Questions about Sentient

Sentient is a communication platform designed to make it much harder for scammers and impersonators to reach you while allowing people and organizations you trust to communicate with you. Instead of making you publicly discoverable through a phone number, email address, or username, Sentient builds communication around trusted connections.

Sentient provides another way to communicate, built around trusted connections and verified identity. You can continue using other communication services. Sentient's central difference is that it is designed to reduce the opportunity for unknown or impersonating parties to initiate trusted-looking communications.

Sentient's goal is to make safer communication broadly accessible. The FAQ should reflect the exact consumer pricing available at launch and distinguish consumer access from any paid business services.

Sentient doesn't require a public identifier for someone to find and contact you. Instead, two people establish a trusted connection using Sentient's connection methods. Once connected, they can communicate through Sentient without exchanging a phone number, email address, or searchable username.

You can establish a connection in person by scanning a QR code or remotely using a temporary six-digit PIN. Once the connection is established, the person becomes part of your trusted Sentient network.

Sentient is designed specifically to avoid the traditional model where knowing or discovering someone's phone number, email address, or username is enough to reach them. Communication is based on connections you establish rather than public contact information.

Phone numbers can be guessed, leaked, purchased, scraped from databases, or obtained through data breaches. Once someone has your number, they can often attempt to call or message you. Sentient is designed so that possession of a piece of public contact information isn't what grants someone access to you.

Sentient is designed around established, trusted connections rather than simply trusting a displayed name or an incoming phone number. A new account claiming to be someone you know does not automatically become the trusted connection you previously established with that person.

Sentient has a separate system for organizations. Rather than forcing consumers to determine whether an incoming account really belongs to a bank, company, or institution, Sentient is designed to distinguish verified organizational communication from ordinary consumer communication.

Business identity is handled separately from ordinary consumer identity. Organizations must go through Sentient's business-account process before operating as verified organizations, reducing reliance on names, phone numbers, logos, or caller ID alone as proof of identity.

Simply choosing a bank's name or copying its logo does not make an account a verified Sentient organization. Business accounts are subject to Sentient's organizational verification process before they can receive verified-business status.

Sentient is being designed so privacy is part of the communication architecture rather than an optional feature. Security mechanisms protect communications and account access, while Sentient aims to minimize unnecessary collection and exposure of personal identifiers.

Sentient's communication architecture should be designed so that employees do not need access to the contents of private conversations to operate the service. The final FAQ wording for this question should precisely reflect the encryption and message-storage architecture implemented in the production release rather than making a broader promise than the technology supports.

Post-quantum cryptography refers to cryptographic techniques designed to resist attacks from both today's conventional computers and future sufficiently capable quantum computers. It doesn't require a quantum computer to use; it runs on ordinary devices today.

ML-KEM is a standardized post-quantum key-establishment mechanism. Sentient uses ML-KEM as part of its cryptographic design to provide protection intended to remain strong against attacks involving future quantum computers. ML-KEM is standardized by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology in FIPS 203.

They protect against different cryptographic threat models. X25519 is a widely used modern mechanism based on conventional public-key cryptography, while ML-KEM is designed for resistance to future quantum attacks. Combining conventional and post-quantum mechanisms can provide protection without depending entirely on either assumption.

No responsible security system should promise that it is permanently or absolutely “quantum-proof.” Sentient uses standardized post-quantum cryptography designed to protect against currently understood quantum attacks, and its security architecture can evolve as cryptographic research and standards evolve.

Encrypted information can potentially be collected today and attacked in the future if sufficiently capable quantum computers become available. This threat model is sometimes called “harvest now, decrypt later.” Using post-quantum protection today can help address information that needs to remain confidential for a long time.

Sentient's account and trusted-device architecture is designed so losing a physical device doesn't automatically give whoever finds it control over your identity. Account recovery and trusted-device mechanisms provide a controlled way of restoring access while making unauthorized recovery more difficult.

A trusted device is a device that has been authorized as part of your Sentient account. Sentient uses device-level security mechanisms so account security doesn't depend solely on someone knowing a password or other easily transferable credential.

If you have access to Sentient, use Settings > Account > Delete account. You can also submit an external account-deletion request on the official Sentient website.

You can delete supported data using Sentient's existing controls where available, or submit an external request for specific data on the official Sentient website.