File deletion
Files are overwritten three times and then deleted — not moved to a recycle bin, and not recoverable by undelete tools.
For Android
A Deadman’s switch for your phone.
It learns your daily rhythm — when you wake, what you open, how you move — and notices when that rhythm stops. Your phone asks you to check in. If you can’t, it can ask someone you trust to check on you, and only then sends the messages you left and deletes the files you marked. Nothing it learns about you ever leaves the device.
What it does
If you die or become unable to use your phone, Mortui carries out the instructions you left.
Message delivery
The messages you wrote go to the recipients you chose, with any files you attached, by email from your own Gmail, Outlook or SMTP account — only when the switch fires, and never by text.
Encrypted vault
Passwords, documents and letters in an AES-256 encrypted vault on your device, ready to attach to your messages. When the switch fires, the vault is erased once delivery is done.
A baseline, not a timer
After two to three weeks it knows what a normal day looks like for you. It reacts to days that fall far outside that — not to one quiet Sunday.
How it decides
Nothing is deleted or sent on the strength of one bad day. Every step below has to happen, in order.
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1Learn
For the first two to three weeks Mortui only watches: when the screen wakes, which apps open, how much you move.
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2Compare
After that, each day is measured against your own baseline. One unusual day is never enough.
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3Check in
Two unusual days in a row, or a phone untouched through hours you are normally active, and your screen asks you to check in. A fingerprint or PIN is all it takes.
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4Ask someone
Miss the check-in and a countdown starts. If you named an emergency contact, they are texted before it ends.
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5Then act
Only when the countdown runs out does anything get sent or deleted. Checking in at any point cancels everything.
See how detection works
Optional, before anything irreversible
A person can be asked to check on you first
You can name up to three emergency contacts. If you do, and a countdown runs four hours with no check-in from you, each of them gets one text from your own phone asking them to call you or come by. With a verified contact in place, the countdown stretches to twelve hours whenever the battery allows, so a human has time to reach you before Mortui deletes or delivers anything.
The text never names Mortui, never suggests you have died, and never carries your files or final messages. The moment you check in, everyone who was texted gets an all-clear. Emergency contacts are optional and included in the free version. With none added, no text is ever sent and the app never asks for SMS permission.
How the check-on step works- Sam listed you as an emergency contact. If they stop responding to check-ins, you’ll get one message asking you to call this number. No action needed now.
1If you add one: a text to confirm
You type in a number and tap Verify. That contact gets a single message saying you listed them and that nothing is needed now.
- Sam hasn’t responded to a check-in on their phone. Could you call them on this number?
2Four hours into a countdown: a request to call
If you have not checked in, each verified contact gets one text asking them to call this number or check on you. You choose the wording.
- Sam has checked in. No action needed.
3When you check in: an all-clear
Everyone who was texted is told you are fine. If nobody reaches you, the countdown still has to run out before anything happens.
Shown with the app’s preset wording, for someone whose name is set to Sam.
Your email
Mortui delivers your final messages through your own email account. If you connect Gmail or Outlook, Mortui uses Google’s gmail.send permission, or Microsoft’s Mail.Send permission, for one purpose: to send the messages you have written to the recipients you have chosen — and only when the deadman’s switch activates because Mortui has detected that you may be incapacitated or have passed away.
Mortui never reads, modifies, stores, or shares your email or contacts. It does not request access to read your inbox. Connecting Gmail or Outlook is optional, and you can revoke Mortui’s access at any time from your Google or Microsoft account settings.
Mortui’s use of information received from Google APIs adheres to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. For full details, see our Privacy Policy.
Your texts
If you add emergency contacts, Mortui asks for Android’s permission to send SMS, and for one purpose: to text the people you named and verified, from your own phone, asking them to check on you when you have stopped responding — and to tell them you are fine once you check in.
That is the only thing text messages are used for. Mortui holds no permission to read, receive, or intercept your messages, no access to your call log, and no access to your address book — numbers are typed in by hand. It never sends your files or final messages by text, and it never uses an SMS gateway or third-party service: each text goes out through your own carrier, like one you send yourself.
Emergency contacts are optional, and the rest of the app works without the permission. Exactly what is stored, what each message says, and when it is sent is set out in the Privacy Policy.
What stays on the phone
Everything. Mortui has no servers and no account to create. What it learns about your days is analysed and stored on your device, in a database encrypted with a key held in Android’s hardware-backed keystore. There is nothing of yours anywhere else, so there is nothing to breach.
Messages leave the phone only when the switch fires, through the email account you connected. Texts, if you set them up, go out through your own carrier. Nothing passes through us.
The security architecture- Encrypted at rest
- AES-256 throughout: the database via SQLCipher, the vault, and your settings.
- Keys in hardware
- Encryption keys live in the Android Keystore and never leave the device.
- No cloud copy
- No backup, no sync, no telemetry. If the phone is gone, so is the data — by design.
- Locked behind you
- Changing what the switch does takes your PIN or fingerprint. Firing it does not.
What it does not have
One price, paid once. No subscription, no advertising, and no account to keep alive.
No subscription
$14.99, once
A tool for after you are gone cannot depend on a card that keeps renewing.
No ads
None
No tracking pixels, no ad networks, no interruptions in your most private app.
No cloud
On-device
Nothing stored anywhere but the phone. There is no server, so there is nothing to breach.
No AI
Arithmetic
Plain statistics, not machine learning. No models trained on your behaviour.
Set it up once.
Monitoring, check-ins, emergency contacts and file deletion are free. Messages, recipients and the vault are a single $14.99 purchase.
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