Color Files, version 1. Last updated: 2026-10-07.
This policy describes what this version of the app does. It is written from the app itself: every statement below can be checked against the app’s code and its list of permissions.
| What | Why | How |
|---|---|---|
| All files and folders in your phone’s shared storage, SD cards and USB drives | The app is a file manager: it shows, opens, copies, moves, renames, compresses and deletes files, finds duplicates and large files, and searches by name and inside documents | Android’s “All files access”, which you grant in Settings. Without it the app cannot work |
| Photos, videos and audio with their dates and sizes | Home, Groups, Clean and Insights | Android’s media list |
| The place a photo was taken, when the photo holds one | To group photos by place (Groups › Places) | Only after you allow “photo locations”. Places are named from a table inside the app |
| Text inside documents (PDF, Word, text files) | To find a word inside a document when you search | Read when you search |
| The list of installed apps | App Manager, the number of apps on Home, and to tell whether an APK file is already installed | Android’s list of apps |
| How much space each app takes (app, data, cache), and when each app was last used and for how long | Insights › Apps: which apps take the most space and which have not been opened for months | Only after you turn on “Usage access” for the app in Android’s settings. Read when Insights opens; not stored |
| Which app saved each photo and video | Insights › Apps: photos and videos saved by each app | Android’s media list |
| Links you share to the app from another app | The Links list | Only what you share; the app does not open or fetch the link |
| What | What is kept |
|---|---|
| Whether a photo shows a QR code or barcode | Yes or no, per photo |
| How many faces are in a photo, to find group photos and selfies | The number, and “group photo” or “selfie”. No face is cut out, measured or recognised, and nobody is identified |
| Where a photo was taken, as a name (town, area) | The photo’s coordinates and date |
| Files that are the same or look the same | A short fingerprint per file |
| Which festival a photo’s date falls on | Nothing new: it is worked out from the date |
This version does not group photos by person. It creates no face data.
In the app’s private storage, which other apps cannot read:
In your shared storage:
Safe folder: a folder named .ColorFilesVault on the phone’s storage, hidden from galleries. It holds the files you moved there, encrypted (AES-256), their small encrypted pictures, an encrypted list of them, and their key encrypted with your recovery code. It stays when you uninstall the app, so a new install or a new phone can open it with the recovery code. Your PIN only works on this phone: what it unlocks is kept in the app’s private storage, sealed with a key kept by Android on this phone (Android Keystore), and is not part of Android backup. Your fingerprint is checked by Android; the app never sees it. The app sends nothing about the Safe folder; the recovery code goes only where you save, share or copy it yourself. The recovery code is asked only when you forgot your PIN or on a new install; after it is used, the app makes a new one, and the old one stops working once you have kept the new one.
The Trash: a folder named .FileExplorer-Trash on each storage. Files you delete are moved there and removed for good after 30 days (you can change the number of days, or empty the Trash yourself).
Your files never do, unless you send them yourself. Only these leave the app:
| What | When | What is received, and by whom | Policy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ads (Google AdMob) | Free version only, after you answer Google’s consent form where the law asks for one. A full-screen ad may show when you leave a feature such as Same photos | The device’s advertising ID (you can reset or delete it in Android’s settings), the app set ID, the IP address, the phone’s make, model and language, the app’s version, how you interact with the ad, and, where Android offers them, Android’s Privacy Sandbox ad topics and measurement. Not your files, their names, photos, places or what the app learnt about them | https://policies.google.com/technologies/ads |
| The No-ads plan (Google Play Billing) | When the app asks Google Play whether the plan is on, and when you buy it | That this app asks for the plan “no_ads” on your Google account. Payment is handled by Google Play | https://policies.google.com/privacy |
| The Safe folder’s recovery code (Android’s Credential Manager) | Only when you tap Save to password manager, or From password manager to fill the code back in | The recovery code goes to the password manager you pick (Google Password Manager or another one you use), which keeps it under its own policy and may sync it to your account there. The developer never sees it | The policy of the password manager you pick |
| Rating the app (Google Play In-App Review) | At most every 60 days, after you freed space with the app, Google Play may show its rating card | Your rating and review go to Google Play under your Google account, as when you rate on the Play Store. The developer sees them in Google Play, as any review | https://policies.google.com/privacy |
In the EU, the UK and Switzerland the app shows Google’s consent form before any ad, and Settings › Remove ads › Ad privacy choices changes your answer later.
Everything else stays on the phone, unless you send it yourself.
You can choose to send something through Android’s share screen or a file picker. Then it goes to the app you pick, under that app’s own policy:
| What you can send | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Files you select and share | The files |
| A crash report, offered once after the app closed unexpectedly | The app’s version, the Android version, the phone’s make and model, the name of the screen, the time, and the technical trace of the error. File names, paths, photos, places and names are taken out before the report is written |
| The diagnostic log (Settings › Backup) | Technical errors since the app was opened. Passwords and file paths are taken out. It is kept in memory only |
| The Safe folder’s recovery code (Share) | The code, as text |
| A copy of your bookmarks and settings (Settings › Backup) | Your bookmarks, which hold folder paths, and your settings, written to the file you choose |
The developer collects nothing: the app sends no data to the developer. Google receives what is listed under “What leaves your phone”, for the ads in the free version and for the No-ads plan. The app holds no analytics code.
The libraries inside the app are listed in the app under Settings › About › Open-source licences. Except Google’s ad, billing and review code and Android’s Credential Manager named above, they run on your phone as part of the app and receive nothing.
The app can work with add-on apps that you install yourself. None comes with the app. An add-on is used only after you approve it in Settings, and what it then does falls under its maker’s policy.
| What you do | What happens |
|---|---|
| Delete a photo or file | What the app kept about it is removed the next time the app looks through your files: when you open the app and about once a day |
| Settings › Photo groups › Look at all photos again | Everything the photo analyser found is deleted and worked out again |
| Empty the Trash | The files in it are removed for good |
| Clear the app’s storage in Android’s settings | Everything the app stored in its private storage is removed. The Trash folder in shared storage stays until you empty it |
| Uninstall the app | Android removes the app’s private storage: its databases, settings, caches and crash report. Your own files stay, and so does the Trash folder .FileExplorer-Trash with what is in it: empty the Trash before you uninstall, or delete that folder afterwards |
| Safe folder › Delete for ever | The encrypted files are deleted at once; they do not go to the Trash |
| Safe folder › Start over (recovery code lost) | Nothing is deleted: the old encrypted files are set aside inside the .ColorFilesVault folder and open again only with their old recovery code |
| Uninstall the app with files in the Safe folder | The .ColorFilesVault folder stays, encrypted, and opens again with the recovery code. Move your files out first if you want them back as normal files, or delete the folder; without the recovery code nobody, the developer included, can open it |
If backup is turned on in your phone’s settings, Android may keep a copy of the app’s settings in your own Google account and put it back when you install the app again. That copy is made by Android, not by the app, and the developer cannot see it.
The app keeps these out of that copy: its databases (bookmarks, history, groups, marks), everything the photo analyser found, and the crash report. The settings that may be copied include folders you chose in Settings, such as “Never touch these folders”.
| What | How long |
|---|---|
| Files in the Trash | 30 days, or the number of days you set |
| Recent files, search history, records of cleaning | Until you clear them or uninstall the app |
| What the photo analyser found | Until the photo is deleted, you start over, or you uninstall the app |
| The crash report | Until you share or dismiss it |
This version does not. If a later version adds it, this policy will be changed before that version is published. As built and tested, it would work like this: it is off until you turn it on; faces are compared on the phone and nothing is sent; turning it off, or choosing “Delete face data”, deletes every face, person and name at once; and face data is kept out of Android backup.
The app is a tool for managing files and is not directed at children. The developer collects no data from anyone; the ads in the free version come from Google as described above.
When the app changes what it reads, keeps or sends, this policy changes with it, and the date at the top changes.
Recodex Labs ranjeetproductstudio@gmail.com