What "local" means in Multime
Multime is a desktop app. Every profile, with its cookies, saved logins, proxy settings and fingerprint settings, is stored on the computer where you use Multime. There's no Multime account that holds a copy of your profiles, and no vendor database of your cookies.
When you share profiles with VAs, that still holds. Your computer hosts the team workspace, and VAs connect to it directly. Profile data goes from your computer to the VA's computer when they open a profile, and back when they close it. There is no Multime server in between.
What is stored where
| Data | Where it lives | Protection |
|---|---|---|
| Profiles, groups, tags, fingerprint settings | Multime's local database | Stored on your disk |
| Cookies | Multime's local database | Encrypted with AES-256-GCM |
| Saved logins: passwords and 2FA secrets | Multime's local database | Encrypted with AES-256-GCM |
| Proxy passwords | Multime's local database | Encrypted with AES-256-GCM |
| Browser data: the browser's own cookie files, local storage, IndexedDB, history | Each profile's own browser folder | Stored as the browser writes it, protected by your computer account |
| Browser engines | Multime's data folder | Each download checked against a SHA-256 checksum |
The encryption key is protected by the operating system: macOS Keychain on a Mac, Windows DPAPI on a PC. Copying Multime's database to another computer doesn't reveal the encrypted secrets, because the key stays protected by the operating system it was created on.
Settings → Storage & backup shows where Multime keeps profiles, engines and logs on your computer.
What still goes over the internet
Local doesn't mean offline. The main network connections are:
- The websites you open, through the profile's proxy. DNS lookups go through the proxy too.
- An IP check before each open, sent through the proxy to ipwho.is, ipinfo.io or ip-api.com. The answer sets the profile's time zone, language and location.
- Engine and extension downloads, when you install a browser engine in Settings → Kernels or add an extension from the Chrome Web Store.
- Team connections, between the owner's computer and VAs' computers, if you use team sharing.
- Integrations you add to automation flows, such as Google Sheets, an HTTP request or OpenAI, only when a flow runs them.
- Billing for paid plans, which Stripe handles.
The local API, which scripts use to open and close profiles, listens only on your own computer. It requires an API key by default and refuses requests that come from web pages.
What this means for privacy
There's no vendor-side copy of your sessions. Cookies act like logged-in sessions, and saved logins include passwords and 2FA secrets. With Multime, the only copy is on your computer and, when a VA has a profile open, on that VA's computer for the length of the session.
You decide who gets access. On team plans, you create each VA account, choose which profiles and actions each VA gets, and see every action in an activity log. Profiles in your private workspace are never visible to VAs. See team sharing.
A copied database isn't enough. Because the encryption key is protected by the operating system, someone who copies Multime's database file to their own computer can't read the encrypted secrets in it. Each profile's browser folder also holds that browser's own cookie files, which are protected by your computer account like any browser data, not by Multime's key.
Your computer's own security still matters. Anyone who can sign in to your computer account can open Multime. Use a strong login password and turn on disk encryption (FileVault on a Mac, BitLocker or device encryption on Windows).
What this means for backups
With a cloud tool, the vendor keeps the copy. With a local antidetect browser, backups are your job. Multime gives you two tools.
Automatic backup. Turn it on in Settings → Storage & backup. Once a day, Multime saves a copy of its database into a backups folder inside its data folder and keeps the last seven. The copy includes profiles, groups, proxies, cookies and saved logins. The secrets in it (cookies, saved passwords, 2FA keys and proxy passwords) stay encrypted with a key held by that computer's Keychain or Windows protection, so a backup can't be read on another computer. It doesn't include each profile's browser folder, such as local storage or history. Automatic backup is off until you turn it on.
Export. You can export selected profiles to Excel or JSON, and choose whether to include cookies, proxies and saved logins. An export with those included holds them as plain text, so store it like you'd store a password list: in an encrypted folder or password manager, never in an open shared drive.
Multime also protects you from one common cause of data loss: it won't open a browser when free disk space drops below the minimum set in Settings → Storage & backup (2,048 MB by default), because a full disk can corrupt profile data.
The honest trade-offs
| Cloud sync model | Multime's local model | |
|---|---|---|
| Where cookies and logins are kept | On the vendor's servers as well as your computer | Only on your computer, and on a VA's computer while they have a profile open |
| Opening the same profile on another device | Sign in on that device | Not automatic; see below |
| Backups | Kept by the vendor | Kept by you, with an automatic daily option |
| Team sharing | Goes through the vendor's servers | Goes through the owner's computer, which must be on |
No automatic sync between your own computers. The Solo plan covers 2 computers, but each one keeps its own profiles. To move profiles, export them and import the file on the other computer. Import reads names, remarks, groups, tags, logins, cookies, proxies and start pages; it doesn't carry fingerprint seeds, so imported profiles get new ones. On the Team and Agency plans there's another route: host the team workspace on your main computer and sign in to it from your laptop with your owner email and password. That covers profiles in the Team workspace, and your main computer has to be on.
Team sync depends on the owner's computer. VAs can sign in and open profiles only while Multime is running on the owner's computer and that computer is reachable. If your VAs work at night, host the workspace on a desktop that stays on.
A lost or broken computer can mean lost logins. There's no vendor copy. A backup of Multime's database can't be read on another computer, because its secrets are encrypted with a key held by the old computer's Keychain or Windows protection. Keep 2FA backup codes and important passwords somewhere else as well, such as a password manager, so you can sign in to your accounts again from a new computer.