Privacy Policy

Last updated: 13 August 2026

This policy explains what Chat Remote collects, what it does not, and why. We have tried to write it in plain language rather than legalese. If anything is unclear, please ask — contact details are at the bottom.

1. Who is responsible

The Chat Remote service is operated at the domain chatremote.net. The operator is the party responsible for the data described in this document.

Chat Remote is also self-hostable software: anyone may run their own server. If you are using a Chat Remote server other than chatremote.net, then whoever operates that server — not us — holds your data, and this policy does not apply to them.

2. What we store

Your account

• Username, display name, email address
• Password — stored only as a bcrypt hash, never in the original form. We cannot read your password; if you forget it, it can be reset but never recovered.
• Avatar, if you set one
• Your two-factor authentication secret, if you enable it
• When the account was created, and when you accepted the terms

An account is optional. Chat Remote works in guest mode: controlling another device, messaging, calling and sending files all work without signing up. An account only adds the ability for your own devices to recognise each other.

Registered devices

• Device ID (a random string generated on the device), the device name you choose, operating system
• The device's public key — used for end-to-end encryption. The private key never leaves your device.
• A hashed device password, if you set one

Contacts and control permissions

• Which devices you have added to your contacts
• Who may control which device, in what mode, and when that permission expires

Activity log

So that you can spot unfamiliar access, and so we can find bugs, the server records what happened — not what was said:

• Successful sign-ins, failed sign-ins, sign-outs
• Account created, account deleted
• New device registrations, successful and failed pairings
• Control requests, approvals, denials, revocations
• When control sessions started and ended

Each entry holds a username, a device ID and a timestamp. No IP addresses, no screen content, no messages.

Statistics

• App download counts, per day and per platform
• A country guessed from your browser's time zone. This is a very coarse signal — it says what time zone your device is set to, not where you are. We do not use any IP geolocation service.

Feedback

If you send feedback through the landing page, we store the message together with the name and email you choose to fill in (both optional).

3. What we do NOT store

This section matters more than the one above, so let us be precise.

Screen content, mouse and keyboard

When you control a device, the screen video and the mouse/keyboard commands travel directly between the two devices over a peer-to-peer connection (WebRTC), encrypted with DTLS-SRTP. They do not pass through our server and we have no way to see them.

The only case where data takes a detour through an intermediate server is when the two devices cannot reach each other because of a firewall — then a TURN server forwards the packets. The TURN server only forwards already-encrypted packets; it holds no key and can decrypt nothing.

Messages and files

Messages and files are encrypted on your device before they are sent, using keys that only the two endpoints hold. The server relays that sealed envelope and keeps no copy. If the recipient is offline, the message simply fails to send and you see an error — we do not hold it for them.

IP addresses

The server does not write IP addresses to its logs or database. An IP exists briefly in memory while a request is being handled — that is technically unavoidable, since without it there is nowhere to send the reply — and inside the abuse-prevention counters, but it is never written to disk.

Location, phone contacts, photos, SMS

The app neither requests nor reads any of these.

4. How the end-to-end encryption works

Briefly, so that you can verify the promise above:

• Each device generates its own key pair locally. The private key is never sent anywhere.
• Two devices exchange public keys and independently derive a shared key (ECDH over X25519 or P-256), passed through HKDF-SHA256 to produce an AES-256-GCM encryption key.
• The server only ever sees public keys. A private key cannot be computed from a public one.
• The app pins the peer's public key the first time it sees it. If the server later returns a different key, the app raises an alarm instead of silently accepting it. This is what stops us from swapping in our own key to eavesdrop.

5. Permissions the Android app requests

6. Third parties

The landing page may display advertising. The app itself — the part where you sign in and control devices — carries no advertising and embeds no third-party tracking code.

We do not sell, rent or trade your data with anyone.

7. How long we keep it

• Account and registered devices: until you delete them.
• Messages and files: never stored, so there is nothing to delete.
• Activity log: kept by size; the oldest entries are pushed out as the log fills.
• Download counts: plain counters, not linked to anyone.

8. Your rights

View and edit

Open Account in the app to see your list of devices. Open Settings to edit your account details and see who is currently allowed to control this device.

Delete your account

Open Settings → Delete account and enter your password to confirm. This cannot be undone and immediately deletes:

• Your account, email, display name and avatar
• Every device you have registered
• Your contacts, and other people's contact entries pointing at your devices
• Every control permission granted to you or by you
• All signed-in sessions, disconnected at once

Withdrawing consent

Stopping use of the service and deleting your account is how you withdraw consent. No permission required.

9. Children

The service is not directed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect data from children under 13. If you are a parent and find that your child has created an account, please contact us and we will delete it.

10. Security

Passwords are hashed with bcrypt. The website is served over HTTPS. Content between two devices is end-to-end encrypted. Two-factor authentication is available if you want it.

Even so, no system is perfectly secure. Use a unique password for this account, enable two-factor authentication, and only grant control to people you genuinely trust — whoever controls your device sees everything on that screen.

11. Changes to this policy

When we make changes, we update the date at the top. If a change materially affects your data, we will say so in the app rather than edit quietly.

12. Contact

Questions about your data, or requests to delete it:

• Email: chatremote.net@gmail.com
• Or use the Feedback section at the bottom of the home page

The Vietnamese version is the original. Where translations differ, the Vietnamese version prevails.