Dead Drop

The dropis loaded.

Spies marked a mailbox in chalk when a drop was ready. Now it's a pin on a map: a message left at a real place for whoever comes looking. No names, no accounts, no trail. Fourteen days later it's gone.

Open the app Read the code
0250500 m
Contour interval 10 m
0°00′00″N 0°00′00″E · Null Island, Gulf of Guinea
How a drop worksFour steps, start to finish

Pin it. Walk away.

  1. 1

    Pin it

    Stand where it belongs and drop a pin. Placing a drop is the only time the app asks for your exact position.

  2. 2

    Leave word

    A title and up to 2,000 characters. Add a password, or keep it unlisted so only people with the link can find it.

  3. 3

    Talk under it

    Every drop has a thread. Messages are encrypted on your phone. The key sits in the link, after the #, and browsers never send that part to a server.

  4. 4

    Let it go

    After fourteen days at most, the drop and every message under it are deleted. Not archived. Deleted.

What people leaveSuggested settings on each

Small things, exact places.

  • Where you parked

    Pin the car before you walk off. When you come back, it's on your phone's list of drops with directions to the spot.

    Unlisted24 h

  • The spare key

    Tell a house-sitter or a guest exactly which plant pot. Send them the link and the password separately, and it's gone by the weekend.

    UnlistedPassword72 h

  • Treasure hunts

    Chain drops into a trail, each one's clue pointing to the next. Make them public and anyone nearby can play.

    Public7 days

  • Meeting point

    Pin the exact spot by the second stage or the north gate, so your group finds you without a dozen texts.

    Unlisted12 h

  • Lost and found

    Found a glove on a bench or keys by the bus stop? Say where they are now, or who's holding them, right where they were found.

    Public7 days

  • A heads-up

    Path flooded, gate locked, the good blackberries are on the left. A note for whoever walks this way next.

    Public72 h

  • A handoff

    Leaving something for a neighbour, a friend, or a buyer: say exactly where it is, and make sure only they know.

    UnlistedPassword24 h

  • A note for someone

    A message left somewhere that means something, for one person to read when they get there.

    UnlistedPassword14 days

Unlisted drops never appear on the map; only people with the link can find them. A password also hides the location until it's entered.

What the server keepsCheck it in the code

Short memory, on purpose.

Kept

  • The drop: its text, its pin, its expiryThat's the product. Gone at expiry.
  • Messages, as ciphertextStored, and unreadable to the server.
  • Reports to moderatorsDeleted after 30 days.

Not kept

  • Accounts, emails, phone numbersThere's nothing to sign up for.
  • Logs of who visitedNo access logs anywhere in the stack. Error logs carry no IP addresses.
  • Your IP addressRate limits use a scrambled copy, held in memory and never written to disk.
  • Your exact positionBrowsing nearby sends a position rounded to about a kilometre.
  • Where you looked on the mapMap tiles and place search are fetched by the server, so OpenStreetMap never sees you.

Text only on this instance: no photo or video uploads.

Run your ownDebian or Ubuntu server

One command.

Point two domains at a fresh server, fill in five settings, and run it from your own machine.

It sets the server up properly: firewall, HTTPS, automatic security updates, nightly backups, and a one-step rollback if an update goes wrong.

A small Hetzner server runs it for about €6 a month.

your machine
$ git clone https://github.com/paxiimus/deaddrop-privacy.git
$ cd deaddrop-privacy
$ cp deploy.env.example deploy.env   # server, domains, email
$ make prod-deploy
What your own instance can do
Photos and video
Switch on uploads for a group you trust. Photos have their location data stripped on upload. Private mode.
An access code
Lock the whole instance, admin included, behind one code you share. Change it to shut everyone else out.
Private exchanges
A mode for arranging a handoff between two people: unlisted, optional password, its own encrypted thread. Private mode.
Your own limits
How long drops last, photos per drop, file sizes, message length, messages per drop, drops per person. Private mode.
Moderation tools
A report queue, a switch that pauses the whole site behind a countdown, and one that turns messages off.
Your own domain
App, API and this landing page on your domains, with HTTPS certificates handled for you.
Backups and rollback
Nightly database dumps, a copy before every deploy, and one command to undo an update that went wrong.
The same privacy
No accounts, no visitor logs, scrambled IPs, maps fetched by the server. Running your own doesn't switch any of it off.
Managed instancesClosed for now

Your own instance. We run it.

For groups and organisations that want a private Dead Drop without running a server: your own domain, an access code, photos switched on, and your own retention rules.

  • Your domain
  • Access code
  • Photos
  • Custom retention
  • Encrypted backups
451

Not available in the United Kingdom. The Online Safety Act puts duties on any site where people can post for others to see, and a free, one-person project can't carry them. UK visitors get a 451 page instead.