We never store where you are. We store where you chose to leave something. Your device decides on its own whether you've arrived; your whereabouts are not recorded on our servers.
We can technically read your stashes today. They are not yet end-to-end encrypted. We don't read them, and we're building toward not being able to. Until then, you should know that.
We do not sell your data. Not to advertisers, not to data brokers, not ever. There is no advertising, analytics, or tracking code anywhere in this app.
Here Lies lets you leave a written message pinned to one exact place, for one specific person, readable only when they physically stand there. That mechanic requires some unusual data. This page explains exactly what we hold, what we deliberately refuse to hold, and why.
Your email address, used to send a six-digit sign-in code. A display name you choose. The date you joined, and a short invite code so friends can add you.
The text of the message. The coordinates you chose for it. An optional place label or venue name you type. Whether it's on the map or buried. The radius that counts as “arrived.” When you created it, and when it was opened.
These coordinates are a place you deliberately selected as meaningful. They are not a record of your movements.
The friend it's addressed to. If you stash something for someone who isn't on Here Lies yet, we store the name or nickname you typed for them plus a one-time claim code. That label is erased the moment the stash is claimed. If you'd rather not put someone's real name in our database before they have an account, use a nickname.
The mutual connections you accept. Both people have to agree. Nobody can stash anything for a stranger — that rule is enforced by the database itself, not just hidden in the app.
When a stash is opened, we record the time. Because a stash can only be opened at its location, a reveal record implies you were at that place at that moment. This is inherent to how the product works. We're telling you rather than burying it.
If you join the waitlist, we store the email address you gave us. That's all.
We keep no location history. Your device checks locally, on its own, whether you're near a waiting stash. When you open one, your coordinates are sent once, compared against that stash's location, and thrown away. They are never written to our database. There is no table of your movements in Here Lies, because we never built one.
No trackers. No advertising identifiers. No cross-app or cross-site tracking. No analytics, attribution, crash-reporting, or data-broker SDKs — not disabled, simply absent. This is why Here Lies never shows you Apple's tracking permission prompt: there is nothing to prompt about.
Here Lies can watch for your arrival while the app is closed, so a buried stash can reveal itself the moment you reach it. That watching happens entirely on your device. Your phone will ask permission first, and you can refuse it or revoke it later in your system settings — the app still works, you'll just open it yourself when you arrive.
Stash text is stored in our database in plain text. Database rules stop other users from reading a stash addressed to someone else, and stop the intended recipient from reading it before they have physically arrived. Those rules do not stop us, as the operator of the database, from being technically able to read it.
We don't read your messages. But “we promise not to” is a weaker guarantee than “we can't,” and we'd rather say the true thing. End-to-end encryption — where the text is scrambled on your phone and we only ever hold ciphertext — is the direction we're building. Until this page says otherwise, don't put something in a stash you would be devastated to have read.
These companies process data on our behalf, solely to make Here Lies work. None of them receive your data for their own purposes, and none of them buy it from us.
We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information — least of all your location — with advertisers or data brokers. We are not building a location dataset to sell later. If that ever changed, it would require your explicit consent, and this page would say so in plain language before anything moved.
Here Lies is in private beta. The database may be reset while we build. Please don't treat a stash as a permanent archive of anything you can't bear to lose.
Here Lies is not intended for anyone under 13, and we don't knowingly collect anything from them. If you believe a child has an account, write to us and we'll remove it.
If this policy changes we'll update the date at the top, and we'll tell you in the app before any change that affects what we collect or who receives it.
Here Lies is operated by JFC Investments. Questions, deletion requests, or anything that looks wrong: hello@herelies.app.