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Smisto privacy notice

Smisto is an email companion that runs on your computer. This notice explains, in plain language, what happens to your data. Short version: your mail stays on your computer, AI and reports are off until you switch them on, and Smisto has no server of its own.

Who is responsible

Edoardo Maria Crescenti, Switzerland, is responsible for Smisto (the "controller" under the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection, nDSG/FADP). Smisto's home on the web is smisto.ch. Until a contact address is published there, contact him about your data through the channel where you got Smisto.

Apart from the beta emails described under "Beta sign-up and newsletter", Smisto never sends email in its own name. Other mail that claims to come from smisto.ch, getsmisto.com or smisto.app is not from Smisto: these domains are set up to reject mail that Smisto did not send.

What stays on your computer

  • Your mail, contacts, folders, to-dos and settings are stored in a database on this computer, in your Windows user folder (%LOCALAPPDATA%\Smisto). Smisto has no server and does not copy this data anywhere.
  • Passwords, sign-in tokens and API keys are kept in the Windows Credential Manager, never in Smisto's database or files.
  • Smisto keeps a troubleshooting log of the last 7 days in the same folder (logs). It stays on your computer unless you choose to send it to someone. You can open it from Settings, About Smisto.
  • Uninstalling Smisto and deleting that folder removes everything Smisto stored.

Who Smisto talks to

  • Your mail provider (for example Gmail, Outlook or your own mail server), to fetch and send your mail. Signing in with Google or Microsoft happens on their pages, under their privacy terms.
  • When you add an account, Smisto may look up your email domain (the part after @, never your full address) in the public Thunderbird settings directory (autoconfig.thunderbird.net) to find the right server settings.

AI features

  • AI is off until you turn it on in Settings, and each AI feature can be switched on separately.
  • With a local model (llama.cpp or Ollama on your computer), nothing leaves your computer.
  • With OpenRouter, the parts of an email that a feature needs (for example sender, subject and the first lines of the text) are sent to OpenRouter and to the provider of the model you picked, which produce the answer. Their own privacy terms apply. Settings describes what each feature sends. OpenRouter needs your own API key, which stays in the Windows Credential Manager.
  • Clients marked "no AI" are never sent to a cloud model.
  • AI only makes suggestions. Nothing is filed, saved or sent until you click.

Crash reports and usage statistics (optional)

Both are off by default. You can turn each of them on or off at any time in Settings, Privacy.

  • Crash reports: when Smisto crashes or hits an error, it sends a technical report: the error message, where in Smisto's code it happened, the Smisto version and your Windows version.
  • Usage statistics: a few anonymous counts, namely "Smisto started", "account added" and which kind of AI you picked (local, OpenRouter or off).
  • What is never sent: your mail, subjects, contacts, names, email addresses, file paths, your computer's name, or the content of anything you write. Smisto removes email addresses and file paths from error messages before they leave your computer.
  • Where it goes: Sentry (Functional Software, Inc.), stored in Sentry's EU data region in Germany. Sentry necessarily sees your internet (IP) address when a report arrives; Smisto does not ask Sentry to store it. Reports are kept for up to 90 days and are used only to fix bugs and understand which features are used.
  • Legal basis: your consent, which you can withdraw at any time by switching the option off. Reports already sent are deleted when their retention period ends.

Beta sign-up and newsletter

The website smisto.ch sets no cookies and uses no analytics. If you sign up there to test Smisto before its release:

  • What is stored: your email address, the devices you would test on, why you want to test, where you heard about Smisto, the language of the page, which versions of the terms of use and of this notice you accepted and when, whether you asked for the newsletter and when you confirmed it, and whether your sign-up is confirmed.
  • Why: to plan the beta, to invite you to test, and, only if you asked for it, to send you the newsletter.
  • Double opt-in: nothing counts until you open the link in the confirmation email. Sign-ups that are not confirmed are deleted after 30 days.
  • Legal basis: your consent. The newsletter is a separate consent that you can give or refuse on its own.
  • How long: until the beta ends, then the sign-ups are deleted; earlier if you ask.
  • Withdrawing: the confirmation email has a link that deletes your sign-up, and every newsletter has a link to unsubscribe. You can also ask through the channel where you got Smisto. Withdrawing does not affect what happened before.
  • Who processes it: Laravel Cloud (Laravel Holdings Inc., USA) hosts the website and its database in its EU region in Frankfurt, Germany. The email service that delivers the confirmation emails and newsletters receives your address and the email. To limit repeated sign-ups, the website keeps your internet (IP) address for one hour; it is not stored with your sign-up.

Your rights

Under the nDSG you can ask what data about you is processed, and ask for it to be corrected or deleted. Since almost all data stays on your own computer, you are in control of it directly.

If you are in the EU or EEA

The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) may also apply. The legal basis for optional reports and for the beta sign-up and newsletter is your consent (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR), which you can withdraw at any time. You have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, data portability and objection, and you can complain to the data protection authority where you live. Switzerland is recognised by the EU as providing an adequate level of data protection.

Changes

If this notice changes, the new version ships with the next Smisto update and appears on smisto.ch.

Last updated: November 2026.