Terms of service.

Last updated: October 25, 2026

These Terms of Service ("Terms") are the agreement between you and Emcognito for your use of the Emcognito website, app, and email-alias forwarding service (the "Service"). The plain-English questions above are part of these Terms; the sections below are the formal version. Where the two ever disagree, email hello@wm.emcognito.com so we can fix the formal text. Your Privacy Policy explains how we handle your data and is incorporated into these Terms by reference.

1. Who we are and accepting these Terms

The Service is operated from Pennsylvania, United States, by VectraSEO LLC, a Pennsylvania limited liability company ("Emcognito," "we," "us"). By creating an account, clicking to sign in, subscribing to a paid plan, or otherwise using the Service, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

2. Eligibility

You must be at least 16 years old to use the Service. If you use the Service on behalf of an organization, you represent that you are authorized to bind that organization to these Terms, and "you" includes that organization.

3. The Service

Emcognito lets you create email aliases on domains we operate (for example, abc123@emcognito.com) and forwards mail sent to those aliases to your real inbox. Until November 3, 2026, you can reply from an alias on the web on any plan, including Free, so your real address stays hidden. From November 3, 2026, replying is a Plus and Pro feature, as described in Section 6. Composing brand-new mail from an alias is a paid feature. Aliases are not mailboxes — we do not keep your forwarded mail for any purpose beyond delivering it to you, no person at Emcognito reads it, and no software of ours inspects what it says (see the Privacy Policy for exactly how long anything is retained). Mail you write and send yourself through Emcognito is different: we check it automatically for spam patterns before it goes out, as described in the Privacy Policy under "Decisions we make automatically." The Service is provided on a best-effort basis and is not designed to be your only channel for time-critical, safety-critical, or legally required communications.

What happens at your monthly forward cap. If you exceed your plan's monthly forward cap, mail addressed to your aliases is not dropped on the spot: we hold it undelivered for a short window — currently 72 hours, stated in the Privacy Policy — and deliver it if your account regains capacity within that window, whether because you upgraded or because your cap reset. The hold is a courtesy and not a guarantee. Its capacity is limited, so when it is full, further over-cap mail is refused and permanently lost; anything still waiting when the window expires is deleted undelivered. In neither case can we recover the message, and we do not tell you or the sender which messages were lost. Do not rely on the hold to receive mail that matters to you — stay within your cap or upgrade before you reach it.

What happens if your account is on hold. If your account is on hold following a payment dispute, described in Section 11A, mail sent to your aliases is not held and not delivered — it is discarded when it arrives. It is not kept for later, and lifting the hold does not bring it back. We do not tell you or the sender which messages were discarded. A hold stops mail more completely than the cap does: at the cap we try to keep your mail for 72 hours, and on hold we do not keep it at all.

Incoming-volume safety pause. Unusually high incoming mail can trigger per-alias or per-account limits before more forwarding quota is spent. Accepted messages wait while processing is paused; you can review aliases and explicitly resume a limited batch in the dashboard, or contact support. Another burst can pause processing again. This is separate from the quota hold: safety-paused mail has no automatic 72-hour expiry and remains until delivered or separately deleted through verified mail-host handling. Suspending or deleting an alias does not itself erase previously accepted safety-paused mail. Older waiting mail is flagged for operator review. Queue or disk pressure can temporarily stop new SMTP intake, allowing sending servers to retry according to their policies. This protection does not establish misconduct by the recipient and is not a delivery guarantee.

4. Your account and sign-in

Older sessions without the current immutable account binding must complete fresh email-link verification before continuing. This identity check does not change your aliases or allowance.

We use passwordless single-use magic links and optional passkeys. You are responsible for keeping access to your registered email account, devices, platform accounts that sync passkeys, and recovery methods secure. Tell us at hello@wm.emcognito.com if you believe your account has been accessed without your permission. You are responsible for activity that occurs under your account.

5. Acceptable use

You agree not to use the Service, or any alias, to:

• send spam or bulk unsolicited mail, or violate the CAN-SPAM Act or any anti-spam, marketing, or telemarketing law;
• send, request, or distribute unlawful, fraudulent, infringing, harassing, or abusive content, or material that exploits minors;
• impersonate another person or organization, or use an alias to commit fraud, phishing, or identity theft;
• evade a ban, suspension, blocklist, or other enforcement action on another service;
• distribute malware, attempt to gain unauthorized access to any system, or probe, scan, or test the security of the Service without our prior written permission;
• resell, sublicense, or commercially redistribute the Service without our written agreement;
• register or attempt to sign in with an email address at a domain we operate, including @emcognito.com, unless we have specifically authorized that use in writing;
• pay for the Service with a payment method you are not authorized to use, or dispute a charge as fraudulent or unauthorized when you did authorize it;
• create or use an account to get around a ban, hold, or other enforcement action we have applied to you, including by signing up with a different email address; or
• violate any applicable law or the rights of others.

You are solely responsible for the mail you send and receive through the Service and for complying with the laws that apply to you. If you break these rules we may apply the holds, bans, and terminations described in Sections 11 and 11A.

6. Plans, billing, and taxes

Free allowances and multiple accounts. You may not create or use additional accounts to multiply a free allowance or evade a quota. Free accounts whose verified addresses resolve to the same personal Gmail mailbox share one free allowance automatically, including existing usage. These checks do not merge your sign-ins, aliases, or messages. Similar email spelling or a shared network alone does not automatically establish a violation. You may request a review or explain a legitimate exception by emailing hello@wm.emcognito.com.

The Service offers a free plan and paid plans (currently Plus and Pro), described on our Pricing page. Paid plans are billed in advance on a monthly or annual cycle through our payment processor, Stripe. Stripe may calculate applicable tax from the billing details you enter; any tax charged is shown before you confirm payment. You authorize us and Stripe to charge your payment method for the amount displayed at checkout and later authorized renewals.

Shared allowance from matching prefixes. When automatic quota protection is enabled, matching verified email prefixes across different providers, matching recent authenticated browser observations, and forwarding activity after a related account exhausted its allowance can place two Free accounts on one shared allowance, including existing usage. This does not establish common ownership or prove abuse. The relationship remains through monthly resets unless separate allowances are restored after review. Paid plans retain their own allowances. If the shared allowance is exhausted, incoming mail follows the normal over-cap holding policy of up to 72 hours; asking for review does not extend that deadline. You may request human review and explain a mistaken connection without purchasing a plan. See our Privacy Policy for the data used and review contact.

Free accounts on one browser. Free accounts that presented the same recent authenticated browser identifier are placed on one shared allowance automatically, including existing usage, at any level of use. Similar spelling, email prefixes, or a shared network do not trigger it on their own, and paid plans are not included. Accounts linked this way, or by the same Gmail mailbox, can also be banned together; see Section 11A. The effects and review rights in the paragraph above apply in the same way. If you share a computer with someone who has their own account, you can ask us to restore separate allowances.

Referral rewards. New rewards require both accounts to be at least seven days old and the referred account to create an alias itself and receive at least one qualifying forward; the alias created automatically at sign-in, aliases created through the developer API, and test messages do not qualify. Each account can qualify at most four referral rewards. Self-referrals, related-account restrictions, reciprocal referrals and review flags can defer a reward. Referral-group signals are reviewed rather than treated as proof of abuse. Existing earned bonuses are preserved. Ask support to review a deferred reward.

Features that need a paid plan. These features work only while your account is on Plus or Pro: (a) replying from an alias, on the web or from your own mail app; (b) creating aliases from your phone, through the iPhone Shortcut or through the Android share sheet and home-screen shortcut; and (c) new-sender alerts with one-tap links that pause an alias or block a sending domain. Free accounts keep the web reply and the Android share sheet and home-screen shortcut until November 3, 2026; from that date they need Plus or Pro. A reply, from the web or from your mail app, counts toward your plan's monthly send allowance and daily compose limit, and is refused once either is used up.

Replying from your own mail app. Mail forwarded to a Plus or Pro account carries a reply address unique to that message, so you can reply to it from your own mail app. Mail forwarded before this feature was turned on does not carry one. We deliver a reply sent to it only if it comes from the email address you sign in with, and only if your mail provider's SPF and DKIM checks pass for that address; any other reply is refused and not delivered. A reply address stops working 365 days after the forward, or earlier if you pause or delete the alias. We remove your own address from the reply before it goes out, so the recipient sees only the alias.

Phone shortcuts. A device token you create for a phone can only create new aliases; it cannot read, change, or delete anything. You can have up to 5 and revoke any of them from your account. Anyone holding the token can create aliases on your account, so revoke it if you lose the device.

Blocking a sending domain. When you block a domain on an alias, mail from that domain and its subdomains to that alias is deleted on arrival without being forwarded, does not count toward your allowance, and is recorded in your Delivery Log as blocked. Neither you nor the sender is told about each message. A block matches the domain shown in the message's From line, so it can also stop mail that only claims to be from that domain. You can unblock a domain at any time in the app.

If you move from a paid plan to Free. When your paid access ends, the features above stop: replies are refused, device tokens stop working, alerts stop, and blocks stop being applied, so mail from a domain you blocked is forwarded again. We keep your reply addresses, device tokens, and block lists for 30 days. If you return to Plus or Pro within those 30 days they work again; after 30 days on Free we delete them.

Checkout recovery. Only one checkout attempt may be active for an account at a time. If a billing operation is uncertain, checkout or account-record deletion may wait while we reconcile it with Stripe. The dashboard shows pending or review status; contact support rather than repeatedly opening new checkouts. Guest checkout remains unavailable.

7. Automatic renewal and how to cancel

Paid subscriptions renew automatically. Unless you cancel, your subscription will automatically renew at the end of each billing period (monthly or annual) and your payment method will be charged the then-current price for the next period, plus applicable taxes, until you cancel. By subscribing you give your express consent to this automatic renewal.

You can cancel at any time from your billing settings inside the app (which opens the Stripe customer portal) — the same online channel you used to subscribe. Cancellation stops the next renewal; you keep paid access through the end of the period you have already paid for. (The Plus first-payment refund in Section 9 works differently: it ends Plus immediately.) Stripe makes payment records available through its hosted billing flows.

For annual subscriptions we will send a renewal reminder before the term renews where required by law.

Failed payments. If a renewal charge fails, our payment processor retries it. During that window your account uses Free limits, and we email you a one-click link to settle the open invoice or replace the card. If the payment has still not been collected seven days after the first failure, we cancel the subscription, write the account to Free, void the unpaid invoice, and pause your paid short aliases immediately. Short aliases resume if you subscribe again. Standard aliases are not affected.

8. Price changes

We may change plan prices or the contents of a plan. If we change the price of a plan you are subscribed to, we will give you reasonable advance notice by email before the change applies to your next renewal, and the new price will not take effect until your next billing period. If you do not agree to a price change, you may cancel before it takes effect.

9. Refunds

Plus: a 14-day self-serve refund on your first payment. Plus has no free trial. Instead, within 14 days after the date you are charged for your first Plus payment (the date on your receipt), you can refund that payment in full yourself from your billing settings inside the app, and your Plus subscription ends immediately when you do. The app shows the last day you can do this. This can be used once per account, applies to the first payment only (not to renewals or to a later re-subscription), and is available to Plus subscriptions only; Pro keeps its free trial and has no self-serve refund. The refund goes back to the payment method you paid with. Standard aliases are not affected. Short aliases pause 7 days after Plus ends, or immediately if the plan is cancelled for non-payment after the seven-day failed-payment window in Section 7, and resume if you subscribe again.

Otherwise we do not offer refunds, except where a refund is required by law or where we state otherwise in writing. You can cancel at any time, and cancelling stops all future charges — from the moment you cancel we will not charge your payment method for that subscription again. You keep paid access through the end of the period you have already paid for, and we do not pro-rate or refund the unused portion of that period. Nothing here limits any statutory right you have under the consumer law of your country of residence, including any right of withdrawal available to consumers in the EEA or the United Kingdom, or the refund we owe you under Section 11 if we terminate a paid account for a reason other than your breach.

10. Existing accounts (grandfathering)

Accounts that existed before our move to send-metered pricing are grandfathered for the period and at the cap described on the Pricing page. Grandfathering is a courtesy and does not change the rest of these Terms.

11. Suspension and termination

You can stop using the Service and delete your account at any time (see the Privacy Policy for how deletion works). We may suspend or terminate your access, with or without notice, if you violate these Terms — especially the Acceptable Use section — or if we must do so to protect the Service, other users, or to comply with law. Where practical and lawful, we will tell you why. If we terminate a paid account for a reason other than your breach, we will refund any prepaid, unused period.

11A. Payment disputes, holds, and bans

Payment fraud: immediate ban. If our payment processor, Stripe, tells us that a card issuer has reported a charge on your account as fraudulent — a dispute (chargeback) filed with the reason "fraudulent", or an issuer's early fraud warning — we ban your account immediately and automatically, as soon as that notice arrives, without notice to you and before anyone at Emcognito has reviewed it. After an early fraud warning we also refund the reported charge and cancel your subscriptions at once, so nothing more is charged to that card. Free accounts strongly linked to yours are banned with it, as described under "Bans" below. A dispute filed for any other reason, such as a service complaint or a duplicate charge, and a failed payment do not trigger this ban. The ban does not lift on its own — not when a hold ends and not when a dispute closes in our favour; a person has to lift it. You can ask us to review it at any time, as described under "Bans".

Holds during a payment dispute. The same fraud report also places your account on hold automatically, as soon as we receive it and before anyone at Emcognito has looked at it. The ban above takes precedence: while it stands, sign-in is refused too. While a hold is in place, forwarding, replies, composing, new and changed aliases, developer API keys, and new purchases all stop. You can still sign in, read your account and aliases, revoke an API key, open the billing portal, and contact us. Updating your card does not lift a hold, and lifting a hold does not lift a ban for payment fraud.

What happens to mail during a hold. Mail sent to your aliases while a hold is in place is discarded on arrival. It is not queued, not held, and not delivered later if the hold is lifted, and neither you nor the sender is told that a particular message was discarded. This is the same outcome described in Section 3 for mail that arrives when the over-cap hold is full.

How a hold ends. A hold ends automatically if the dispute closes in our favour. It does not end automatically if the dispute closes any other way. You can ask us to review a hold at any time by writing to hello@wm.emcognito.com; a person will look at it and decide, and we will tell you the outcome. We aim to reply within 5 business days.

Bans. Separately, we may ban an email address from Emcognito for serious or repeated abuse — including the conduct listed in Section 5. A ban refuses sign-in, ends your existing sessions, and stops all forwarding and replies. A person decides to ban an account, except for the immediate ban for payment fraud described above, which is automatic. When an account is banned, Free accounts strongly linked to it (the same browser, the same personal Gmail mailbox, or a shared allowance with such an account) can be banned automatically too, and a new account that signs in from the banned account's browser is banned and refused sign-in. Paid accounts are not banned this way. We do not notify you by email of a ban; if you write to us, we will tell you why. A ban lasts until we lift it, and lifting a ban also lifts the linked bans it caused. The banned address, and a protected identifier of its browser, are kept on a denylist as described in the Privacy Policy, including after the account is deleted. You can ask us to review any ban, including a linked one, by writing to hello@wm.emcognito.com; a person will review it.

What a hold means for what you have paid. A hold does not renew your subscription and does not extend the period you have paid for. Time that passes while a hold is in place is not credited back and is not refunded. If we end a paid account because of a dispute you filed over a charge you did in fact authorize, that is a breach of Section 5 and Section 9 applies: no refund. An account banned for payment fraud is treated the same way, unless a review shows the fraud report was mistaken; then we lift the ban and Section 11 applies. If we end a paid account for any other reason, Section 11 applies and we will refund any prepaid, unused period. Nothing here limits any statutory right you have under the consumer law of your country of residence.

12. Intellectual property

The Service, including its software, design, and content we create, belongs to Emcognito and is protected by intellectual-property laws. We grant you a limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use the Service for its intended purpose while these Terms are in effect. You keep ownership of the content you put into the Service (such as alias labels and notes), and you grant us only the limited rights needed to operate the Service for you.

13. Disclaimers

The Service is provided "as is" and "as available." To the fullest extent permitted by law, we disclaim all warranties, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. We do not warrant that mail will always be delivered, that the Service will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that aliases will work with every sender or recipient. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain disclaimers, so parts of this section may not apply to you.

14. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Emcognito will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or for lost profits, lost data, or undelivered or misdirected mail, arising out of or relating to the Service. Our total liability for any claim relating to the Service will not exceed the greater of the amount you paid us for the Service in the twelve (12) months before the event giving rise to the claim, or US $50. Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot be limited under applicable law, including, for consumers, any non-waivable statutory rights.

15. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold Emcognito harmless from claims, losses, and reasonable expenses arising from your misuse of the Service or your violation of these Terms or of applicable law. This section does not apply to the extent a claim results from our own wrongdoing, and it does not expand any liability you would not otherwise have as a consumer under applicable law.

16. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms. When we make a material change, we will update the "Last updated" date and give registered users reasonable advance notice by email before the change takes effect. Changes apply going forward only and do not retroactively change disputes that arose before the change. If you keep using the Service after a change takes effect, you accept the updated Terms; if you don't agree, stop using the Service and you may cancel.

Changes to the Free plan announced in the app. Starting in October 2026, we are telling Free accounts with a notice inside the app, without advance email notice, that replying from an alias (Reply securely in the delivery log) and the Android share sheet and home-screen shortcut will need Plus or Pro from November 3, 2026, as described in Sections 3 and 6. That is the advance notice we chose to give for this change, and it is not the email notice described above. Nothing you already paid for changes: these features stay on Plus and Pro, and no price changes. If you do not want to continue on the changed Free plan, you can stop using the Service or delete your account at any time.

Changes made without that email. The automatic bans added to Sections 5, 6, and 11A on September 30, 2026 — bans that extend to linked Free accounts, bans at sign-in from a banned account's browser, and the immediate ban for payment fraud — took effect when they were published, without advance email notice. We chose to start them without that notice because they enforce conduct these Terms already prohibited: fraudulent payments, disputing a charge you authorized, and creating accounts to get around a ban. You can still ask us to review any ban, as described in Section 11A.

17. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules. You and Emcognito agree to bring any dispute relating to the Service exclusively in the state or federal courts located in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and you consent to the personal jurisdiction of those courts. If you are a consumer, this section does not deprive you of the protection of mandatory consumer-protection laws of the country where you live, and it does not prevent you from bringing a claim in your local small-claims court where the law allows.

18. General

• Entire agreement: these Terms and the Privacy Policy are the whole agreement between you and Emcognito about the Service.
• Severability: if any part is unenforceable, the rest stays in effect.
• No waiver: if we don't enforce a right, that's not a waiver of it.
• Assignment: you may not assign these Terms without our consent; we may assign them to a successor (for example, in a merger or sale of the business).
• Force majeure: we are not liable for failures caused by events beyond our reasonable control.

19. Contact

Questions about these Terms, billing, cancellation, or a notice of a legal concern: hello@wm.emcognito.com.