Privacy policy

Last updated October 12, 2026

Read Receipts is made by Herald ([Company legal name]). Your messages are read and made into a book on your Mac. We only receive the finished book, and only when you order it.

Your messages

The Mac app reads Messages on your Mac. Before you pick a conversation, it shows only names, how many messages there are and the dates they span. It reads the messages themselves only after you agree to it for that conversation, and you agree separately for each one.

If you choose an iPhone backup stored on your Mac, the app reads it the same way, on your Mac. The app also reads your Contacts so it can show names next to phone numbers. Neither leaves your Mac.

The book is laid out on your Mac. The messages you import stay there until you delete the book in the app, which also removes your agreement for that conversation. The app never changes anything in Messages.

What we receive when you order

• The finished book as PDF files: the pages and the cover of each volume. The pages contain the messages you chose to print, set as they'll appear in the book.
• The choices for the order: the title, the binding, the shipping speed, any extras, page counts, and a gift card or discount code if you use one.
• Your email address, and the name, shipping address and phone number for delivery.

We don't receive the rest of the conversation, or the messages in any other form. Nothing is sent to us until you order.

That's for a book made in the Mac app. A book made on the website is different, because we already hold its messages for 30 days to make it: see Wrapped and books on the website. When you order one, its PDFs become the order's files, as above.

Who else sees it

• Stripe takes payment. You enter your card on Stripe's page, and we never see the card number.
• Lulu prints and ships the book. It receives the PDFs, and the name, address, phone number and email needed to deliver it.
• Cloudflare hosts this site and stores orders and their files for us.

We don't sell your information or share it with advertisers.

How long we keep it

We keep your book's files and the order's details so you can order another copy later. They stay until you ask us to delete them. After that we keep only what the law requires for tax and accounting, such as what you paid and when.

Gift cards

When you buy a gift card, we keep your email, the names and the message you write for the card, its code and its balance. The card's page shows the names and the message, so share its link only with people you'd show the card to.

Email from us

When you order, we write to the address you gave about that order: that we have it, that it's paid, and that it shipped, with the tracking link the printer gives us. If you ask a book made on this site to email you its link, we send that one letter and don't keep the address. The link carries the book's key, so anyone with it can open the book: keep it to yourself.

The email list

If you leave your email on this site, we keep the address, when you left it and which page it came from. We use it only to write to you about Read Receipts. Ask us and we'll take you off the list.

Wrapped, books on the website, and sharing rewards

Wrapped is worked out on your Mac, from a conversation you've already agreed to let the app read. Nothing about the conversation is sent to us to make it. The cards and the video are saved on your Mac, and you decide whether to post them.

On the website, you can make a Wrapped from a chat export instead. The file you upload is read on our server in memory, only to count it, and is gone when the answer is sent back: we don't save it, log what's in it, or use it for anything else. What comes back to your browser is the numbers and the names in it. The cards and the video are made in your browser. To keep the site up, Cloudflare counts uploads from each connection for a minute and turns away more than ten; we never see or keep that count.

If we don't recognize a file's layout, we ask before going further. With your OK, the first 60 lines of the file, with email addresses, links and phone numbers masked, go to Anthropic, whose model Claude works out the layout. Anthropic doesn't train on what we send it. We keep the layout it describes, a pattern for the lines with no names or messages in it, so the next file like yours is read without asking.

While you choose a book's cover and typeface, the file is sent again each time the pictures are drawn: our own server sets the covers with your title and a page of your first messages in each typeface, sends the pictures back, and keeps nothing, the same as for a Wrapped.

Making the book is different, because a book can't be made without the messages. If you ask for one, and say yes to keeping them, we store that conversation's messages (or the year you chose), along with the book's PDFs, its cover and the pictures of the pages you turn to. They're encrypted in storage and typeset on our own server, they're used for nothing but your book, and they're deleted 30 days after the book is made. "Delete This Book" on its page deletes them at once. Only the browser that made the book can open it: it keeps the book's address and key so you can come back to it. If you order it, the order keeps the book's PDFs (not the messages) like any other order, so you can order another copy.

If you send in a post for a sharing reward, we keep:

• the post's link, which includes the account name when the link has one
• the screenshot you upload, and a fingerprint of it so we can tell if the same picture is sent twice
• your email address
• the views, likes and reposts you typed, and whether you ticked that the post says #ad
• a one-way hash of an id the app makes at random for your Mac (the app sends the id, and we keep only the hash)
• any flags our checks raise, such as a link or a screenshot we've seen before

We keep these to give each reward once per person and per Mac, and to check for fraud. A person on our team reviews every claim for a free book, and spot-checks others. We keep submissions while the promotion runs and for [N] months after it ends, in case a reward is disputed, then delete them. The official rules say who can take part and how.

Each Mac gets a random referral code the first time the app asks for one. With it we store only the hash of your Mac's id, how many friends' orders using it have been paid, and the gift card that holds your credit. When an order uses a code, we keep the code with the order.

We also count how far people get with Wrapped, as the number of times each step happens per day: Wrapped opened, a card or video exported, a link sent in, a code used, a book ordered. Each count is a number for a day and a step. We don't store an id, an IP address or anything about who did it or what's in their messages.

This website

The site sets no cookies and runs no analytics or advertising trackers. Its fonts load from Google Fonts, so Google receives your IP address when a page loads. Cloudflare handles every request to the site, as any web host does.

The other person in the book

When you order, you confirm that you're in the conversation and that the other person is happy to be in a printed book. If you appear in someone's book and want us to delete the copy of it we hold, write to us. We can't recall a book that has already been printed.

Children

Read Receipts isn't meant for children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect information from them.

Your choices

You can ask us for a copy of what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it. Write to hello@readreceipts.lol and we'll reply within 30 days.

Changes

If this policy changes, we'll update it here and change the date at the top. If a change affects what leaves your Mac, the app will tell you before it happens.