Privacy Policy

This policy describes how the Forte iOS app and backend handle your personal information. Plain English, no lawyer-speak.

1 Who we are

Forte is operated by the team you'll find in the About section of the app. This policy applies to the Forte iOS app and the backend service it connects to. By creating a Forte account you agree to the handling described below.

2 What we collect

Account information. When you create an account we store your email, your name if you provided one, and a secure hash of your password. If you sign in with Google instead, we store the Google user identifier Google gives us and the email associated with it.

Profile and résumé data. Anything you enter in your profile — headline, city, country, work authorization, skills, target roles, target locations, excluded keywords, work experience, education — is stored so the matcher can score postings against you. If you upload a résumé PDF, we extract the text to auto-fill your profile. We keep the extracted structured profile. We do not keep the raw PDF on disk once parsing finishes.

Job data. When you run a scan, we store the postings we fetched, the AI-generated match score and reasoning, your status per posting (interested / applied / skipped / rejected), any notes you add, and any tailored résumé or cover letter you generated.

Private assessments. The topics and per-concept mastery records from the Tests tab live on your device only. Your test answers never leave your phone. Server-side we only see a timestamp per completed session — used exclusively for free-tier rate limiting. We never see the questions, the answers, or your score.

Subscription data. If you subscribe, Apple sends us a signed transaction identifier, the product id (monthly or yearly), and the expiration date. We do not receive your Apple ID, payment method, or card details.

Usage counters. To enforce free-tier caps, we record timestamps of when you triggered a gated action (scan, tailored résumé, cover letter, résumé parse, test session). These are counters only — not analytics, not profiling, not shared.

Feedback. If you use the in-app feedback form, the text you typed, the optional screenshot you attached, your email, the app version, your device model, and your iOS version are emailed to our support inbox so we can respond.

3 What we don't collect

No third-party analytics. No advertising networks. No tracking pixels. No cross-app tracking. No location data. No microphone, camera, or contacts access. No device advertising identifier. No crash-reporting SDKs that send data off-device.

4 How we use your data

Only to provide the features you asked for: finding matching jobs, scoring them against your profile, generating tailored résumés and cover letters, running your private skill assessments, managing your subscription, and replying to your feedback. We do not profile users, sell data, or use it to train any machine-learning model of our own.

5 Third parties we share data with

Microsoft Azure OpenAI. We send résumé text, profile fields, job description text, and assessment prompts to Microsoft-hosted OpenAI models to generate match scores, tailored documents, and test questions. Microsoft's enterprise terms commit that your data is not used to train their models.

Tavily and Brave Search. Title and location queries are sent to these web-search APIs so we can discover real job postings. No personal identifiers are attached to these queries.

Google. If you choose the "Sign in with Google" button, we exchange an ID token with Google's OAuth service to verify your identity. We do not request any Google permissions beyond your email and basic profile.

Apple. Your subscription purchase, renewal, and refund events flow through Apple's StoreKit. Apple also provides the App Store distribution itself.

We do not share data with advertisers, data brokers, marketing firms, or analytics providers.

6 Where your data lives

On our side. Your account, profile, jobs, usage counters, and subscription records are held on servers we control. All connections between the app and those servers use HTTPS.

On your device. The app's private storage holds your assessment topics, per-concept mastery ledger, completed session history, and a cached authentication token. This local storage is sandboxed to the app — other apps cannot read it, and we do not read it remotely.

7 Data retention

Your account and its associated data are kept for as long as you use Forte. You can delete your account at any time from Profile → Delete my account in the app — this removes every row linked to your user id within seconds. Feedback emails you previously sent remain in the support inbox unless you ask us to delete them.

8 Your controls

Access. Your profile data is visible to you in the Profile tab. Your jobs, match scores, tailored résumés, and cover letters are visible in the Jobs tab. Your completed test sessions are visible in Tests → History.

Edit. Every profile field is editable through Edit Profile.

Delete your account. Tap "Delete my account" at the bottom of the Profile tab. Deletion is immediate. Your Apple subscription is a separate thing — cancel it in Settings → Apple ID → Subscriptions.

Reset local assessment data. Wipe on-device mastery ledger and session history from Settings inside Profile.

Export. Tailored résumés can be saved to Files or shared to any installed app from the résumé view.

9 Children's privacy

Forte is not directed at anyone under 16 and we do not knowingly collect data from children. If you believe a child has created a Forte account, contact the support email below and we'll delete the account.

10 Security

Passwords are stored as cryptographic hashes, never in plain text. Session tokens are cryptographically random values transmitted only over HTTPS. We do not store Apple payment details, Google credentials, or credit card numbers.

No system is unbreakable. If a breach affects your data, we will notify you by email without undue delay.

11 Changes to this policy

If we change how we handle your data, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top of this page and surface a notice inside the app the next time you open it. Continued use after that notice means you accept the new policy; if you don't, you can delete your account at any time.

12 AI-generated content

Forte leans heavily on large language models to generate match scores, fit highlights, gaps, red flags, tailored résumés, cover letters, and assessment questions. These outputs are inferences, not facts. They can be incomplete, outdated, or plainly wrong.

You are responsible for what you submit. Always read and verify any AI-generated content before you send it to an employer, share it with another person, or rely on it to make a decision about your career. Forte provides these outputs on an "as is" basis; we are not liable for outcomes that follow from acting on AI-generated content without reviewing it.

13 Contact

Questions or requests about this policy: moo047483@gmail.com