Privacy & offline data

Running Hermes locally is a privacy choice. Here is what stays on your machine and what to watch for.

What stays local

Data	Location
Conversations	~/.hermes/sessions/
Memory	~/.hermes/memory/
Skills	~/.hermes/skills/
Config	~/.hermes/config.yaml
Model inference	Ollama on localhost

Hermes does not collect telemetry or usage analytics. API calls go only to the LLM provider you configure. With Ollama, that's localhost.

What can leave your machine

Feature	Data leaves?
Ollama (local)	No
Telegram/Discord gateway	Messages via platform servers
Web search/browse tools	Queries go to web
Cloud fallback provider	Prompts go to API
Nous Portal tools	Via Portal subscription

For complete offline, disable web tools and cloud fallbacks. Use CLI only (no messaging gateway).

My privacy setup

model:
  provider: custom
  base_url: http://localhost:11434/v1

agent:
  disabled_toolsets:
    - web
    - browser
    - image_gen

approvals:
  mode: manual

No cloud provider configured. No gateway (or Telegram only when I choose to enable it).

Handling sensitive files

• Hermes with shell access can read anything your user can read.
• Don't run as root.
• Use the Docker terminal.backend for untrusted tasks.
• Review memory periodically; it may store sensitive facts from past sessions.

Backing up (stays local)

To move everything to another machine without any cloud service:

hermes backup                          # zips all of ~/.hermes/ to your home dir
hermes import ~/hermes-backup-<ts>.zip # restore on the new machine

For a single profile, use hermes profile export <name> / hermes profile import <file> (credentials stripped, safe to share).

Air-gapped checklist

• [ ] Ollama running locally, no outbound model API
• [ ] Web toolsets disabled
• [ ] No cloud fallback configured
• [ ] No messaging gateway (CLI only)
• [ ] No MCP servers with external access

This gives you an agent that never sends data off the machine.