Last updated: 13 October 2026
This policy covers the CTO Teachings Assistant (“Assistant”), our inbox app at assistant.ctoteachings.com, and the Assistant connector your own AI assistant uses. It is separate from, and more specific than, the CTO Teachings website privacy policy, which covers our consulting business. CTO Teachings LLC is the controller of the information described here. Your use of Assistant is also governed by the Assistant Terms of Use.
Assistant connects to your Gmail, keeps the mail that arrives in your inbox, and lets the AI assistant you choose (for example Claude or ChatGPT) sort it by how much it matters to you and suggest replies. Assistant itself runs no AI model. The sorting and drafting are done by the assistant you connect, through the connector you authorise.
Assistant’s use and transfer to any other app of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.
In plain terms, for the data we receive from your Gmail account:
Account information, from Google Sign-In. Signing in uses Google’s identity token only. From it we store your email address, your Google account identifier, your display name and the URL of your Google profile picture (we do not copy the picture itself), and any roles on your account.
Gmail access. When you connect a Gmail account, Assistant requests these Google permissions:
https://www.googleapis.com/auth/gmail.readonly — to read the mail in your inbox and to search your Sent mail, as described below;https://www.googleapis.com/auth/userinfo.email — to know which address you connected;https://www.googleapis.com/auth/gmail.send — requested only when you first choose to send a reply from Assistant, and used only to send the replies you press Send on.Google gives us an access token and a refresh token for that account. We store them encrypted with a Google Cloud KMS key that only Assistant’s server can use. We also store the connected address, the permissions granted, when you connected it, and the bookkeeping Gmail needs to tell us about new mail.
Your inbox mail. Assistant asks Gmail to notify it (through Google Cloud Pub/Sub) when new mail reaches your inbox. When you first connect, it also reads up to 50 inbox messages from the last 14 days. For each inbox message it stores: the sender, recipients and reply-to address, the subject, Gmail’s preview snippet, the message body (as plain text, up to 50,000 characters), when it arrived, its Gmail labels, and the identifiers needed to reply in the same thread. Attachments are not downloaded or stored.
Your Sent mail. Assistant reads your Sent mail for two things. For each new message, it checks whether you have ever emailed that sender, and stores only the yes-or-no answer. While you set up your sorting rules, it reads your ten most recent sent messages to suggest how you greet people and sign off; those suggestions are shown to your connected assistant, and the sent messages themselves are not stored.
LinkedIn messages. Assistant has no connection to LinkedIn. If you choose to have LinkedIn email you about new messages, those notification emails arrive in your Gmail inbox and are treated like any other inbox message.
Sorting results, rules and replies. For each message we store the priority your assistant gave it, its short reason, any reply it drafted, and, if you sent a reply, the text you sent and when. We store your sorting rules in your own words (who always matters, what is urgent, what to ignore, your writing style), your first language, and when you connected an AI assistant.
Diagnostic information. When something fails in the website, it reports the error to Sentry, our error-reporting provider, including the error, the page, the app version, and your account identifier, email address and display name. For a session that hits an error, Sentry’s session-replay feature records a reconstruction of what was on screen, which can include the email you were viewing and anything you typed in that session. Ordinary sessions are not recorded. Our servers also keep operational logs, which include your account identifier and can include details of the Gmail requests they make, including message content. Logs and error reports are used only to keep Assistant running and secure, and access to them is restricted.
The connector gives the assistant you authorise the messages waiting to be sorted (sender, subject, snippet), the full content of a message when it asks for it, your sorting rules, and the setup suggestions described above, and lets it save a priority, a reason and a draft reply. It cannot send mail; only you can, by pressing Send. That assistant is run by its own provider (for example Anthropic or OpenAI), not by us, and what it does with the information is governed by your agreement with that provider. You connect it yourself, and you can remove the connector at any time in your assistant’s settings.
Assistant does not delete, archive, label, mark as read or otherwise change anything in your Gmail; it does not create drafts in Gmail; and it does not access your contacts, calendar, Drive or any other part of your Google account. It does not show ads, use advertising identifiers or run analytics trackers.
Your account and stored mail are kept in Google Cloud Firestore in the United States, in a Google Cloud project we control. Our servers run on Google Cloud Run, Gmail notifications pass through Google Cloud Pub/Sub, Gmail tokens are encrypted with Google Cloud KMS, and the website is served by Cloudflare. Error reports go to Sentry. These providers may process information in countries other than yours; we take reasonable steps to keep it protected in line with this policy.
We do not sell your personal information. We share it with the service providers that run Assistant — Google (sign-in, Gmail, Cloud Firestore, Cloud Run, Pub/Sub, KMS and logging), Cloudflare (website hosting) and Sentry (error reporting) — each processing it on our instructions. Your mail goes to the AI assistant you connected because you directed it. A reply you send goes to its recipients through Gmail. Beyond that we disclose information only where we are legally required to, where it is necessary to protect our rights or someone’s safety, or to a successor entity in a merger or reorganisation of our business, which would remain bound by this policy.
We keep your stored messages, sorting results, rules and account for as long as your account exists, so your inbox stays sorted. Gmail tokens are kept until you disconnect that Gmail account. Firestore backups are kept for seven days, so deleted data leaves our backups within a week. Gmail notifications not yet processed are kept by Pub/Sub for at most one day. Error reports are retained by Sentry, and server logs by Google Cloud, under their own retention schedules, on the order of weeks to months, not indefinitely.
Disconnect Gmail in Assistant’s setup screen to stop it receiving new mail and to delete the stored Gmail tokens for that account. Disconnecting does not delete messages already stored. You can also remove Assistant’s access at any time from your Google Account permissions page.
To delete your account and all of your data — every stored message, your connected accounts and tokens, your rules and your sign-in records — email [email protected] from the address you signed in with. We will delete it and confirm when it is done. You can also ask for a copy of what we hold about you, or for a correction.
Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, update, or delete your personal information, to object to or restrict certain processing, to withdraw consent, and to request a copy of your data. Email [email protected] or use our contact page and we will respond in line with applicable law.
Assistant is for people aged 18 and over, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children.
Sign-in and every request to our servers use encrypted connections. Gmail tokens are encrypted at rest with a dedicated Cloud KMS key that only Assistant’s server can use. Access to production data is limited to the people who need it. No system is perfectly secure, but we work to protect your information and to limit who can reach it.
We may update this policy as Assistant changes. When we do, we will revise the "Last updated" date above, and the change takes effect once posted on this page. We will not use data received from Google in a new way without telling you and, where required, asking for your consent.
Questions about this policy, a request to exercise your rights, or a request to delete your account: email [email protected] or use our contact page. The terms that govern your use of Assistant are in the Assistant Terms of Use.