation ever says something different from the English, the English version is the one that counts, as far as the law where you live allows.

10. Where Cheese is available

Cheese is available through the App Store in selected countries and regions.

11. Getting in touch

Privacy questions: info@mysterybox.art

MYSTERY BOX FOR DEVELOPMENT AND INNOVATION - L.L.C - S.P.C
United Arab Emirates