Privacy Policy

Last updated: September 4, 2026

bHive Software makes bHive. This policy covers it and the website. The short version: the app runs on your Mac, there is no account, and we collect nothing about you or your content.

There is no server of ours that receives your data. Not your files, not your clipboard, not your searches. That is not a promise about how carefully we handle what we collect. It is that there is nothing to handle.

The basics

No account. You never sign in or give us personal information to use bHive.
No analytics or telemetry. bHive does not track how you use it, and sends no usage data to us or to anyone else.
No ads, and nothing sold. We do not sell, rent, or share personal information, because we do not have any.

bHive Your files

Everything happens on your Mac. bHive indexes and searches your files locally. Your files, their contents, and the search index never leave your device.
Your files stay in place. bHive reads your originals where they already live. It does not upload or copy them to any server.

What the local index contains, and how to think about backing it up, is covered in detail on Your Data.

Software updates

bHive can check for updates automatically using Sparkle, a widely used open-source update framework. To do that, the app fetches a small public file listing available versions from Amazon S3.
If you accept an update, the download itself comes through bhive.software, which counts it and then redirects to the file on S3. So a firewall will show a connection to our website at that moment, and only at that moment. We count how many updates happen, per version. Nothing identifies you or your Mac.
As with any request to a website, that contact includes your device's IP address, which our hosting providers handle as a normal part of running a network. We do not use it to identify you, build a profile, or track you between sessions.
You can turn automatic update checks off in bHive's settings and check by hand instead.

This website

No cookies, no third-party trackers. We do not run Google Analytics or any advertising or tracking scripts.
Anonymous download counts. When you download an app from this site, we add one to a counter, along with which app it was and the host that referred you, if your browser sent one. Never the full referring URL, which can carry personal information in its path or query. We do not store your IP address, your name, or anything that identifies you.
Server logs. Our web host may keep standard server logs, a normal part of running any website, for security and reliability. We do not sell or share them.

What we never do

We never sell, rent, or share your personal information.
We do not show ads.
We do not require an account or collect personal data to use bHive.

Who we are

bHive is made by Brandon Edling, an independent developer in New Jersey, under the name bHive Software. There is no company behind it beyond that, and no investors, which is part of why it can promise what it promises: nothing about you or your content is collected, so there is nothing to sell. You can find him on LinkedIn.

Open-source software inside the app

bHive includes a small media helper built from FFmpeg (version 8.0, licensed under the LGPL v2.1), used only to read video and audio containers macOS cannot open itself, such as MKV, WebM and AVI. It runs entirely on your Mac and never connects to anything. The unmodified source is at ffmpeg.org/releases/ffmpeg-8.0.tar.xz, and the exact build configuration is published in bHive’s repository (Frameworks/ffmpeg/configure-bhive.sh); the licence text ships in the app at Contents/Resources/ffmpeg-COPYING.LGPLv2.1.

bHive receives updates through Sparkle (MIT), and the wordmark is set in Comfortaa (SIL Open Font License).

Contact

Questions about privacy? Email hello@bhive.software.

Changes

If we update this policy, we will change the date at the top of this page.