Peak is a privacy-first product. This page explains exactly what that means, where the data lives, what (very little) leaves your Mac, and why.
From the iPhone-backup folder you select (Peak is sandboxed and can read nothing else):
~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/) — Peak reads sms.db and the attachment files referenced by the threads you scan.AddressBook.sqlitedb inside that backup*** — Peak reads phone numbers and email addresses to resolve them to contact names (so threads with phone +15551234567 can be labeled "Mom"). This comes from the backup itself; Peak never touches the Mac's own Contacts app, and reads no other contact field.Because Peak is a sandboxed Mac App Store app, it cannot open anything outside the folder you selected. You can verify this in the source.
Everything Peak writes goes either to the location you choose when exporting, or inside Peak's sandboxed app container (~/Library/Containers/app.peak.desktop/):
Nothing. Peak makes no outbound network connections at all. Updates are delivered by the Mac App Store, so Peak itself never needs to phone home — not even to check for a new version.
You can verify this with Little Snitch, Lulu, or nettop -P -l 0 -p $(pgrep -x Peak) in Terminal.
No. Peak is built for a parent reviewing their own minor child's device, and we encourage being open with your kid about it. A few technical facts that follow from how Peak works:
Whether and how you discuss Peak with your child is a parenting decision — but Peak is not a tool for covert surveillance.
The PDFs are written to disk as ordinary files. If someone has access to your Mac, they can open them.
Recommendations:
~/Public/ or a shared location.For higher-stakes storage (e.g., evidence for a legal proceeding), copy the reports to an encrypted disk image (Disk Utility → File → New → Disk Image) or an encrypted external drive.
If your Mac has FileVault on (the default on Apple Silicon Macs), the entire disk is encrypted at rest. Peak's outputs are inside that. When the Mac is shut down or locked, the data is unreadable without your password.
Peak does NOT add a second layer of encryption to its own outputs. The reports are plain PDFs. We chose this because (a) FileVault is already strong, (b) a second layer often confuses non-technical users (lost passwords = lost reports), and (c) you may want to share or print reports — encrypted formats make that harder.
If you want defense in depth, use the encrypted disk image approach above.
The default scanner is deterministic word matching — no ML.
If you're on macOS 26 (Tahoe) or later, Peak can optionally use Apple Foundation Models to rate flagged messages in context. This is an on-device model that runs entirely inside your Mac's secure enclave / Neural Engine. The message text is processed locally; nothing is sent to Apple's servers or any cloud service.
You can disable AI rating in Settings → General → "Use AI rating when available."
Future versions may add image classification (also on-device) to flag concerning photos. That feature, when added, will be opt-in and clearly disclosed.
iOS has a built-in feature called Communication Safety (Settings → Screen Time → Communication Safety on the kid's device) that uses on-device ML to detect nudity in incoming/outgoing photos and warn the kid. Peak does not replace or interact with Communication Safety. That feature lives entirely on the iPhone and is Apple-managed. We recommend enabling it independently if you have a younger kid.
Peak runs on your Mac and processes your kid's iPhone backup. The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act regulates online services that collect personal information from children under 13. Peak does not have an online service or collect anything online — therefore COPPA does not apply to Peak itself.
However: if you scan messages from a child under 13, you should think about whether your kid's contacts (some of whom may also be under 13) have a reasonable expectation that their messages might be read by your kid's parent. Most courts and ethics frameworks consider this fine for parental supervision of a minor child. Adult-to-adult message reading would have different legal implications (federal wiretap laws, state two-party consent rules).
Not in v1.
If we add cloud sync later (between Peak Desktop and a hypothetical Peak Mobile companion app), it will:
If we ever change this promise, you'll see it in big text in the release notes, and you'll get to choose whether to update.
Things Peak does NOT do, will NOT do, and you should NOT expect:
This list isn't a roadmap — it's a non-goal list. Don't ask Peak to do these things; Peak isn't that kind of product.
Peak is a pure-Swift native app — there's no Python interpreter, no embedded script, no sidecar process. Everything is a regular Mac binary.
In the App Store build, networking and the auto-updater are compiled out: there's no URLSession, socket, or HTTP client in the shipping app at all. On top of that, the Mac App Store sandbox blocks any network connection the app doesn't explicitly request — and Peak requests none.
Next: Changelog.