Your AI Memory Should Be Yours

Short answer: What your AI knows about your work is worth keeping, so it should live somewhere you control. Edwin stores your memory as a SQLite file on your own Mac, backs it up with encryption every night, and works with any MCP-compatible AI client, so changing tools never means starting over.

Why does it matter where AI memory lives?

The longer you work with an AI, the more it knows: your projects, your decisions, the people involved and what changed along the way. Memory built inside a single app lives on that company's servers, under its terms. If the product shuts down or the terms change, that history stays behind. It happens: in October 2025 the AI companion Dot shut down, about 16 months after it launched in June 2024 (TechCrunch (opens in a new tab)). Users could download their data first; the companion they had built up could not come with it.

What does "yours" mean in Edwin?

A file on your Mac. Your memory is a single SQLite file on your own computer.
Encrypted nightly backups. Every night Edwin writes an encrypted backup (AES-256, under your key) to your iCloud Drive.
Your key. Backups and snapshots are encrypted under a key you hold. Setup asks you to save it in your own password manager, then has you paste the saved copy back so Edwin can confirm it works.
Works with your AI tools. Any MCP-compatible client, such as Claude, can read your memory, and you can export it at any time.
A record you can verify. Each snapshot's fingerprint is recorded on a signed audit chain, and the portal's Verify checks it. If the chain is ever broken, Edwin lists the break for you instead of quietly repairing it.

Local-first, not local-only: to extract and check facts, Edwin sends text to AI providers (Venice, Google Gemini and Anthropic), and your backups go to your iCloud Drive. The privacy policy lists what goes where.

What happens if you lose your key?

Then the backups can't be decrypted. That's what it means for the key to be yours alone, and it's why Edwin's setup confirms you've saved a working copy.

What about decentralized storage?

We're also exploring Walrus, decentralized storage on the Sui network, as a way to keep encrypted snapshots off any single company's servers. It's an opt-in experiment, off by default; your backup is the nightly encrypted copy described above.

What should you look for in any AI memory?

Where does it live, and can you get a copy?
Who holds the encryption key?
Does it work with more than one AI tool?
Can you verify its snapshots haven't been altered?

Edwin's answers: on your Mac, with a copy in your iCloud Drive; you; yes, any MCP client; and yes, through the signed audit chain. Ownership is one of five problems Edwin is built around; the other four are in five ways AI memory fails.