Private transcription that keeps audio on your device

For confidential interviews, internal meetings, personal notes and anything you would rather not upload, Skeleton Fingers can transcribe entirely on your own computer.

How the private lane works

Skeleton Fingers has two lanes, and only one of them is private in the strict sense. The lane called "In your browser" runs the Whisper speech recognition model inside your web browser, on your own device. The first time you use it, your browser downloads the model files once. After that, your recording is read and transcribed locally. The audio is never sent to our servers.

This lane is free, unlimited and needs no account. It is slower than the fast lane because your computer does the work, and it does not label speakers.

Precisely what leaves your device

"Private" claims are only useful if they are specific, so here is the full picture for the browser lane:

• Your audio: never leaves your device.
• Your transcript: stays in your browser. If you are signed in and choose to save it to your account, the text (not the audio) is sent to our servers and stored until you delete it.
• Usage details: we record anonymous details such as that a transcription ran, how long the file was, how long it took and whether it worked. These never include the audio.
• Analytics: the site uses Google Analytics to measure visits.

The fast lane is not the private lane

The fast lane is built for speed: our servers process an hour of audio in seconds, with speaker labels and automatic language detection. To do that, your recording is uploaded to our servers and transcribed by our speech-to-text provider, Deepgram. We store the converted audio we transcribed and the transcript with your account, and we may also store the original file you uploaded, until you delete that transcript or your account. Nothing is deleted automatically.

That is a reasonable trade for many recordings, and you stay in control: deleting a transcript also deletes its stored audio and original file. But if a recording should never be uploaded, use the browser lane.

Good practice for sensitive recordings

• Choose "In your browser" before you drop in the file. The lane you pick decides whether anything is uploaded.
• You do not need an account. The browser lane works signed out, which keeps the transcript off our servers entirely.
• Mind your own device. The transcript lives in your browser tab and wherever you paste it, so the usual care with shared computers applies.
• Get consent. Recording and transcribing people usually requires their permission. Private processing does not change that.

A note on compliance

Skeleton Fingers does not make HIPAA or other regulatory compliance claims. If you handle material covered by a legal or contractual obligation, check with whoever sets that policy, and share this page so they can see exactly how each lane handles audio.

For every detail of what we collect, why, and how deletion works, read the privacy page.