Your Master Key, Your Data - Real Ownership in Jottii
Most apps tell you your data is yours. Then they hold the keys, and "yours" turns out to mean "available to you, conditionally, while we're around and you're in good standing."
Jottii's master key model is the architecture's commitment to actually meaning it. The catch is that real ownership is also real responsibility. Here's how the model works, why we made the call, and what to do so you don't end up locked out of your own writing.
The problem the master key solves
In a zero-knowledge app, the encryption key for your entries must never reach the company's servers. (See Zero-Knowledge Architecture, Without the Jargon.)
That creates a tension. If the key is on your device, what happens when you sign in on a new device? Or when you wipe your phone? Or when you forget your password?
A bad answer is "we'll keep a copy of the key for you." It looks user-friendly. It also means the company can decrypt your data, which breaks the zero-knowledge promise.
The right answer is "you choose the key. You keep it. You bring it with you to new devices yourself."
That's the master key in Jottii: a passphrase you pick at signup, and one we never see, never store, and never display back to you.
The signup flow
When you create a Jottii account, here's what actually happens:
- Enter your email and the 6-digit code we email you. That's the account layer — it tells us who you are, nothing more. No password. No third-party OAuth.
- Choose your master key. This is a passphrase you come up with. We require at least 14 characters with a mix of upper case, lower case, digits, and symbols, and we reject anything on the public-leak lists. A live strength meter helps you land on something strong. There is no "suggested" key, no copy button, no QR code; you type it yourself.
- Re-enter to confirm. The same passphrase, twice, before the workspace opens.
- Your workspace unlocks. From this point on, every entry you write is encrypted on your device with a key derived from that passphrase. The server stores ciphertext.
We never see the master key. We never store it. We can't show it back to you on any future screen, because we don't have it. The only place it exists is in your head.
That's the whole flow. Save the passphrase somewhere safe before you leave the screen — a password manager, a printed copy in a safe, anywhere outside Jottii.
What "the master key" actually means here
Under the hood, your passphrase runs through a slow key-derivation function (Argon2id) on your device, which produces the 32-byte symmetric key that actually encrypts and decrypts your entries. The derived key lives in your device's local secrets vault — the OS keychain on desktop and mobile, a non-extractable browser-managed key on web — only while you're unlocked.
When the device locks (a tab close on web, a sign-out, or the 7-day passphrase re-validation window expiring), the local secrets vault wipes its copy. The next time you open Jottii, you re-enter the passphrase, the device re-derives the key, and your workspace opens again.
For everything that follows, "your master key" means the passphrase you chose. The 32-byte derived key is a detail; you'll never need to think about it.
Adding a new device
Sign in on a second device, the same way:
- Enter your email and the 6-digit code we email you.
- Re-enter the master key passphrase you chose at signup.
That's it. Different machine, same passphrase, same Argon2id parameters, same derived key — the new device decrypts the same entries.
You don't paste a recovery phrase. You don't import a key file. You just remember the passphrase and type it.
Losing access — what happens
If you forget your master key, your data is gone. We say it loudly because it's the proof the system works.
This is true even on devices that look like they're still logged in. Each device only holds the derived key for the duration of an unlocked session — after a tab close on web, a sign-out, or the 7-day passphrase re-validation window expiring, that device wipes its copy too and asks you for the passphrase again. With no passphrase, no derived key. With no derived key, no decryption.
If you remember the passphrase but lose every device, you're fine. Sign in on a fresh machine, enter the passphrase, and your encrypted entries — still on our servers as ciphertext — decrypt back into a workspace you can read. The passphrase is portable; the devices are not.
There is no password reset flow. There is no master-key reset flow. Support cannot help you read your data, because support cannot read your data either. By design.
How to keep your master key safe
Treat the master key as the most sensitive secret in your Jottii life:
- Save it in a password manager (1Password, Bitwarden, KeePass, iCloud Keychain). The password manager itself is presumably backed up.
- Print it and keep it in a physical safe or sealed envelope you trust.
- For high-sensitivity users: split it across two locations using a simple secret-sharing scheme (write half on each of two paper copies, separately stored).
What to avoid:
- A note on your phone that syncs to a cloud you don't control the encryption of.
- An email to yourself.
- A photo on your camera roll (which probably backs up to a cloud).
- A Slack DM to yourself.
Each of those puts the passphrase in a place a third party could access — convenient, but it weakens the threat model.
The philosophical bit
A recurring critique of this model: "this is too hard for normal users." We hear it. We disagree, mostly.
The framing of "too hard" assumes the alternative — companies holding keys for users — is the floor. It is the floor for most apps, and we think the floor is too low. The bar for a journal — for the place you write things you wouldn't say out loud — should be that you, not a company, are in charge of access.
That bar requires you to take one minute at signup to pick a passphrase you'll remember and save it somewhere. Once saved, it doesn't bother you again. For 99% of users, the "I forgot" event never happens. For the 1% it does, the trade is the difference between having your journal back and not.
The broader pattern
Master-key models are common in cryptocurrency wallets, where the same trade-off applies: you own the key, you bear the consequence. Cryptocurrency users have lost billions to forgotten passphrases. They have also retained access to billions through correct passphrase storage. The model works when users take it seriously.
A journal isn't a Bitcoin wallet, but the trust contract is similar. Real ownership means real responsibility, and the master key is the artifact of that ownership.
And the other side: your data is one click away
Real ownership is also being able to take your data out whenever you want. One click in Settings → Export builds a zip with every Jottii entry as a Markdown file, plus a manifest. Re-importable into Jottii later, or open in any Markdown editor. There's no "request your data" form, no waiting period, no support ticket. The full guide is in Bring Your Notes From Anywhere to Jottii.
If this model fits your view of how a private app should work, Jottii is built around it — and remembering your master-key passphrase is the only complicated thing you'll be asked to do.