Privacy Policy

Effective October 2, 2026 · Last updated October 2, 2026

The short version

bighelp is an app for talking to an AI agent that you run with Hermes on your own computer or server. Your chats go from your device straight to that computer. They don't pass through us.
Your Hermes computer, and the AI provider you set it up with, see what you send. That's how the agent answers you. Their privacy policies cover what they keep.
We don't sell your data, show ads or track you across other apps and websites.
Notifications are optional. If you turn them on, a small amount of device data goes through our notification service. Message text is encrypted for your device first, so our service can't read it.

1. Who we are

bighelp is made and published by Colton Coan, an individual developer in the United States ("we", "us"). For the data that our own notification service handles, described in section 5, Colton Coan is the data controller.

We are not the controller of your chats. You choose the Hermes computer that bighelp connects to, and you or whoever runs it decides what happens to the data on it.

Questions or requests: [email protected].

2. How bighelp works

bighelp is a front end for Hermes Agent, open-source agent software that you install on a computer or server you control. When you connect, bighelp signs in to that Hermes computer directly over your network, VPN or the internet. There's no bighelp account.

We don't run the AI. We don't provide AI models, and we don't receive, store or read your conversations.

3. Your Hermes computer and AI provider

When you use bighelp, the following go to the Hermes computer you connected and are handled according to how it's set up:

Messages you type or dictate, and files, photos and documents you attach
Voice audio, if you use live voice or choose to have Hermes transcribe your recordings (see section 7)
The name you save in the app, so the agent knows who's talking when several people share it
Data from iPhone tools you turn on, like Calendar, Reminders or Apple Health (see section 7)
Your answers to questions, forms and approval requests from your agent

To answer you, Hermes normally sends this content to the AI model provider configured on it, such as Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter or a model running locally, and to any tools or services the agent uses. You are talking to an AI agent, not a person.

Hermes keeps chat history, memories and files on that computer. Those, and anything the AI provider keeps, are governed by the host's settings and that provider's privacy policy, not by us.

4. What stays on your device

bighelp stores some things on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch or Vision Pro so it works quickly and offline:

Sign-in details for your Hermes computer, kept in the device-only Apple Keychain. They don't sync and aren't included in backups.
Cached chats, drafts and attachments for the computers you've connected, in the app's private storage
Settings, themes and avatar pictures you choose
A random person ID stored in iCloud Keychain, so your saved name follows you across your own devices. It's random and isn't tied to your Apple ID or any of your details.

We can't see any of this. It stays on your devices until you delete it, remove the computer from the app or delete the app.

5. Optional notifications and our service

bighelp can alert you when your agent replies or needs an answer, show progress on the Lock Screen (Live Activities) and connect a few iPhone tools while the app is open. These features use a small service we run on Cloudflare. It's optional: chatting works without it.

There's no account to create. When you turn on notifications for a Hermes computer, the app makes a random ID for this install and a signing key that never leaves your device. Our service then stores:

The random install ID and the public half of its key
Which of your Hermes computers may notify this install, recorded as random IDs
Your Apple push token, encrypted when stored
Encrypted notification text and encrypted iPhone-tool results while they're being delivered
Delivery records and overall counts, which don't include message content

Message text is encrypted on your agent's side for your device before it reaches us. Our service passes it on without decrypting it, and it doesn't have the keys to read it.

There's one exception. Live Activities show a chat's title, your agent's name and a progress step on your Lock Screen. Apple needs that text in a readable form, so our service and Apple can read it while delivering it. It never includes your messages, the agent's replies, files or tool details. You can turn Live Activities off in the app or in iOS Settings.

Like any internet service, Cloudflare also handles connection details such as your IP address and request times while it delivers traffic.

6. Push setup and app activity

bighelp includes the BuzzKit software kit, which handles push notification setup. It starts when the app opens, before you turn notifications on, and sends the following to BuzzKit's servers (buzzkit.dev):

A random ID for this install. Once you turn on notifications, a random notification ID replaces it.
App version, iOS version, device model, language and region setting, and when the app was installed
App events: installed, updated, opened and closed, notification delivered or opened, and Live Activity started or ended
Your Apple push token, once you allow notifications

We use this only to deliver notifications and keep them working. These events contain no names, email addresses, messages, contacts, location or health data. We don't use them for advertising, and we don't link them with data from other companies' apps or websites.

7. Device features and permissions

Each of these is off until you use the feature, and iOS asks for your permission first. You can change any of them in iOS Settings.

Feature	What happens
Microphone and speech	Turn-based voice is transcribed on your device by default, and only the text is sent. If you choose Hermes transcription, the recording goes to your Hermes computer. Live voice streams your audio to your Hermes computer, and your agent may pass it to its voice provider. On Apple Watch, dictation follows Apple's own settings.
Camera	Scans pairing codes, captures photos and documents you choose to attach, and powers Reflective Vision. We don't record or keep camera frames. Photos you attach go to your Hermes computer.
Photos	Lets you pick avatar pictures, which stay on your device, and attach images to chats. Saving to Photos happens only when you tap Save.
Approximate location	Used only when you turn on local weather. It goes to Apple Weather, and we don't keep it.
Calendar and Reminders	If you turn these tools on, your agent can read, create, change and delete your events and reminders when you ask. The results go to your Hermes computer and may go to its AI provider.
Apple Health	If you turn this tool on, bighelp reads only the Health data you choose and only to answer your health and fitness questions. That data goes to your Hermes computer and may go to its AI provider. bighelp never writes Health data and never uses it for advertising, marketing or analytics, and we never sell it or store it on our service.
Local network	Lets the app reach a Hermes computer on your home network, VPN or Tailscale.
Notifications and Live Activities	See sections 5 and 6.

Results from iPhone tools reach your Hermes computer through our encrypted relay, which can't read them.

8. Other services the app contacts

Link previews: when a chat contains a link, the app may load that page's title and picture directly from the website, without cookies. The website sees your IP address. YouTube links play in an embedded player from youtube-nocookie.com.
Provider logos: the app downloads AI provider logos from our public file server, which runs on Cloudflare. These requests carry no account or chat data.
Plugin updates: the app checks GitHub for the latest version of the bighelp Hermes plugin.
GitHub (optional): if you connect GitHub, the app talks to GitHub with the access you approve. GitHub's privacy policy applies.
Sign-in pages: if your Hermes computer uses a browser sign-in, that page is run by whoever runs your computer or its sign-in provider.

bighelp includes no advertising, ad-measurement or crash-reporting software.

9. Who receives data

Recipient	What and why
Your Hermes computer	Everything you send in chats and from the tools you turn on, so your agent can work. You or whoever runs it controls it.
Your AI and tool providers	What your agent sends them to answer you, chosen on your Hermes computer.
Cloudflare, Inc.	Hosts our notification service and this website (section 5).
BuzzKit (buzzkit.dev)	Push setup, delivery and app events (section 6).
Apple	Delivers notifications and Live Activities, and provides Weather, iCloud Keychain and the App Store.
GitHub, YouTube and linked websites	Only when you use the features in section 8.

We don't sell or rent personal data, and we don't share it for advertising. We may disclose data if the law requires it, and we'll only hand over what we actually have. That's mostly random IDs and encrypted data.

10. How long we keep data

Notifications for a Hermes computer: until you turn them off for that computer or remove it from the app.
Install ID, its public key and your push token: until you ask us to delete them. Deleting the app doesn't remove them, because a deleted app can't tell our service it's gone.
Encrypted notification text and tool results: until they're delivered or the registration they belong to is removed.
Notification delivery records: deleted automatically by the notification service once they're no longer needed for delivery.
BuzzKit app events and IDs: kept according to BuzzKit's retention settings for our project, and deleted when you ask us to delete your data.
Data on your devices: until you delete it, remove the computer or delete the app.

Backups kept by our infrastructure providers may hold deleted data for a short time before they expire.

11. Legal bases (EU and UK)

Providing the features you ask for (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR): running notifications, Live Activities and iPhone tools.
Legitimate interests (Art. 6(1)(f)): keeping the service secure, preventing abuse and confirming notifications are delivered.
Consent (Art. 6(1)(a), and Art. 9(2)(a) for health data): sending content to your agent and its AI provider, device permissions and Apple Health. You can withdraw consent at any time in the app or in iOS Settings.

12. Your rights and choices

Depending on where you live, you can ask us to give you a copy of your personal data, or to correct it, delete it or restrict how we use it. You can also object to how we use it, ask to take it elsewhere and withdraw your consent. To do any of this, email [email protected]. We'll answer within one month. We may ask you to confirm the data is yours.

Most of your data never reaches us, so many requests are best handled on your Hermes computer or with your AI provider. In the EU or UK, you can also complain to your local data protection authority.

13. Deleting your data

Notifications for one Hermes computer: turn them off for that computer in the app, or remove the computer. That removes its registration from our service.
Everything our service holds about your install: email [email protected] and we'll delete it.
Data on your device: remove the Hermes computer in the app, or delete the app.
Chats and memories on your Hermes computer: delete them in bighelp or on the computer itself. We can't reach them.

14. International transfers

We're based in the United States, and Cloudflare, BuzzKit and Apple may process data in the US and other countries. Where EU or UK law requires it, these transfers rely on the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or Standard Contractual Clauses.

15. Security

Credentials stay in the device-only Keychain. Traffic uses TLS, and notifications and relayed messages are end-to-end encrypted with Apple's built-in cryptography. Our service stores push tokens only in encrypted form. No system is perfectly secure, though. Anyone who can unlock your device, or gets into your Hermes computer, may be able to read your data there. To report a security problem, email [email protected].

16. Children

bighelp isn't meant for children. You must be at least 13, or the minimum age to consent to data processing where you live (16 in some EU countries), and old enough to use the AI services your agent relies on. We don't knowingly collect data from children. If you think a child has used our notification service, contact us and we'll delete the data.

17. US state privacy rights

We don't sell personal information or share it for cross-context behavioral advertising, as California and other US state laws define those terms. We don't use sensitive information to infer anything about you. You can make the requests in section 12 from any US state, and we won't treat you differently for making them.

18. This website

bighelp.app runs on Cloudflare Pages. It uses no cookies, analytics or ad trackers. Cloudflare processes standard request details such as your IP address to deliver the pages and protect them from attacks.

19. Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we'll update the date at the top. If a change affects how your data is used in a significant way, we'll tell you in the app before it takes effect.

20. Contact

Colton Coan, publisher of bighelp
Email: [email protected]