Et al. Get on the App Store
Privacy policy

I don’t collect anything. Your notes stay on your Mac.

Last updated: May 2026.

What I collect

Nothing. Et al. doesn’t collect, send, or store any personal information about you.

  • No accounts, sign-ups, or email addresses.
  • No analytics or telemetry.
  • No crash reporting that includes user data.
  • No advertising identifiers.
  • No third-party SDKs or tracking libraries.

Where your annotations live

Safari stores your highlights and notes on your Mac. They never leave your Mac. I do not have a service that can receive them, and I have no way to read them.

AI on supported Macs

On Apple Silicon Macs running a recent macOS, Et al. offers a few optional AI features. These work with the highlights and notes you’ve saved: a short summary built from a selection of highlights, answers to questions you ask about your highlights, suggested searches based on what’s in your Library, and suggested names when you make a new folder or tag. When you export an academic citation, Et al. can also suggest details like title, author, and date from the page you saved.

All of this runs on your Mac using Apple’s built-in AI. Nothing about your highlights, notes, or browsing is sent to me or to anyone else.

Permissions the extension asks for

Et al. asks Safari for a small number of permissions. Here’s what each one is for:

  • activeTab: to read the text on the page you’re looking at, so it can be highlighted.
  • scripting: to draw your highlights on the page.
  • storage and unlimitedStorage: to remember your annotations between visits on your Mac.
  • downloads: to save a file when you export your annotations or citations.
  • nativeMessaging: so the extension can ask the bundled app on your Mac to run the AI features above. The messages stay between the extension and the app, both on your Mac.

Web pages you visit

Et al. reads the content of pages you choose to annotate, so it can attach highlights and notes. This reading happens on your Mac. Page content is never sent anywhere.

Third parties

Et al. doesn’t share data with anyone else. There’s no data to share.

Children

Et al. isn’t directed at children under 13. I don’t knowingly collect information from anyone, children included.

Changes to this policy

If this policy changes in any meaningful way, I’ll update the date at the top and note the change in the changelog. The spirit of it — nothing leaves your Mac.

Contact

Questions about privacy? Write to etalextension@kirkcrawford.com.