No accounts

shinmuscat has no sign-up, no accounts and no newsletter. We never ask for your name, your email address or anything else before you use the tools.

The file tools run on your device

The media transcriber, screen recorder, PDF tools and image editor open and process your files inside your browser. Your files are never uploaded. None of these tools sends a file, a recording or anything in them to us or to anyone else. When you save a result, it goes straight from your browser to your device.

The screen recorder uses your screen, camera and microphone only on this site, and only after you allow it in your browser.

What your browser downloads, and from where

Some features need extra files, which your browser fetches from the services below. As with any website you visit, they see your IP address and browser details. None of them gets your files.

Hugging Face (huggingface.co and its download servers): the AI models. That means the Whisper speech model behind the media transcriber and the screen recorder's Transcribe button, and the Select Subject model in the image editor. Each one downloads the first time you use that feature.
jsDelivr (cdn.jsdelivr.net): the code that runs those models, plus the code the media transcriber uses to read the sound from your file. These download only when you use those features.
Google Fonts (fonts.googleapis.com and fonts.gstatic.com): Word to PDF only, and only when your document uses a common font your device doesn't have, such as Calibri or Arial. Your browser then downloads a free lookalike font. Only the font name is requested. No text from your document is sent.
TikTok (tiktok.com): the video player on the TikTok transcript pages. More on that below.
YouTube (youtube-nocookie.com and other Google servers): the walkthrough video on the homepage, the tool pages and some guides. Nothing loads from YouTube until you press play. After that, YouTube sees your IP address and browser details and may store cookies or similar data in your browser, under Google's privacy policy.
Google Analytics: every page. More on that below.

Your browser keeps the AI model files so it doesn't have to fetch them again. Clearing your browser's site data for shinmuscat.com removes them.

What happens to the link you paste

You paste a public TikTok link on one of our TikTok transcript pages, and your browser sends it to our server. Our code reads only the link, plus your IP address for the rate limit below. Before using the link, the server strips everything after the "?", such as tracking codes.

The server then asks TikTok for the video's public page. If that plain request fails, it tries again with a headless browser, which is a browser with no screen that runs on our server. Either way, it then downloads the video's own caption file from TikTok. TikTok sees the request coming from our server, with our server's browser details, so your own details never reach TikTok this way.

The link and the transcript sit in memory only while your request runs. shinmuscat has no database, so neither is saved on our side. The transcript goes back to your browser and the server keeps no copy.

The TikTok video player

When a transcript is on screen, the page shows the video in TikTok's own player. The player loads from tiktok.com, so TikTok gets your IP address and browser details and may use its own cookies. This also happens when you come back to a TikTok transcript page and your latest saved transcript reopens. TikTok's own privacy policy covers what TikTok does with that data.

Your transcript history

Your 12 most recent transcripts are saved in your browser's local storage, on your own device. Each one keeps the video link, title, creator name, length, language and caption lines, so you can reopen it later. They never leave your device and we never see them. You can delete any of them in Recent picks, or clear your browser's site data for shinmuscat.com to delete them all.

Hosting and server logs

shinmuscat is hosted on Vercel. Like any web host, Vercel processes standard request data in its server logs, including your IP address and user agent (your browser and device type). Our own code doesn't log your IP address or the TikTok link. Vercel's own privacy policy explains how it handles this data.

Rate limiting

To keep the TikTok tool fair for everyone, our server counts how many links each IP address sends, up to 8 a minute. The count lives only in the server's memory and covers one minute. After that, it is deleted the next time the server handles a request, and every count disappears when the server shuts down. Counts are never saved to storage or written to our logs.

Analytics

We use Google Analytics 4 (measurement ID G-Z06Q388E09) on every page to see how many people visit and which pages and tools they use. It loads as soon as you open a page, and there is no cookie banner. It sets two cookies, _ga and _ga_Z06Q388E09, so Google can tell new visits from return visits. Google sets them to last up to two years, though many browsers delete them sooner.

Google Analytics sends Google the address of the page you're on, the page that sent you here, and your browser and device details. Google also receives your IP address, and says Google Analytics 4 doesn't log or store it. We never put your files, links or transcripts into page addresses, so page views don't include them. If you click a link to another site, such as a TikTok video or the tip jar, Google Analytics may record that link's address.

Google's own policy is at policies.google.com/privacy. Most tracking blockers stop Google Analytics from loading, and some browsers block or limit it in their privacy settings. Google also offers an opt-out browser add-on. A private window doesn't stop it, but its cookies are deleted when you close the window.

Tips

The tip jar is a plain link to PayPal, and no PayPal code runs on shinmuscat. If you click it, you go to PayPal's site and PayPal handles the payment directly. shinmuscat never sees your card or bank details. As with any PayPal payment, PayPal shares some payment details with us, such as your name and email address.

No selling your data

We don't sell or rent your data, and there are no ads on shinmuscat. The only outside services involved are the ones named on this page.

Contact

shinmuscat is a free tool run by one person. If you want anything removed or have a question about this policy, reach out through my GitHub profile.

Changes to this policy

If this policy changes, the date at the top will be updated.

Privacy policy