Privacy policy

Last updated 28 October 2026

memtale is a journal. What you write in it is about as private as data gets, so this page tries to say plainly what is kept, where, for how long, who else is involved, and how to take it all back. If anything here is unclear, or seems to disagree with what the app does, write to me and I will fix whichever one is wrong.

Who is responsible

memtale is run by me, Ismael Arenzana, an individual in Spain. I am the controller of your personal data under the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). For anything about your data, including the requests described below, email iarenzana@gmail.com.

The short version

• No advertising, no analytics, no tracking, no third-party scripts, and no selling or sharing of your data with anyone for their own use.
• Your journal is stored encrypted, under a key that belongs to your account alone.
• You can export everything, and you can delete your account from inside the app at any time.
• memtale is not end-to-end encrypted. The server holds the keys, which is what lets it sync, search and convert your photos, and it means that whoever operates the server (me) could technically read your journal. I don't, and the system is built so that nothing reads it except to serve it back to you.

What memtale keeps

Your account

• The handle and display name you choose. No email address, phone number or real name is needed to have an account.
• Your passkeys: the public half of each (the private half never leaves your device or password manager), and the name of the device it was made on.
• Your signed-in sessions: when each started and was last used, the browser or device it reports (user agent), and the IP address it signed in from, so you can recognise and sign out devices in Settings.

Your journal

• Everything you put in it: entries, titles, photos, videos, voice notes, drawings and handwriting, moods, chapters, and the settings that travel with your account.
• What the app attaches to an entry when you let it: the place and coordinates, the weather, and on Apple devices your step count and mindful minutes from Apple Health.
• What you import from other apps (Day One, Apple Journal, calendars, Health Auto Export), including any health data in those files, such as sleep, heart rate or cycle data. Health data is a special category of personal data under the GDPR (Article 9). memtale only holds it when you choose to import it or connect Apple Health, and you can remove it at any time.

An invite request

If you ask for an invite on this site, I keep the email address you give, the note you write, and the language of the page, so that I can send you an invite. Nothing else is recorded with it, not even your IP address.

On your own device

The web app stores your session, your settings, unsent drafts and a copy of your book in your browser's storage so it works offline. These are not cookies, nothing in them is shared with anyone, and signing out or deleting your account clears them. The Apple app keeps the same kinds of things on the device, with your session token in the Keychain.

How it is protected

Every connection is encrypted (HTTPS). In the database, the contents of your journal, and every photo, voice note and drawing in storage, are encrypted with a key unique to your account. That key is itself encrypted with a master key that never touches the disk or the backups. Accounts are kept apart by the database itself, not just by the application. Sign-in uses passkeys only, so there is no password to steal or reuse.

Some information has to stay readable to the server to work: your handle and display name, the dates and types of your entries (so they can be put in order and synced), the size of your files, and the session details listed above.

Why it is used, and on what basis

• To provide the journal you asked for: storing, syncing, showing and exporting your entries, keeping you signed in, and protecting the service from abuse. The legal basis is the performance of our agreement (GDPR Article 6(1)(b)).
• Health data is processed only on the basis of your explicit consent (Article 9(2)(a)), which you give by importing it or connecting Apple Health, and withdraw by removing it or disconnecting.
• Invite requests are used only to send you an invite, at your request (Article 6(1)(b)).
• Security and server logs are kept for the legitimate interest of keeping the service secure and working (Article 6(1)(f)).

Your data is never used for advertising, profiling, or training anyone's AI models.

Who else is involved

These companies run parts of the infrastructure. They process data only on my instructions, under data processing agreements, and none of them may use it for themselves.

• Hetzner Online GmbH (Germany) hosts the server and the database, in Germany.
• Cloudflare, Inc. stores photos, videos, voice notes and drawings (Cloudflare R2), encrypted as described above. Cloudflare is a US company and the storage is not limited to the EU.
• Backblaze, Inc. stores the nightly backups, encrypted twice: once as described above and again by the backup software. They are stored in the United States.

Transfers to Cloudflare and Backblaze in the United States rely on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework where the company is certified, and on the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses. Email me for a copy of the safeguards.

Some features fetch public information from other services:

• Weather comes from Open-Meteo. The service receives a location rounded to about a kilometre and nothing else. From the web app the request goes through memtale's server, so Open-Meteo never sees your IP address; the Apple app asks Open-Meteo directly from your device.
• Maps in the web app are tiles from OpenStreetMap, fetched by your browser at city level, never street level, and kept in its cache. The OpenStreetMap Foundation sees your IP address and which city tile was asked for. The Apple app uses Apple Maps, and Apple's own services to name the place you are in.
• Link previews for a link you paste are fetched by memtale's server, so the site sees the server, not you.
• “On this day” events come from Wikipedia on a fixed schedule, for every day of the year at once. Nothing about you is ever sent.
• Passkeys are created and stored by your device or password manager (for example iCloud Keychain or Google Password Manager), under that provider's own privacy policy.

How long it is kept

• Your account and journal: until you delete them. Deleting an entry, photo or other item removes it from the service; deleting your account removes everything listed under “Your account” and “Your journal” at once, and its files from storage within minutes.
• Backups: nightly backups are kept for up to about 12 months (daily for two weeks, weekly for two months, monthly for a year) and then deleted automatically. A backup taken before you deleted something still contains it, encrypted, until that backup expires. Backups are only ever used to restore the service after a failure, and I will not restore a deleted account from them.
• Server logs, which record IP addresses, the time and the address of each request, are kept for about two weeks.
• Invite requests: until the invite is sent or the request is declined, then deleted when the account it led to is deleted, or earlier on request.

Your rights

Under the GDPR you can access your data, correct it, have it deleted, take it with you, restrict or object to how it is used, and withdraw consent at any time. Most of this you can do yourself:

• Export your whole journal from Settings, in open formats (Markdown and your original files).
• Correct or delete anything by editing or deleting it.
• Delete your account in Settings → Account → Delete account, on the web, iPhone, iPad and Mac. You confirm with your passkey; it cannot be undone.
• See and end your sessions, and remove passkeys, in Settings.

For anything else, or if you can no longer sign in, email iarenzana@gmail.com. I will answer within a month. You also have the right to complain to a data protection authority; in Spain that is the Agencia Española de Protección de Datos (aepd.es), or you can contact the authority where you live.

Children

memtale is not meant for children under 14, and I do not knowingly hold their data. If you believe a child has an account, email me and it will be deleted.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version will be posted here with a new date. If a change affects what is done with data you have already given, I will say so in the app before it takes effect.