Terms of Service

1. About Cinch

Cinch is an open-source remote clipboard for developer context. You install a client on each of your devices, keep local clipboard history on your machine, and can sync encrypted clips through a hosted or self-hosted relay. The Cinch client, desktop app, and relay are open source under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0. You can read, audit, modify, and self-host the code from github.com/cinchcli.

2. Eligibility

You may use the Service only if you can form a legally binding contract with us under the law applicable to you, and only if your use is not prohibited by law. The Service is not directed to children under 13 (or the equivalent minimum age in your jurisdiction), and you must not use the Service if you are under that age.

3. Your account and authentication

To use the relay-backed parts of the Service, you sign in with a supported identity provider (currently Google). When you sign in, you authorize Cinch to receive the limited profile information described in our Privacy Policy.

You are responsible for keeping your sign-in credentials and your paired devices secure. Each device receives its own access token; if a device is lost or stolen, you can revoke that device's access from inside the desktop app or by running cinch auth logout on another paired device. You agree to notify us promptly at [email protected] if you suspect unauthorized use of your account.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to use the Service to:

• violate any applicable law, regulation, or third-party right;
• upload, store, or transmit content that is illegal, infringing, defamatory, fraudulent, abusive, threatening, or invasive of another's privacy;
• distribute malware, viruses, ransomware, or any other malicious code;
• attempt to access another user's account, devices, or clips, or otherwise interfere with the security or integrity of the Service;
• send spam, conduct phishing campaigns, or use the Service to harass others;
• reverse engineer, decompile, or attempt to extract source code from any component of the Service, except to the extent that this restriction is prohibited by applicable law or expressly permitted by the AGPL 3.0 license;
• impose an unreasonable or disproportionate load on the relay (for example, by automating clip pushes at a rate well beyond ordinary use, or by attempting to use the Service as a generic file-transfer backbone);
• use the Service to develop a competing product where doing so would violate the AGPL 3.0 license or any other applicable license terms.

We may apply reasonable rate limits and abuse mitigations to protect the Service and its users.

5. Your content

You retain all rights in the clips you push through the Service. You are solely responsible for the content of those clips and for ensuring that you have the right to copy, store, and synchronize that content under the laws applicable to you.

To operate the Service, you grant Cinch a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to store, transmit, display to your paired devices, and delete your clips, solely as necessary to provide the Service to you. We do not claim ownership of your clips and we do not use your clips for any other purpose. If you enable client-side encryption (recommended), the relay only ever receives encrypted payloads.

6. Service availability and modifications

We work hard to keep the Service available, but we offer it on an "as-available" basis. We may add, change, suspend, or remove features at any time, and we may temporarily or permanently take down all or part of the Service for maintenance, security, or operational reasons. We will give reasonable notice of material changes when we can.

Cinch offers the client, desktop app, local store, MCP tools, transforms, and self-hosted relay as free open-source software. The public hosted relay is a free best-effort service with fair-use and abuse limits. Commercial support for self-hosting setup, migration, deployment guidance, and support agreement discussions is handled by direct agreement. Current public terms are published on our pricing page.

7. Open source software

The Cinch client, desktop app, and relay are released under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL 3.0). Your rights to copy, modify, and redistribute that software are governed by the AGPL 3.0 license, not by these Terms. These Terms apply only to your use of the Cinch-operated relay and hosted Service. If you self-host the relay, you are the operator of that deployment and these Terms do not govern its operation.

8. Third-party services

The Service uses third-party services to function, including identity providers (such as Google for sign-in) and hosting infrastructure. Your use of those third-party services is governed by their own terms and privacy policies. We are not responsible for the practices of third-party services and we encourage you to review their terms.

9. Termination

You may stop using the Service at any time. You can also delete your account, which removes your account record, paired devices, and any clips stored on the relay, subject to the retention rules described in our Privacy Policy.

We may suspend or terminate your access to the Service if you violate these Terms, if your use of the Service creates a security or operational risk to others, or if we are required to do so by law. We will give you reasonable notice when we can, unless doing so would compromise the security or integrity of the Service.

Sections that by their nature should survive termination (including but not limited to sections 5, 10, 11, 12, and 14) will survive.

10. Disclaimer of warranties

THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE", WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, CINCH DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND ANY WARRANTY ARISING OUT OF COURSE OF DEALING OR USAGE OF TRADE.

We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure, or free of viruses or other harmful components, or that any clip you push will be successfully delivered to your other devices. You use the Service at your own risk.

11. Limitation of liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL CINCH OR ITS MAINTAINERS, CONTRIBUTORS, OR INFRASTRUCTURE PROVIDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, USE, GOODWILL, OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSSES, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO YOUR USE OF (OR INABILITY TO USE) THE SERVICE, WHETHER BASED ON WARRANTY, CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), STATUTE, OR ANY OTHER LEGAL THEORY, AND WHETHER OR NOT WE HAVE BEEN INFORMED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

IN ANY CASE, OUR TOTAL CUMULATIVE LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS RELATING TO THE SERVICE WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) THE AMOUNTS YOU HAVE PAID US FOR THE SERVICE IN THE 12 MONTHS PRECEDING THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE LIABILITY (WHICH WILL ORDINARILY BE ZERO) AND (B) ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS (USD 100).

Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion or limitation of certain warranties or damages. In those jurisdictions, the above limitations apply only to the extent permitted by law.

12. Indemnification

You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Cinch and its maintainers from and against any claims, damages, losses, liabilities, costs, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or related to: (i) your use of the Service in violation of these Terms; (ii) the content of the clips you push through the Service; or (iii) your violation of any law or third-party right.

13. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. When we do, we will revise the "Last updated" date at the top of this page. If the changes are material, we will provide notice by email to the address associated with your account or by a prominent notice in the Service before the changes take effect. Your continued use of the Service after the effective date of updated Terms means you accept the updated Terms.

14. Miscellaneous

• Entire agreement. These Terms, together with our Privacy Policy and any additional terms presented for specific features, form the entire agreement between you and Cinch regarding the Service.
• Severability. If any provision of these Terms is held to be invalid or unenforceable, the remaining provisions will remain in full force and effect.
• No waiver. Our failure to enforce any provision of these Terms is not a waiver of our right to do so later.
• Assignment. You may not assign or transfer these Terms without our prior written consent. We may assign these Terms in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, with notice to you.
• No agency. Nothing in these Terms creates an agency, partnership, joint venture, or employment relationship between you and Cinch.

15. Contact

If you have questions about these Terms, please reach out:

Email: [email protected]
Project: github.com/cinchcli