Privacy

ScoZu and the ScoZu iPhone app. Updated October 27, 2026.

The short version

Your books and your reading stay on your devices. ScoZu has no ads, no analytics and no tracking. If you choose to use ScoZu Cloud, it keeps your backups and the reading data your devices sync, so your X4 Pro and your iPhone stay in step, and nothing else.

On your X4 Pro and in the iPhone app

Books, highlights, notes, reading history, Flip It cards, game progress and settings are stored on the device (the X4 Pro's SD card, or the app's own storage on your iPhone). They are not sent anywhere unless you use ScoZu Cloud.

ScoZu goes online only for what you ask it to do: checking the sites you follow in Feeds, fetching articles you send it, the daily horoscope in ScoZmic if you turn it on, setting its clock, and ScoZu Cloud. Those sites see an ordinary request from your device, as they would from a browser.

The iPhone app and your own X4 Pro talk to each other directly over your Wi-Fi, to send articles, books, pictures and Cards both ways. Nothing passes through us. The two are paired with a code, and the app keeps the pairing key in your iPhone's Keychain.

The install page

The install page at scozu.thatmess.com/install keeps a daily tally of how often it's opened, the update file is downloaded, an install starts, finishes or stops, and the dictionary is copied. That's all it keeps: a number for each, per day, with no addresses, cookies or anything else about you or your device.

The iPhone app asks for your camera only when you choose to take a photo for a Card, and for your local network only to find your X4 Pro.

ScoZu Cloud (optional)

ScoZu Cloud, at cloud.thatmess.com, backs up your ScoZu and keeps your devices in sync. If you create an account, we store:

• a random account number and your passkey's public key (there is no password; the private key never leaves your device),
• if you sign in with Apple or Google, their ID for your account and the email address they give us (with Apple, this can be a private relay address),
• the name and model of each device you connect, and when it was last seen,
• what your devices sync: where you are in each book, your highlights and notes, bookmarks, the settings that travel between devices (such as text size), your reading speed and reading stats, game progress, and the sites you follow in Feeds with which articles you've read, kept or deleted. Books are known by a fingerprint of the file, with their title and author,
• your backups: settings, highlights and notes, bookmarks, reading history and stats, Library lists, followed sites and Cards, Flip It cards and game progress. The ten newest backups of each kind are kept for each device.

Wi-Fi passwords, your passcode, books, articles and other files are never sent to ScoZu Cloud. We use this data only to run ScoZu Cloud: to sign you in, to keep your devices in sync and to give your backups back to them. We don't sell it, share it or use it for advertising. ScoZu Cloud runs on Cloudflare, which stores it for us.

You can disconnect a device at any time from the device or the website. To delete your account and everything stored with it, sign in at cloud.thatmess.com, choose Delete Account… and type DELETE; it's removed at once. You can also email us from the address below and we'll remove it.

Children

ScoZu isn't directed at children under 13, and ScoZu Cloud doesn't knowingly hold accounts for them.

Questions

Write to less.of@thatmess.com. If this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it.