A capture starts only when you start it: by pressing Capture the screen on the app's own page, or by opening one of its links, fourscreenshots://region or fourscreenshots://screen, usually from a keyboard shortcut or a gesture. It never captures by itself, on a schedule or in the background.
With 4Zones installed, 4Screenshots asks 4Zones, another app by the same developer on the same device, for one picture of the screen. 4Zones hands it over directly, on the device. While 4Zones is not installed, 4Screenshots says so just before Android's screen-sharing question and offers a link to 4Zones' Google Play page; tapping it opens Google Play or your browser, which makes an ordinary visit. 4Screenshots fetches nothing.
Otherwise, Android shows its own screen-sharing dialog and you choose what to share, or say no. 4Screenshots takes one picture, then gives the permission back straight away. It never keeps the permission between captures, and it never records video or sound. While it is taking the picture, it shows a notification.
The picture is held in memory and shown to you. Nothing is written until you choose:
The whole-screen link (fourscreenshots://screen) saves and copies at once, because that is what it is for.
Every picture is stripped of hidden information (text fields, dates, thumbnails) before it leaves 4Screenshots. The copy used for the clipboard and for sharing is one file in the app's cache, and each new picture replaces the last.
When you press Text, 4Screenshots reads the words in your selection with Google's ML Kit text recognition, which is built into 4Screenshots and runs on your device. The words appear for you to correct and copy. You can arrange them as a table, save it as a .csv file in Documents/4Screenshots, or share it. ML Kit is designed to send diagnostic information (about the device, the app and how the feature performed) to Google; in 4Screenshots it cannot, because 4Screenshots has no internet permission.
Share opens Android's share sheet. Quick-share buttons send the picture straight to an app you added, such as an AI assistant or your email. A shortcut, such as one WhatsApp chat, opens that chat with the picture on your clipboard for you to paste. In every case the other app receives only that picture, only because you pressed the button, and its own privacy policy applies to what it does with it. 4Screenshots sends nothing to us.
None of it is sent anywhere by 4Screenshots.
You can check the list yourself on the app's store page, or with aapt2 dump permissions on the APK. It declares four: two that let it run the short foreground service Android requires for a screen capture (FOREGROUND_SERVICE and FOREGROUND_SERVICE_MEDIA_PROJECTION), one to show that service's notification (POST_NOTIFICATIONS), and one generated by Android's own AndroidX libraries that only keeps the app's internal messages private. No internet, network, storage, camera, microphone, location or contacts permission.
Android's cloud backup is switched off for 4Screenshots, and so is Android's phone-to-phone transfer: when you move to a new device, your settings, quick-share list and log are not copied across. Nothing is copied to us by either.
4Screenshots is not directed at children and collects no personal information from anyone.
Delete saved pictures and tables in your gallery or file manager. Remove quick-share entries on the main page. Settings, Apps, 4Screenshots, Storage, Clear storage deletes everything else, and so does uninstalling. We hold nothing, so there is nothing to ask us to delete.
If this policy changes, the new version will be published on this page with a new effective date.
John Paul Bizeray, trading as Mr-Bizzy, United Kingdom
Support Email: [email protected]