Cookies & Local Storage
1. We set no cookies
Not one — not for sign-in, not for preferences, not for measurement. No Aleph Developments website or application writes a cookie to your browser, and we have enabled no hosting feature that would write one on our behalf. You can verify this in your browser's developer tools: open the Application or Storage panel on any of our domains and the cookie list is empty.
2. Why there is no consent banner
Consent banners exist because sites store or read information on your device for purposes you have not asked for — usually analytics and advertising. We do neither, so there is nothing to ask you about, and putting a banner in your way to look compliant would be theatre. The small amount of data the tools keep on your device is strictly necessary for features you chose to use: your theme, your language, your sign-in, your presets.
3. What we do use instead
The tools use two browser storage mechanisms, both of which stay on your device and are never transmitted to us. localStorage persists until you clear it, and holds things you would be annoyed to lose — your saved presets, your language choice. sessionStorage is wiped when you close the tab, and holds only a short-lived cache so the interface can paint correct account state without waiting on a network round trip.
Both are scoped per origin by the browser itself, so a value written by Aleph Photo is unreadable by any other site, and unreadable by us.
4. Every key, in full
This is the complete list, taken from the source rather than from memory.
| Key | Store | Where | What it is for | Lifetime |
|---|---|---|---|---|
aleph-suite-token | localStorage | Hub and all six tools | A signed token describing your entitlement, so the interface can show your plan immediately on load. It is used for display only — access is always re-checked on the server. | Until you sign out or clear storage |
aleph-suite-email | localStorage | Hub and all six tools | Shows which account is signed in, so the header can say so. | Until you sign out or clear storage |
aleph-suite-status | sessionStorage | Hub and all six tools | A cache of the last subscription check, so moving between tools does not refetch what you already saw. Goes stale after five minutes. | Until the tab closes |
aleph-theme | localStorage | This site, hub and tools | Whether you chose the dark, light or 1976 theme. | Until you clear storage |
aleph-locale | localStorage | Hub and tools | Which of the seven interface languages you picked. | Until you clear storage |
aleph-lumen-presets | localStorage | Aleph Lumen | Your own saved develop presets. This is your work — back it up if it matters, because clearing storage deletes it and we have no copy. | Until you clear storage |
aleph-mock | localStorage | Hub | A development flag used while building the account flow. Absent unless it has been set deliberately. | Until you clear storage |
| Per-tool first-run flags | localStorage | Each tool | Records that you have seen a tool's welcome screen, so it does not greet you every time. | Until you clear storage |
5. One honest detail about the status cache
aleph-suite-status is kept after it goes stale rather than deleted. That
is deliberate: a five-minute-old answer can still be shown while a fresh one is being
fetched, whereas deleting it would leave the interface with nothing to paint and put
a placeholder where your plan should be. It is mentioned here because "we keep it a
bit longer than the TTL suggests" is exactly the sort of detail a storage disclosure
usually leaves out.
6. Third-party requests
This site loads nothing from anyone else. No fonts, no scripts, no images, no embeds — every byte comes from our own domain, which is why the typeface you are reading is one already on your system.
The Aleph Creative Studios apps currently load their typefaces from Google Fonts. That sets no cookie, but fetching a font does reveal your IP address and browser to Google, which we count as a third-party disclosure and name on the privacy page for that reason. Self-hosting those fonts is on the list of things to fix.
When paid plans begin, subscribing will send you to Stripe's own hosted checkout page, which does set its own cookies under its own policy. That happens on Stripe's domain, only if you choose to subscribe, and not before.
7. How to clear it
Clearing site data for our domains removes everything listed above. In Chrome or Edge, open developer tools, then Application, then Storage, then "Clear site data". In Firefox it is under Storage in developer tools, or Settings, then Privacy, then Cookies and Site Data. In Safari it is Settings, then Privacy, then Manage Website Data. Using a private or incognito window keeps nothing after you close it.
Two consequences to expect: you will be signed out, and any presets you saved in Aleph Lumen will be gone for good. Nothing else is lost, because nothing else was being kept.
8. Changes
If we ever start setting a cookie, this page will say so before it happens, say what the cookie does, and — where the law requires consent — ask for yours properly rather than assuming it.
9. Contact
Questions about anything on this page: email us.