Terms & privacy.

Who you’re dealing with

Latent is the trading name for restoration, digitizing and data recovery work done by Drew Springer, operating as a sole individual, contactable at drew@drewspringer.net. There’s no team, no call center, and no third party who touches your material. When you email, you get me.

What I promise, and what I can’t

I promise effort, honesty and care. I can’t promise outcomes. Photo restoration and data recovery both depend far more on the condition of the source than on skill or software, and anyone who guarantees a result before seeing the material is guessing or lying.

Specifically:

• I’ll tell you what I realistically expect before you pay anything.
• On restoration work you approve a watermarked preview before payment. If it isn’t good enough, you don’t pay.
• On data recovery, if I recover nothing meaningful, there is no fee. You only cover return shipping.
• I won’t overstate what a tool did. If a result is partly reconstructed rather than actually recovered, I’ll say so plainly.

Your data, and what happens to it

This is the part most people care about, so it’s the most detailed.

Where it lives

Your files sit on encrypted storage that isn’t shared, isn’t synced to a public cloud service, and can’t be accessed by anyone but me. Transfers happen over encrypted links.

What I look at

On recovery jobs I open files only as far as needed to confirm they’re intact and to build your file list. I’m not reading your documents or browsing your photos, and I have no interest in doing that.

How long I keep it

• Restoration and digitizing: working copies deleted 90 days after delivery.
• Data recovery: images and recovered data deleted 30 days after delivery.
• Ask me to delete it sooner and I will, right away, and confirm when it’s done.
• Ask me to keep it longer and I will, as long as you tell me before the window closes.

What I never do

• Use your material as AI training data, or feed it to any service that would.
• Sell, share or hand your files to anyone else, barring a valid legal order.
• Publish a before-and-after anywhere, including Instagram, without asking you first, every single time. “No” needs no explanation and costs you nothing.

Physical media you send me

Your originals are yours and they come back. I log and photograph everything when it arrives, and I do all work on copies or sector-level images, never on the original.

• Return shipping is at cost, tracked, and insured to the value you declare.
• Declare a value before shipping. Otherwise the carrier pays out very little, and I can’t cover what a carrier loses in transit.
• For one-of-a-kind originals, I’ll always suggest handing them over in person instead of shipping. Please take that suggestion.
• Material left with me for more than 12 months after I’ve tried to reach you three times may be disposed of. I’ll make a real effort to avoid this.

Data recovery, specifically

Recovery carries risks that restoration doesn’t, and you should understand them before sending anything.

• A failing drive can fail further at any moment, including while being imaged, and including if nobody does anything wrong. Imaging first is how I minimize this, but it can’t be eliminated.
• I do logical recovery only: no cleanroom, no platter work, no chip-off. If your device needs that, I’ll tell you and point you to someone who does it, at no charge and with no markup.
• Recovered files may be incomplete, corrupted, or missing their original names and folders. That’s normal, and it isn’t a failure of the service.
• You confirm the device is yours or that you have the owner’s permission. I’ll decline anything that looks otherwise.
• Recovery isn’t a substitute for a backup. Once you have your files back, back them up in two places. I’ll show you how if you want.

Money

• Fixed-price services are payable up front. Quoted work is payable on approval of the preview or file list.
• A quote doesn’t change after you accept it. If I find more work than expected, that’s my estimating problem, not your invoice.
• Bulk upscaling: if you’re unhappy with a batch, tell me within 14 days and I’ll redo it or refund it.
• Restoration: you approve before you pay, so refunds rarely arise. If I got it wrong, I’ll fix it or refund it.
• Recovery: no meaningful data, no fee. “Meaningful” is judged against what you told me you needed.
• Digitizing isn’t refundable once the physical media has been processed, since the work is already done, but I’ll redo anything that came out badly.

Limits of liability

My total liability for any job is capped at what you paid me for that job. I’m one person doing careful work at prices well below a commercial lab, and those prices only work because I’m not insuring the replacement value of irreplaceable material.

I’m not liable for consequential losses (lost income, lost opportunity or distress) arising from data that couldn’t be recovered or a photograph that couldn’t be restored. If your material is worth more than that to you, and it may well be, a specialist lab with commercial insurance is the right call, and I’ll happily tell you so.

Work I’ll turn down

I reserve the right to decline any job, and I’ll refund anything already paid if I do. In particular:

• Devices that aren’t yours, or that you can’t confirm you’re allowed to access.
• Material that’s illegal to possess. I’ll stop work and, where the law requires it, report it.
• Requests to alter a photo in a way meant to deceive, like adding people or events to a scene and presenting it as real.
• Anything I can’t do well.

This website

The site sets no advertising or tracking cookies and runs no third-party analytics. Payments are taken on Stripe’s own checkout pages: card details never touch this site and I never see them, only the name, email and amount on the receipt. Fonts and everything else on the page come from this site, so your browser doesn’t contact anyone else just by visiting. Contact forms are handled by Formspree, which processes the name, email and message you type in order to deliver it to me. Nothing else is collected.

Changes and disputes

If I change these terms, the version in force for your job is the one published when you booked it. Ask and I’ll send you a copy.

If something goes wrong, email me first. I’d much rather sort it out directly than have either of us bring anyone else into it.

These terms are written in plain English for a one-person operation and aren’t legal advice. If your job involves something unusually valuable or a business contract, say so. I’m glad to sign something your side drafts instead.

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