Hearth watches for movement, never images or sound. Only the family you invite can see what it makes of that, and the detail of how it's all protected is below, in plain English first and the formal policy after.
The sensors can only report that something moved, or that the front door opened or closed, with a time. No cameras, no microphones, no images, no audio. That is all Hearth ever has to work with.
The hub only ever calls out. It carries its own unique security certificate, and every signal is encrypted on its way to Hearth and while it's stored. Nothing on the internet can reach into the home, and there are no router settings to change.
The written evening update is on from the start, and there's a single switch in Settings if you'd rather not. Only the day's headline figures are used to write it: wake time, room visits, outings, how the night went. Raw sensor events never leave Hearth. The dashboard, patterns and alerts work the same either way.
The account holder invites people by email, and can remove them at any time. Hearth staff have no routine access to your family's data, and any remote access to the hub for support is logged.
“Movement in the kitchen at 9:42am.” That's the entire message. No image, no sound, no identity. The sensors physically cannot record anything else.
The hub forwards each event over an encrypted connection to Hearth's servers in the EU, where the day's pattern is worked out and stored, encrypted at rest.
The dashboard, updates and alerts go to the family members you've invited, and nobody else. Hearth staff have no routine access, and any remote access to the hub for support is logged.
To write the evening update, one extra step is added: the day's headline figures (visit counts, wake and sleep times, outings) and the name you've given your parent in the app are sent securely to our AI provider to be written up in plain English. Raw sensor events never leave Hearth. Switch AI summaries off in Settings and this step stops.
Last updated: September 2026
Draft document. This privacy policy is a working draft and may be updated before launch. It reflects our current approach and commitments.
Hearth is a wellbeing monitoring system that uses passive sensors: motion detectors and a door contact sensor. There are no cameras, no microphones, and no audio recording of any kind. We believe care monitoring should be invisible to the person being cared for, and transparent to the family using it.
Hearth is a cloud-first service. A small hub in the home forwards sensor signals, encrypted in transit (TLS with a per-device certificate), to Hearth's cloud infrastructure hosted in the EU, where activity patterns are analysed and made available to your Care Circle through the app and dashboard. Sensor data consists of movement and door events only, never images or audio. Data is encrypted in transit and at rest. The hub only ever makes outbound connections and does not accept any inbound connections from the internet. Access to the dashboard requires a signed-in account.
We use a small number of specialist providers to run the service: cloud hosting, sign-in, transactional email, payment processing and, when AI summaries are switched on, an AI model provider. Each processes only what it needs to do its job. We never sell your data and never use it for advertising.
The written daily updates and weekly report are generated by a third-party AI model provider. AI summaries are switched on when your household is set up, so the app is useful from the first day, and can be switched off at any time in Settings. To generate a summary, aggregated daily metrics (such as room-visit counts, wake and sleep times, outing durations and activity trends) and the display name you have given the monitored person in the app are sent securely over HTTPS to the provider. Raw sensor events and addresses are never sent. The provider is contracted not to use this data to train its models.
Only invited members of the Care Circle can view dashboard data and receive notifications. Care Circle membership is managed by the primary account holder. Members can be added or removed at any time. Hearth Systems staff do not have routine access to your sensor data. Any remote access to the hub for troubleshooting is recorded in an access log, which we will provide to the account holder on request.
Hearth Systems Ltd is the data controller. The data subject is the monitored person (your parent). Our lawful basis for processing is the legitimate interest of the family members in monitoring the wellbeing of a vulnerable person, combined with the informed consent of the monitored person.
As a data subject, the monitored person has the right to:
When a household is set up, we ask the account holder to confirm that they have told the monitored person what Hearth does, and to record one of two things: that the monitored person agreed, or that they are unable to make that decision themselves and the account holder is acting in their best interests. That confirmation is stored with the account, and the account holder can review or change it at any time from Settings.
To exercise any of these rights, contact [email protected].
Hearth is designed for monitoring elderly adults living independently. It is not designed for, marketed to, or intended for use with children under 18.
We will notify all account holders by email of any material changes to this policy before they take effect.
Hearth Systems Ltd
Registered in England & Wales
Email: [email protected]