How do I digitise an ID or bank statement without the cloud?

Why these documents in particular

An ID card, a bank statement, a letter from a doctor or a tax assessment are exactly the papers you want to have to hand digitally. They are also the papers whose content you least want to see in someone else’s hands. An ID shows your name, date of birth, address and signature, and a bank statement shows your IBAN and what you spend money on. If you digitise documents like these, it is worth knowing where copies are created along the way.

Where copies are created along the way

Many scanner apps for phones store their scans in the provider’s cloud so that they appear on every device. Some also send the page to a server for text recognition. In both cases a copy of the document sits with a company, and how well it is protected depends on that company’s terms and security. Whether an app works like this is stated in its privacy notice and in its sync settings.

The second copy is often created unnoticed in the photo gallery. If automatic photo backup is switched on, the phone uploads every new photo to the cloud of its maker or of a photo service, including a photo of an ID card. The third is created during the transfer. If you email the picture to yourself or send it to your computer through a messenger, it is stored on that service’s servers on the way, often permanently.

How the document stays on your own device

A scanner connected directly to the computer creates the fewest copies. A phone works almost as well. Before you take the photo, check whether automatic photo backup is running, and either switch it off for this purpose or take the pictures in a folder that is excluded from it. Transfer the picture by USB cable or through a network share on your home network instead of an internet service. Afterwards delete the photo on the phone, and also from the recently deleted folder that many galleries keep for a while.

On the computer itself, what matters is who can get at the file. A user account with a password and a screen lock are the basis. A folder that is synchronised with cloud storage is the wrong place for these documents, because that is where the path out begins all over again. On Windows that can include the Desktop, Documents and Pictures folders when OneDrive folder backup is switched on. The OneDrive settings show under “Sync and backup” whether it is.

Store encrypted and share with care

A file on the hard disk can be read by anyone who copies it, for example from a lost laptop or from a backup. Programs that store their collection encrypted protect against that, as long as the key is not copied along with it. That only holds while the document stays inside the program, though. An exported PDF is an ordinary file again, and you have to keep it the way its content requires.

If you have to hand over a copy of your ID, give out only what the recipient actually needs, and send it by a route you trust. A digitised document is not a certified copy. Where an authority asks for the original or a certified copy, the scan does not replace it.

Where Quorvyn Docyra helps

Quorvyn Docyra processes documents only on your computer and uploads no document content, neither to us nor to anyone else. Edge detection, straightening, organising and exporting to PDF are free and work without internet access as well. Docyra stores its collection encrypted with AES-256-GCM, and the operating system’s key store holds the key. An exported PDF, by contrast, is not encrypted. Docyra does not handle the path from phone to computer, which is what the advice above is for. Docyra is still in development and not available yet. The product page lists which connections it needs for sign-in and subscription and what it deliberately does not do.