TECHBENCH
Privacy Policy
TechBench web app. Effective October 18, 2026. Updated October 18, 2026.
The short version
TechBench stores what your shop enters so you can work diagnostic cases together. We don't sell your information or show ads. A few service providers, listed below, receive some of it so the app can run.
What we collect
- Your account: your display name, your role, your shop, and your PIN, which is stored only as a scrambled one-way hash we can't read. We don't ask for an email address or phone number.
- Your shop's work: vehicles (VIN, year, make, model and specs, and the customer name and license plate if you enter them), mileage, complaints, symptoms, trouble codes, test steps and readings, findings, repairs, verifications and notes, along with who entered each one and when.
- Torque questions: each question you ask Torque, the AI helper, is saved with who asked, the case, and how much of the AI service it used.
- Staying signed in: one cookie keeps you signed in for 30 days. Failed sign-in attempts are recorded with a one-way hash of your network address and erased after 24 hours.
- On your device: your light or dark setting and where you moved the Torque button.
- Camera: used only while you scan a VIN barcode. The picture is read on your device and not uploaded.
Who else receives information
- Cloudflare hosts the app and its database, and provides the traffic and error logs we use to keep it running. Errors in the app are otherwise written only to your own browser.
- Anthropic (the Claude AI) drafts shared-fix write-ups and answers Torque questions. It receives the vehicle's year, make and model, the complaint, symptoms, codes, test steps, findings, repairs, verification and your question. It does not receive customer names, VINs, plates, shop names or technician names, but text you type into those fields is sent as written, so keep customer details out of free-text notes.
- NHTSA, the U.S. vehicle safety agency, receives a VIN when you decode one, and year, make and model when recalls are looked up.
- Google Fonts and unpkg supply fonts and the barcode-scanner code. Your browser loads these directly, which shares your network address with them, as with most websites.
Shared fixes
A fix is shared with other shops only after someone in your shop, other than a technician, reviews and publishes it. Other shops see the vehicle's year, make and model, codes, symptom summary, the write-up, repair, verification, references and dates. They never see your shop's name, your name, the customer's name, the VIN or the plate. There is no automatic removal of personal details, so check the write-up before you publish it.
What we don't do
- No ads and no advertising trackers.
- We don't sell or rent your information.
Keeping and deleting your data
We keep your shop's data while your shop uses TechBench. The app doesn't have a delete or export button yet. Email us and we'll export or delete your account or your shop's data.
Children
TechBench is for automotive professionals and isn't meant for children.
Changes
If this policy changes, the new version will be posted on this page with a new effective date.
Contact
Email [email protected].