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HTKapp
HtkCloudSync

HtkCloudSync

Last updated: October 13, 2026

Two-way sync between your Ubuntu computer and your cloud storage.

This is an English translation provided for convenience only. The French version is the only legally binding text.

1. Data collected

HtkCloudSync collects nothing. The application contains no analytics, advertising, behavioural tracking or crash-reporting SDK, and HTKapp runs no server in between: nothing you sync ever reaches us, not even a usage statistic.

What stays on your computer

  • The authorisation to your account: kept in your session keyring (GNOME Keyring, KWallet — any compatible service), encrypted by your session. It is written neither to the settings nor to the logs.
  • A local index: the names, sizes, dates and identifiers of the files being tracked, so the application knows what changed on each side. It holds no file contents.
  • Your settings: sync folder, selected folders, bandwidth limits, notifications.
  • An activity log: the paths and sizes of the files handled, and the errors met. Never a file's contents, never your authorisation — a filter masks any value that looks like a token. The log files are readable by you alone.
  • Your synced files, in the folder you chose.

What travels to your cloud provider

Your files, and what describes them — name, size, date, folder tree — through Google Drive's official API, over HTTPS, with certificate verification. That is the very point of the program: syncing means sending and receiving. The only servers contacted are Google's, plus a local address on your own machine while you authorise — and htkapp.com, once a day, to find out whether a newer version has been published (see below).

2. The Google authorisation

Signing in happens in your browser, on Google's own pages. HtkCloudSync never sees your password: Google hands the authorisation back to a local address on your computer (127.0.0.1, on a random port), and that is what goes into your keyring.

The authorisation covers your whole Drive — the https://www.googleapis.com/auth/drive scope —, not a folder reserved for the application: you pick which folders to sync, and the program must be able to read, write, move and trash them wherever they live. Google's consent screen states this before you accept.

You can withdraw it at any time, on either side:

  • in HtkCloudSync, “Disconnect” erases the authorisation from the keyring and the local index;
  • at Google, the page listing the apps with access to your account revokes it for good.

HtkCloudSync's use and transfer to any other app of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

3. Checking for updates

Once you have connected an account, HtkCloudSync asks htkapp.com once a day whether a newer version of the package has been published, and tells you with a notification. Before that first account, nothing is sent: an application installed and never set up contacts no one, neither Google nor us.

The request carries nothing about you: no cookie, no identifier, not even the version you have installed — the comparison happens on your computer. Our server therefore learns your IP address and the time of the request, as any web server does for any page you open, and nothing else. The application accepts no address other than htkapp.com, redirects included.

The first request goes out a minute after the service starts, then every twenty-four hours; after a network failure it is retried an hour later. The date of the last check and the last version seen stay on your computer.

You can stop it, and it stops at once:

  • in the application, Settings ▸ General ▸ “Check for updates”;
  • on the command line, htkcloudsync-cli config check_updates false.

Downloading stays your own move: the application never downloads or installs anything by itself.

4. Data sharing

We collect, sell and share no data arising from your use of HtkCloudSync. Your cloud provider — Google today — is the sole recipient of your files, because you chose it: what it does with them falls under its own agreement with you and its privacy policy.

5. Security

  • Network traffic is HTTPS only, with certificates verified.
  • The authorisation lives in your session keyring. With no keyring reachable, accounts move to “reconnection required” rather than writing anything in the clear.
  • The service runs inside your session, for your user account alone; logs and secrets are created readable by you only.
  • Deletions go to the trash on both sides and conflicts keep both versions: nothing is erased for good without an explicit move on your part.

6. Third-party services

No analytics, advertising or crash-collection service is embedded. The application's only network dependencies are the cloud service you connect to it and, if you leave it on, the daily update check described above.

7. Exporting the activity log

Exporting the log writes a CSV or JSON file on your computer, where you choose. It holds the paths of the files handled, the address of the account concerned, and the date and nature of each event — never an authorisation, never a file's contents. Nothing is sent anywhere: if you pass it on to us with a support request, that is your own move, and you can read it first.

8. Your rights (GDPR)

The application sends us no data: on that side, there is nothing to access, correct or delete.

When you write to us through the support form or by email, however, we keep your message and your contact details for as long as it takes to handle your request. That processing is described in our legal notice: purpose, legal basis, retention period. You have a right of access, rectification, erasure, restriction and objection over this data, as well as the right to lodge a complaint with the CNIL. To exercise them, write to contact@htkapp.com.

9. Contact