Privacy Policy

1. The short version

Your screen, what you type, your clipboard, and your files travel encrypted between your own devices. We can't see them, and we never store them.

We keep what it takes to run your account, help your devices find each other, and bill you. We don't sell your information, and we don't use it for advertising.

2. What we never collect

Sessions are encrypted on one of your devices and decrypted on the other, with keys that are made on your devices and never leave them. So none of this ever reaches us:

• The picture of your screen
• Your keystrokes, clicks, and touches
• Your clipboard
• Your files
• Your computers' passwords

3. What we collect

• Your account: your email address, your name if you give one, and how you sign in. A passkey leaves us only its public key. Sign in with Apple gives us an identifier, and the email Apple shares with us.
• Your devices: each one's name, kind (Mac, PC, iPhone, or iPad), system and app versions, when it was last online, the fingerprint of its encryption certificate, and on iPhone and iPad a token for sending it notifications.
• Sign-ins: the IP address and browser or app that signed in, and when.
• Sessions: when a session between two of your devices starts and ends, which two devices, and whether it went through the relay. Never what happened in it.
• While your devices find each other: their public IP addresses and the network paths they could use, which our signal service passes from one to the other.
• Your subscription: your plan, its status, and its trial and billing dates. Payments go through Stripe or Apple, so we never see your card.
• Email: which emails we sent you, and whether each was delivered, bounced, or marked as spam.
• Crash reports: when an app or the site hits an error, a report with the device model, system and app versions, and where in the code it happened. Never your screen or what you typed.
• The website: anonymous page views, counted without cookies.
• Messages you send us.

4. How we use it

• To sign you in and keep your account secure, including emailing you when a new device signs in.
• To show which of your devices are online and connect them.
• To charge for your subscription and send the emails it needs, such as your sign-in codes and a reminder before a trial ends.
• To fix crashes and improve the apps.
• To answer you when you write to us.

We don't use your information for advertising, and we don't sell or rent it to anyone.

5. Who handles it for us

A few companies run parts of Elsewhere for us. Each gets only what its job needs, and may use it only to do that job.

• Vercel hosts the website and its API.
• Amazon Web Services runs the signal service and our database, and sends our email.
• Cloudflare runs the relay used when two devices can't connect directly. It passes along encrypted packets it can't read.
• Stripe handles payments made on the website.
• Apple handles App Store purchases, Sign in with Apple, and notifications to iPhone and iPad.
• Sentry collects crash reports.

6. When we might share it

We share information outside those companies only when the law requires it, to protect someone's safety or our rights, or as part of a sale or merger of the business, in which case this policy keeps applying to what was collected under it. We'll tell you when the law allows.

7. How long we keep it

Your account, devices, sign-ins, session records, and the log of emails we sent you stay for as long as your account exists. Deleting your account deletes them. Emails to an address with no account, such as a sign-in code nobody used, are deleted from the log after 90 days.

The signal service's logs, which include IP addresses, are deleted after 14 days. Billing records are kept for as long as tax and accounting law requires. Crash reports are deleted by Sentry on its own schedule, within 90 days.

8. Your choices

• See your devices, and sign out any of them, on your account page.
• Delete your account from the app or the account page. It takes effect at once.
• Ask for a copy of your information, or to correct it, by writing to us. We'll answer within 30 days.

Depending on where you live, laws such as the GDPR and California's privacy law give you these rights and others, including the right to complain to a data protection authority. We honor them for everyone.

9. Where it's stored

Your information is stored in the United States. If you use Elsewhere from elsewhere, it's transferred there.

10. Children

Elsewhere isn't meant for children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect their information. If you think a child has an account, tell us and we'll delete it.

11. Changes

When this policy changes, the date at the top changes too. If a change matters, we'll email you before it takes effect.