How we protect your data

We built Ask Linc to help people make better financial decisions — not to collect, sell, or exploit your data. Privacy isn't just a feature. It's the foundation.

You Control Your Data — Always

You choose what accounts to connect (or not).

You can disconnect any time — instantly.

You can delete all your data with one click. No dark patterns.

We never sell, share, or train on your data. Period.

Read-Only Access via Plaid

Ask Linc uses Plaid to connect to your financial accounts. Plaid is used by thousands of banks, apps, and fintech tools and is SOC 2 Type II compliant.

We never see or store your login credentials.

All access is read-only — Ask Linc cannot move or touch your money.

You can revoke access at any time, directly from your account or via your bank.

We Don't Store Sensitive Identifiers

We intentionally avoid storing personally identifiable information (PII) wherever possible.

No account numbers. No raw transaction descriptions.

We tokenize sensitive data before it ever touches our AI layer:

"Bank of America Checking"→ "Account_1"

"Chase Sapphire Preferred"→ "Card_2"

"Trader Joe's"→ "Merchant_12"

That means even if data flows through our system, it's anonymized — and not useful to anyone but you.

GPT, But Smarter (And Safer)

Ask Linc uses OpenAI's GPT models to answer your financial questions. But unlike typing into ChatGPT directly, we:

Anonymize your financial data before it's passed to GPT

Use the OpenAI API, not ChatGPT — your data is not used to train any models

Only send the minimum context required to answer your question

So you get the clarity of GPT — without the exposure.

Infrastructure & Encryption

All data is encrypted:

In transit (TLS 1.2+)

At rest (AES-256 where applicable)

We host our backend on Render and Vercel, using secure, industry-standard practices including environment isolation, access control, and daily backups.

No Tracking, No Ads, No Creepy Stuff

We don't use cookies for tracking or ad targeting. We use lightweight analytics to understand usage patterns — but never tied to your identity or data.

Want to Leave? No Problem.

You can:

Disconnect all linked accounts

Wipe all your data

Close your account

We'll respect that — no friction, no dark patterns.

Questions? Talk to a Human

Privacy is a relationship — not a legal checkbox. If you ever have questions, concerns, or suggestions, reach out directly through our contact page. We'll always respond, and we'll always be transparent.

"Ask Linc was built because existing tools made us feel vulnerable — pasting bank statements into ChatGPT, hoping no one sees. That's not good enough. So we made something better."

Your data. Your control. Real answers — without the risk.