Privacy Policy

Last updated: 2026-06-02

WhatCable is a small macOS menu bar app that tells you what each USB-C cable plugged into your Mac can actually do. This page explains what data the app handles.

What WhatCable reads

WhatCable reads USB-C port state, USB-PD Discover Identity messages, power source data, and Thunderbolt switch information from your Mac through Apple's IOKit framework. All of this stays on your Mac. It is used only to render the popover you see in the menu bar.

What WhatCable sends

WhatCable checks the public GitHub Releases API once every six hours to see if a newer version is available. That request includes a User-Agent header naming the app and your installed version (for example, WhatCable/0.8.4). It does not include any personal information, and no analytics, telemetry, or identifiers are sent.

If you click "Report this cable", WhatCable opens GitHub in your default browser with the cable's public e-marker fields pre-filled in a new issue. You review the contents and decide whether to submit it. Nothing is sent automatically.

Contributing diagnostic data (opt-in)

WhatCable has an optional "Contribute Diagnostic Data" feature, in Settings and the right-click menu. It is off by default and never runs on its own. When you choose to run it, a consent screen explains what will be sent before anything leaves your Mac.

If you proceed, WhatCable runs a set of read-only IOKit probes and sends the results to a WhatCable server to help improve cable, port, and display detection. The submission contains:

• Raw IOKit registry properties for your USB-C and Thunderbolt ports, power delivery state, and Thunderbolt topology.
• The model and capabilities of any connected display, read from its EDID. The monitor's serial number is removed before the data is sent.
• Your macOS version and Mac chip type.
• A one-way SHA-256 hash of your Mac's hardware UUID, used only to group submissions from the same machine. The original UUID is never sent and cannot be recovered from the hash.

No names, accounts, raw serial numbers, or personal data are included. It is the same kind of data visible in System Information. Decline at the consent screen and nothing is sent.

WhatCable Pro (purchase and licensing)

WhatCable Pro is an optional paid upgrade. Buying it and keeping it activated involves some personal data that the free app never touches.

• Purchase. Payment is handled by Stripe. Your card details and email address are processed by Stripe under Stripe's privacy policy. WhatCable never sees or stores your card details.
• Licence delivery. Your licence key is emailed to the address you bought it with.
• Activation and validation. When you activate a key, and once each time the app launches afterwards, WhatCable sends your licence key and your Mac's hardware UUID to WhatCable's licensing server to confirm the licence and enforce the two-Mac limit. If the server can't be reached, Pro keeps working offline for up to 30 days.
• What the licence server stores. Your licence key, the email you bought it with, and the hardware UUID of each Mac the key has been activated on (up to two), so one key can't be used on more machines than allowed.
• Support. If you use the support form on the website, it collects the email address and the licence key or Stripe transaction ID you enter, so we can find your purchase and reply.

Deactivating a licence (in the app, or with whatcable --deactivate) removes the stored key from that Mac. The free app makes none of these calls.

What WhatCable stores

WhatCable stores your in-app preferences (display mode, hidden ports, notification toggles, font size) in the standard macOS user defaults system, on your Mac. With WhatCable Pro, your licence key is also stored on your Mac so it doesn't have to be re-entered.

What WhatCable does not do

Outside the opt-in diagnostic feature and the Pro purchase and licensing described above, WhatCable does not collect, store, or transmit:

• Personal information (name, email, address, phone number).
• Account or device identifiers.
• Browsing or app usage analytics.
• Information about other apps or files on your Mac.
• Anything about devices connected to ports WhatCable does not need to read.

Contact

Bug reports and questions go through the public GitHub repository at github.com/darrylmorley/whatcable.