In recent years, online note-taking and list-making apps have become increasingly popular. These platforms allow users to easily jot down thoughts, save webpages, clip articles, and organize notes. Public, multi-user platforms and private, encrypted apps handle user data very differently, leading to implications for personal privacy.
Public note platforms
Many popular online note services are designed as public platforms, allowing multi-user access and collaboration. Users create notes, lists, bookmarks, and notebooks visible to their connected groups or sometimes fully public. While these social features facilitate sharing, they also come with inherent privacy tradeoffs.
- Content and metadata visibility – On most public platforms, the content users add including typed notes, web clips, uploaded files, and notebook titles is visible to other group members or fully searchable/public. It means private thoughts and information entered into the platform are openly accessible. Additionally, metadata like timestamps, geotags, and usage tracking exposes reading and writing habits.
- Data mining risks – The content and metadata of public notes provide a trove of user insights for platforms to utilize internally or sell to third parties. De-identified aggregates of user data mined for trend analysis and sold to advertisers for targeting. Furthermore, privacy policies allow individual notes and notebooks to be accessed for commercial purposes under vague consent terms.
- Security vulnerabilities – Allowing open access to user content necessitates securing that data from malicious hacking attempts. While reputable platforms utilize security measures like encryption and anomaly detection, vulnerabilities have allowed compromised accounts, data leaks, DDoS attacks, spamming, and phishing across various public services over the years.
Private note apps
Alternatively, private note apps forgo the collaborative features of public platforms in favor of enhanced security, encryption, and access control capabilities to restrict all entry points into personal data.
- Zero-knowledge encryption – Private services employ end-to-end encryption so that no one but the owner decrypts their content. This “zero-knowledge” approach locks notes behind a key derived from the user’s master password or secret phrase, keeping the platform provider blind even with database access. Content remains encrypted locally before syncing across devices.
- No data mining or selling – With zero-knowledge encryption, private platforms cannot access or analyze user notes, and thus cannot mine the content, metadata, or reading patterns. As the provider cannot decrypt or learn from user data, selling to third parties is also eliminated. Advertising in apps focuses on subscriptions rather than data-based targeting.
- Enhanced security controls – Strict access control is enforced so that no one but the owner holds the keys to their private vault. Optional two-factor authentication, biometrics, emergency access via contacts, and permanent data deletion further harden platform security from intrusion or surveillance.
The enhanced privacy and security of zero-knowledge encrypted services do impose some inconveniences. Public note platforms streamline sharing and collaboration among groups at the cost of privacy. privnote remains siloed within an individual user’s encrypted vault. While some private platforms allow note links to be shared temporarily, joint editing and notebook-sharing features are limited. Compared to public platforms, onboarding friends to a private service also requires them to install the app rather than simply receive an invite.