Last updated 23 August 2026
Dopamine Ratt collects nothing, sends nothing, and cannot reach the internet. This page explains what that means in detail, and how you can check it for yourself rather than take our word for it.
None. The app has no accounts, no sign-in, no analytics, no crash reporting, no advertising and no third-party SDKs of any kind.
The app does not request the android.permission.INTERNET
permission. On Android, an app without that permission is placed outside the
networking group by the operating system, so it cannot open a network connection
at all. This is enforced by the system, not by our code: even a bug or a
misbehaving library could not transmit anything.
| What | Where | Leaves the device? |
|---|---|---|
| Your list of watched apps | Private app storage on your phone (SharedPreferences) |
No |
| An optional image you supply as the sign artwork | The app's own folder, only if you place a file there yourself | No |
Automatic backup is switched off (allowBackup="false"), and the
app's data-extraction rules exclude its files from Google cloud backup and from
device-to-device transfer. Your watchlist does not travel to a new phone or into
any backup. Uninstalling the app deletes all of it.
Dopamine Ratt works by noticing when a watched app comes to the foreground, so it can show the interruption screen first. Android exposes that through an accessibility service, which is why the app asks you to enable one.
The service is declared with
canRetrieveWindowContent="false". It therefore cannot read
the contents of your screen: not text, not messages, not passwords, not
what you type, not what you browse. It receives window-change events and reads a
single field from them, the package name of the app that just came to the front,
for example com.instagram.android. If that package is on the list you
chose, the app shows its own screen. That is the entire mechanism.
Nothing about which apps you open, or when, is recorded, stored or timed. The package name is compared against your list and discarded.
| Permission | Why |
|---|---|
VIBRATE | A short haptic knock when the interruption screen appears |
| Accessibility service | To notice which app came to the foreground, as described above |
The app requests no other permissions. It has no access to your contacts, location, camera, microphone, files, call logs, messages or accounts.
The app is not directed at children and collects no personal information from anyone, regardless of age.
The complete source is published at
github.com/mayilian/dopamine-ratt.
You can build it yourself and compare the result with the published release. You
can also inspect any release directly: the permission list in the APK shows that
INTERNET is absent, and searching the compiled code turns up no
networking classes and no server addresses.
If a future version of the app ever changes what it can access, this page will be updated before that version is published, and the date at the top will change.
Questions about this policy, or about the app's handling of data, can be raised at the project's issue tracker, or by email to langtoolsapp@gmail.com.