Frelio Privacy Policy.

Last updated: October 1, 2026

Frelio is a private notebook for your friendships. Frelio is made by Daniel Norris and Josh Caliguire. This policy covers Frelio on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and Android, from Frelio 1.8 on Apple devices and Frelio 1.4.0 on Android.

The short version

You can use Frelio without an account. Your notebook then stays on your device, and Frelio's server never receives it.
If you create a Frelio account, your notebook is encrypted on your device before it leaves. Frelio's server stores it but can't read it, and neither can we.
To run an account, Frelio keeps a few things it can read: your email address, your first name if you give it, the devices you've signed in on, and some counts and dates about your notebook. The full list is below.
Frelio has no ads. It doesn't track you across other apps or websites, and we don't sell your data.

Using Frelio without an account

Everything you put into Frelio (people, notes, photos, events, places, connects and gift ideas) is stored on your device.

iCloud sync on Apple devices. If iCloud sync is on in Settings and you haven't created a Frelio account, your notebook syncs between your iPhone, iPad and Mac through your own private iCloud database. Apple stores it under your Apple account. We can't see it.

Device backups. Apple's iCloud Backup may include Frelio's data in your own iCloud backup. On Android, Google's device backup may keep a copy in your own Google account so it can be restored on a new phone. Both copies sit in your own account. We can't see either.

Exports. When you export a spreadsheet or a Frelio archive, the file goes wherever you choose to send or save it. Frelio doesn't keep a copy anywhere else.

Frelio accounts

A Frelio account is optional. It keeps your notebook on every device you sign in on, including across Apple devices and Android. You can sign in with Apple or with Google.

What Frelio can read

Your email address. With Sign in with Apple you can choose Hide My Email, and then Frelio only receives Apple's relay address.
Your first name, if you give it or your sign-in provider passes it along. If you sign in with Google, Google also passes along the name and profile picture link on your Google account, and the sign-in system keeps those with your login. Frelio itself only uses your first name.
A random account ID that Frelio uses to tell accounts apart.
Whether you've asked for Frelio updates by email (see "Emails" below).
When you created your account and when you last signed in. The sign-in system also records the IP address and app details of each signed-in session. It uses them to keep sessions secure, and Frelio doesn't use them for anything else.
Your devices: the name of each device you sign in on (for example "Daniel's iPhone"), whether it's an iPhone, iPad, Mac or Android device, which version of Frelio it runs, when you added it, and roughly when it last synced (to the nearest hour).
Facts about your notebook, without its contents: each record's kind (a person, a note, a place and so on), its size, and when it changed; each photo's size; and the random IDs that tie records and photos together. This is how Frelio can count your people, places and events without reading them.

What Frelio can't read

Everything in your notebook: every person, note, place, event, connect, gift idea and connection, and your own card.
Every field on those records, including names, phone numbers, birthdays, dates, tags, what you wrote, and which people, places and events belong together.
Every photo.

These are encrypted on your device before they're uploaded. The server only ever holds the encrypted copy.

How the encryption works

Your first device makes a random 256-bit notebook key. Every record and photo is encrypted with it using AES-256-GCM before it leaves the device.
Each device you sign in on gets its own key pair. The notebook key is locked to each device separately, and the private half of each device's key never leaves that device.
Key backup. So that a new device usually only needs a sign-in, Frelio also keeps the notebook key in a place only you control. On Apple devices it's saved in your iCloud Keychain, which Apple end-to-end encrypts. On Android it's saved with Google's Block Store in your Google account, encrypted with your phone's screen lock, and it comes back when you set up a new phone from that account. Frelio never sees the key in either place.
Recovery key. When you create an account, Frelio shows you a recovery key once. It can also open your notebook. Keep it somewhere safe.
If you lose every device, and the key backup, and your recovery key, nobody can open your notebook. That includes us. We can't reset it for you. Your encrypted notebook stays on the server, so finding your recovery key later brings everything back.
Adding a second device can also be done by approving it from a device you already have. Both show the same six-digit code so you can check it's really yours.

Signing out and removing devices

Signing out stops sync on that device and removes it from your account. The notebook stays on the device. You can also remove a device from your account on another device. A removed device stops syncing and keeps its notebook, and it keeps the key it already had.

On an Apple device, iCloud sync switches off while that device is signed in to a Frelio account. The copy already in your iCloud stays where it is, untouched. Sign out and iCloud sync goes back to however you had it set.

Who handles account data

Frelio uses a few companies to run accounts. They handle data on our behalf and under our instructions, not for their own use.

Supabase runs sign-in and the database that stores your account details and your encrypted notebook. Its servers for Frelio are in the United States (Oregon, AWS region us-west-2).
Cloudflare R2 stores your encrypted photos, in its Western North America region.
HubSpot is the customer database we use for our business. Frelio sends it account holders only, never people who use Frelio without an account. For each account it gets your email address, first name, account ID, sign-up date, which platforms you use, your Frelio version, when you were last active, whether you've asked for updates, and how many people, places and events are in your notebook, along with a simple stage worked out from those, like whether you've just signed up or haven't opened Frelio in a while. It never gets anything from inside your notebook. Frelio's server can't read that anyway.
Apple and Google handle Sign in with Apple and Sign in with Google under their own privacy policies. They tell Frelio your email address, and sometimes your name.

Emails

The sign-in screen has a box that says "Send me the occasional Frelio update." It starts unchecked, and your account page has the same switch. Check it and you'll get the occasional email about Frelio, with an unsubscribe link in every one.

Leave it unchecked and you won't get those updates. We'll only email you about the account itself, such as a reply to a deletion request or a notice about its security.

Permissions Frelio may ask for

Frelio asks for a permission only when you use a feature that needs it. Each one is optional, and Frelio works without all of them.

Contacts. Frelio reads your contacts only when you ask it to: to link someone's card, to text or call them from their page, to add people you pick from your contacts, or to add someone without making a duplicate. Your address book is never uploaded. People you choose to add become part of your notebook, and like the rest of it they're encrypted if you sync.
Microphone and speech recognition. Only while you use the mic to dictate. Your device's speech service turns it into text: Apple's on iPhone, iPad and Mac (on the device where possible), and your phone's speech recognition service on Android. Frelio keeps the text and never keeps the recording.
Photos. Frelio uses the system photo picker, which shares only the photos you choose.
Notifications. Check-in nudges and birthday reminders are scheduled on your device.

Frelio on Apple Watch talks only to Frelio on your iPhone. Frelio's widgets read from the notebook on your device.

When you share your card, Frelio makes a link to frelioapp.com/card with your card details packed into the part of the link after the "#". Browsers never send that part to a server, so the site sees a visit to the card page but not who the card is about. The page shows the card in the other person's browser and stores nothing. Your card itself lives in your notebook, encrypted if you sync.

Keeping and deleting your data

Without an account, your notebook stays on your device until you delete it or delete the app, subject to your own device backups.
When you delete something in your notebook, it's deleted on your other devices too. The server keeps a small marker that it was deleted (its ID, kind and time, with no content) so every device knows.
Your account stays until you delete it.
Delete your account in the app: open your You page, tap Delete account under "Your Frelio account", and type "delete" to confirm.
Without the app, go to https://frelioapp.com/delete-account and email a deletion request from the address on your account. We delete the account within 7 days and reply when it is done.

Deleting your account removes your encrypted notebook, your photos, your devices, your encrypted keys and your account details from Frelio's server, and deletes your contact record from HubSpot. The device you delete from also clears the notebook key from its keychain and key backup. Two things take a little longer to disappear: HubSpot keeps deleted contacts in its recycling bin for up to 90 days, and our daily backups of the account database roll off within seven days.

Deleting your account doesn't delete the notebook on your device. It stays there, and you can keep using Frelio without an account.

Your choices

Wherever you live, you can:

export your whole notebook from Settings at any time;
correct anything in the app;
delete your account and everything synced to it, as above;
email us to ask what Frelio holds about you or to have it deleted.

Security

Everything travels to and from Frelio's server over encrypted connections. Each account can only read its own rows in the database. Your notebook is encrypted before it leaves your device. No system is perfectly secure, and that's the reason for the last part: someone who broke into the server would find account details, but not your notebook.

Children

Frelio isn't made for children under 13, and accounts aren't for anyone under 13. If you think a child has created an account, email us and we'll delete it.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version will be posted here with a new date. If a change affects what Frelio can read, we'll also say so in the release notes for the version that makes it.

Contact

Questions about privacy in Frelio: contact@danielnorris.com

Want your account and its data gone? Delete your Frelio account.