Your Diary, Your Secrets: The Story Behind MemoirME’s “Double Layer Encryption”

Whenever I pitch MemoirME at events, the very first question I always get isn’t about our cool features, but rather: “Hey, do you apply encryption to the diaries?”

And when I said “Yes, in-transfer encryption”, the immediate follow-up question is always: “So… does that mean you can read my secrets stored in your database?” 😑

To be completely honest, technically speaking, with standard encryption, the person managing the database (like me) could read it. But according to our policy, I would NEVER do that. However, an “honor system” promise isn’t always enough to make people feel safe, right? A diary holds your deepest thoughts! That’s why MemoirME decided to go all in and introduce Double Layer Encryption—essentially locking myself out of the system so you can write with 100% peace of mind.

So, how does it work? Let me explain it simply.

The “Box Inside a Box” Mechanism 📦

Normally, MemoirME is protected by the default encryption of Firebase (our tech stack) combined with standard HTTPS. Think of this layer as a “Postman”. When you save your diary, the postman takes your data, puts it in a box, locks it, and carries it away. While in transit, nobody can peek inside. But once it reaches the final destination (the database), he opens the box and stores the data.

With Double Layer Encryption, MemoirME gives you your very own “Personal Safe”.

You write your text, add photos, drop in videos… then put everything into your personal safe and lock it yourself with a unique key (called a Seed phrase). When the “Postman” arrives, you hand him your securely locked safe, which he then puts into his transit box. The result? When it arrives at the database, all I see is a locked safe—a bunch of meaningless characters. Your secrets are absolutely safe!

Won’t encrypting big photos and videos make the app lag? 🐢

A lot of you might wonder: if the app has to locally encrypt a massive chunk of multimedia data on your phone, will it slow everything down?
The answer is: Not at all! We handle the encryption process smoothly on a completely separate background thread (the magic of Dart & Flutter 😉), so it doesn’t affect your UI experience whatsoever. The locking process only takes about 1-2 seconds. It’s so fast you probably won’t even notice it happening!

IMPORTANT WARNING: The Golden Key 🔑

I need to emphasize this very seriously: MemoirME DOES NOT KEEP your Seed phrase, nor do we store it as plain text anywhere on our servers.

It belongs entirely to you. When you generate it, the app practically begs you: This Seed phrase is extremely important. Please, keep it safe! If you lose it, I’m sorry… but even God can’t save you. All diaries encrypted with that phrase will be lost forever. So please, keep it secure!

Now, go ahead and write in MemoirME with total peace of mind!