Terms of Service

Last updated November 8, 2024

1. Introduction From everyone at Alby, thank you for using our products and services! We build them to provide you a better experience for payments online. Many people are using Alby every day. Because we don't know every one of our users personally, we have to put in place some Terms of Service to help keep the ship afloat. These terms of service constitute a legally binding agreement (Agreement) made between you, whether personally or on behalf of an entity (“you” or “User(s)”) and Alby Inc., (“Alby”, “we”, “us”, or “our”), concerning your access to and use of our services (“Services”) which include the website, the Alby Account, the Alby Buzz plan, the Alby cloud infrastructure service and the Alby APIs and use of our products (“Products”) which include the Alby Browser Extension, the self-custodial Alby Hub and Alby Go.

2. General By accepting these terms and accessing or using the Products and Services, you agree that you have read, understood, and accepted all of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement that apply to our Products and Services, as well as our Privacy Policy. You affirm that you are the older of 18 years old or the age of majority as required by your local law and have the capacity to enter into this Agreement. If you are accessing the Products and Services on behalf of the company you work for, you also affirm you have the proper grant of authority and capacity to enter into this Agreement on behalf of such company. We may change the terms of this agreement and supplemental agreement at any time without prior notice. Any changes will take effect immediately when posted (unless specifically indicated otherwise), and your continued use of the Products and Services means you have accepted these changes.

3. Accuracy, Completeness, and Timeliness of Information We are not responsible if information made available in the Products and Services is not accurate, complete or current. The material in the Products and Services is provided for general information only and should not be relied upon or used as the sole basis for making decisions without consulting primary, more accurate, more complete or more timely sources of information. Any reliance on the material in the Products and Services is at your own risk. This site may contain certain historical information. Historical information, necessarily, is not current and is provided for your reference only.

4. Modifications to the Products and Services We reserve the right at any time to modify or discontinue the Products and Services (or any part or content thereof) without notice at any time. We have no obligation and shall not be liable to you or to any third-party for any modification, price change, suspension or discontinuance of the Products and Services.

5. Products and Services, License We do not warrant that the quality of any Products and Services purchased or obtained by you will meet your expectations, or that any errors in the Products and Services will be corrected. Unless explicitly stated otherwise, we own or license all intellectual property rights related to the Products and Services. The Products and Services are protected by intellectual property laws and treaties around the world. We grant you a limited, non-exclusive, revocable, non-transferable, non-sublicensable right to use the Products and Services during the Term for your own internal purposes except otherwise specified. You must not use any part of the content on the Services for commercial purposes without obtaining a license to do so from us. All our trademarks, service marks, trade names, logos, domain names, and any other features of our brand are our sole property. These Terms of Service do not grant any rights to use any such brand features whether for commercial or non-commercial use.

6. Your Alby Account To become a user of the Services, You must establish an account (an “Account”). Please note, using the self-custodial Alby Hub, the Alby Browser Extension or Alby Go does not require an Account. Approval of your request to establish an Account will be at the sole discretion of Alby. Each Account and the user information and password for each Account (the “Account ID”) is for Your sole use and must not be transferred to a third-party with the right to access Your Account ID or Account. To use any of the Services, or to create an Account, you must meet at least the following conditions (“Conditions”):

You will be asked to submit certain information about Yourself (“Registration Information”) to establish an Account. The provided information must be valid, current, complete and accurate. You agree to maintain and promptly update the Registration Information to keep it accurate and current.
You may not select or use an Account ID of another person with the intent to impersonate that person.
You will maintain the accuracy of such information and promptly update such Registration Information as necessary.
You have the legal capacity and you agree to comply with this agreement.
If you are an entity, you must be legally organized and operating under the laws of your jurisdiction.
You will not use the Account for any illegal or unauthorized purpose.
Your use of the Account will not violate any applicable law or regulation.
If you are an individual, you must not be located in, or under the control of, any sanctioned or embargoed jurisdiction or a jurisdiction where our services are restricted. If you are an entity, you must not be owned or controlled by anyone in such locations.
If you are an individual, you must not be on, or if you are an entity, not owned or controlled by anyone on, U.S. or international sanctions lists, including the Office of Foreign Assets Control's SDN list, the U.S. Department of Commerce's Denied Persons List, and similar watchlists

By making an account or using the services, you represent and warrant that you meet all of the Conditions. If you stop meeting the Conditions, you must immediately notify us and stop using your Account and the Services. We reserve the right to remove your Account in this case. We also reserve the right, to reclaim, or change a username (e.g. your lightning address) you select if we determine, in our sole discretion, that such username is inappropriate, obscene, or otherwise objectionable. Even if you meet the Conditions, we may, in our sole discretion, determine that you’re not eligible to have an Account or use the Services.

7. Responsibility You are fully responsible for how you use the Products and Services. You are responsible for all activities that occur on your Account, whether or not you know about them. You will ensure the security and confidentiality of Your Account ID and will notify Alby immediately by email at by email at support@getalby.com, if any Account ID is lost, stolen or otherwise compromised. It is your responsibility to keep a backup of all credentials, including the unlock password, the recovery phrase, private keys and other sensitive information related to the Products and Services and to keep this backup outside of the Products and Services. If you do not maintain a backup outside of the Products and Services, you will not be able to access the assets previously accessed using Products and Services. You are responsible for the use of Products and Services by any user who accesses Products and Services with your account credentials. You are responsible for obtaining all necessary rights and permissions to permit processing of Content (as defined below) in the Alby infrastructure service.

8. Password Management With respect to the Products, Alby does not receive or store the unlock password, nor any recovery phrase or private keys. Alby cannot assist you with password retrieval. You are solely responsible for remembering, storing and keeping secret the password and recovery phrase. The assets you have associated with the Products may become inaccessible if you do not know or keep secret your password, private keys and recovery phrase. Any third party with knowledge of one or more of your credentials (including, without limitation, a recovery phrase or password) can access the assets via your Products or recover your funds in another app and initiate transactions. When you use the Products and Services, we strongly recommend that you: (i) create a strong password that you do not use for any other website or online service; (ii) provide accurate and truthful information; (iii) protect and keep secret all credentials such as the recovery phrase; (iii) protect access to the used Products and Services; (iv) promptly notify us if you discover or otherwise suspect any security breaches related to the Products and Services; and (v) create a backup of the recovery phrase and passcode. You agree to take responsibility for all activities that occur with the Products and accept all risks of any authorized or unauthorized access to the Products and Services used, to the maximum extent permitted by law.

9. Transactions Alby shall not be liable to you for any malformed transaction payloads created using our Products and Services. Once transaction details have been submitted to the network, we cannot assist you in canceling or otherwise modifying the transaction or transaction details. Alby has no control over your assets stored by the Products and does not have the ability to facilitate any cancellation or modification requests.

10. Alby's Cloud Infrastructure Service In combination with an Alby Account, we are offering a cloud infrastructure service to give you the opportunity to self-host your Alby Hub app. This offering is optional and is part of Paid Products and Services. There are no service level commitments, however, Alby uses its best effort to maintain high service levels and minimize downtimes. It is agreed between Alby and the user that during an incident the objective of us will be to expeditiously resolve the incident and make reasonable assessment of the severity and call for certain elevated incident response. Any planned maintenance and downtime of the Alby infrastructure service will be announced upfront. There might be emergency changes that leave no time for notifications to you. Service interruptions may happen due to unrecoverable underlying infrastructure failure from hardware providers or any components, services, connections that are outside Alby's control. Examples: Any Force Majeure incidents that impact the accessibility of cloud infrastructure locations of Alby, any performance and service level deviations due to targeted attacks on the platform by anyone or due to the breach of fair or projected usage patterns by users, distributed Denial of Service attack originating from any server or sudden burst of requests not in line with the previously known traffic patterns.

11. Ownership and Control You retain all ownership and intellectual property rights in and to your Content. The use of the Alby infrastructure service will not affect your ownership or license rights in Content. Content consists of all data, software such as the self-custodial Alby Hub app, and information that you authorize access to, input to or run through the Alby cloud infrastructure service. We retain all ownership and intellectual property rights in the Alby Account service and the cloud infrastructure service, derivative works thereof, and anything developed or delivered by or on behalf of us under this Agreement. This means you retain full ownership of the self-custodial Alby Hub app when you self-host the app with the Alby cloud infrastructure service. Alby has no control over the data that a user provides to form any transaction using the Products; or how transactions are processed. Alby therefore cannot and does not ensure that any transaction details you submit via the Products will be confirmed by the network. The transaction details submitted by you via Products provided by us may not be completed, or may be substantially delayed, by the network used to process the transaction. We do not guarantee that Products can transfer title or right in asset or make any warranties whatsoever with regard to title.

12. Paid Products and Services Some of the Products and Services are provided on the basis of payment. The fees, duration and conditions applicable to the purchase are described in the dedicated sections of the according Products and Services. By using the Products and Services, you agree that we may collect fees. Please note that our fees are subject to change. We will provide you notice of changes in our fees by communicating them to you in writing or posting the changes to the Products and Services. Your continued use of the Products and Services after the effective date of such change will constitute your agreement to pay the updated fees. These fees are an essential part to be able to maintain and improve the high standards you've come to expect from us. The user may incur charges from third parties by using the Products. One example are network fees required to use an asset's network applicable to an asset transaction. Alby may attempt to calculate such a fee for you. Our calculation may not be sufficient, or it may be excessive. You are solely responsible for selecting and paying any such fee and Alby shall not advance or fund such a fee on the user's behalf. Alby shall not be responsible for any excess or insufficient fee calculation. Lightning Service Providers, such as those providing incoming liquidity, may have their services included in Alby's Products, such as the self-custodial Alby Hub, and in Alby Services as part of the subscription. In these cases, the user enters into a direct contractual relationship with the Lightning Service Provider. If included in Services as part of the subscription Alby may advance the fees on behalf of the user. If included in the Products, the user is solely responsible for paying fees to the Lightning Service Provider. In any case Alby cannot be held liable by users for any issues arising from the use of Lightning Service Providers including impaired payment routing, high routing fees, or unwanted channel closures and will not reimburse any fees or costs associated with these services.

13. Third-party Tools We may provide you with access to third-party tools which we neither monitor nor have any input or control over. You acknowledge and agree that we provide access to such tools ”as is” and “as available” without any warranties, representations or conditions of any kind and without any endorsement. We shall have no liability whatsoever arising from or relating to your use of third-party tools. Any use by you of optional tools offered through the Products and Services is entirely at your own risk and discretion and you should ensure that you are familiar with and approve of the terms on which tools are provided by the relevant third-party provider(s). Please review carefully the third-party's policies and practices and make sure you understand them before you engage in any transaction. Complaints, claims, concerns, or questions regarding third-party products should be directed to the third-party.

14. Fee Credits By not finishing the setup of your Alby account which requires connecting a wallet like the self-custodial Alby Hub, payments received are added to your Alby account as fee credits. These fee credits are solely a digital representation of value within the Alby Products and Services system. Fee credits are only intended for the purchase and use of Alby products and services, such as the subscription for Alby Cloud or for opening a lightning network channel during Alby Hub wallet setup. You understand and agree that:

Fee credits do not confer vested rights or entitlements to any property or cash-equivalent value.
Fee credits are non-transferable and cannot be sold, assigned, exchanged, or otherwise transferred between accounts.
Alby reserves the right to manage, regulate, control, modify or eliminate credits at its sole discretion, and Alby shall have no liability to you or anyone for the exercise of such rights.
Alby reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to manage, regulate, modify, or eliminate credits, except as required by law. Alby will not be liable to you or any third party for the value or availability of any credits.
Fee credits may expire upon account termination or other specified conditions.

Any material changes to credit policies will be communicated in advance. By creating your Alby account, holding or using fee credits, you acknowledge and agree to these terms and conditions.

15. Termination and Suspension You can cancel your subscription at any time by logging into your Alby Account. Your cancellation will take effect at the end of the current paid term. If Alby terminates or suspends a user's account for any reason, the user is prohibited from registering and creating a new account under their name, a fake or borrowed name, or the name of any third party, even if the user may be acting on behalf of the third party. In addition to terminating or suspending the account, we reserve the right to take appropriate legal action, including without limitation pursuing civil, criminal, and injunctive redress.

16. Acceptable Use You agree not to use Products and Services in ways that: (1) violate, misappropriate, or infringe the rights of any Alby entity, our users, or others, including privacy, publicity, intellectual property, or other proprietary rights; (2) are illegal, defamatory, threatening, intimidating, or harassing; (3) involve impersonating someone; (4) breach any duty toward or rights of any person or entity, including rights of publicity, privacy, or trademark; (5) involve sending illegal or impermissible communications such as bulk messaging, auto-messaging, auto-dialing, and the like; (6) avoid, bypass, remove, deactivate, impair, descramble or otherwise circumvent any technological measure implemented by us or any of our service providers or any other third party (including another user) to protect the Products and Services; (7) interfere with, or attempt to interfere with, the access of any user, host or network, including, without limitation, sending a virus, overloading, flooding, spamming, or mail-bombing; (8) violate any applicable law or regulation; or (9) encourage or enable any other individual to do any of the foregoing.

17. User Comments, Feedback, and Other Submissions If, at our request, you send certain specific submissions or without a request from us you send creative ideas, suggestions, proposals, plans, or other materials, whether online, by email, by postal mail, or otherwise (collectively, "comments"), you agree that we may, at any time, without restriction, edit, copy, publish, distribute, translate and otherwise use in any medium any comments that you forward to us. We are and shall be under no obligation (1) to maintain any comments in confidence; (2) to pay compensation for any comments; or (3) to respond to any comments. We may, but have no obligation to, monitor, edit or remove content that we determine in our sole discretion are unlawful, offensive, threatening, libelous, defamatory, pornographic, obscene or otherwise objectionable or violates any party's intellectual property or this Agreement. You agree that your comments will not violate any right of any third-party, including copyright, trademark, privacy, personality or other personal or proprietary right. You further agree that your comments will not contain libelous or otherwise unlawful, abusive or obscene material, or contain any computer virus or other malware that could in any way affect the operation of Products and Services or any related website. You may not use a false email address, pretend to be someone other than yourself, or otherwise mislead us or third-parties as to the origin of any comments. You are solely responsible for any comments you make and their accuracy. We take no responsibility and assume no liability for any comments posted by you or any third-party.

18. Personal Information Your submission of personal information through the Products and Services is governed by our Privacy Policy at https://getalby.com/privacy-policy.

19. Errors, Inaccuracies, and Omissions Occasionally there may be information in our Products and Services that contains typographical errors, inaccuracies or omissions that may relate to our Products and Services descriptions, pricing, and/or promotions. We reserve the right to correct any errors, inaccuracies or omissions, and to change or update information or cancel purchases if any information in our Products and Services is inaccurate at any time without prior notice (including after you have submitted your purchase). We undertake no obligation to update, amend or clarify information in our Products and Services, including without limitation, pricing information, except as required by law. No specified update or refresh date should be taken to indicate that all information in our Products and Services has been modified or updated.

20. No tax, legal, financial or investment advice You should not interpret any content provided by the Products and Services as tax, legal, financial, or investment advice. We have no special relationship with or fiduciary duty to You and Your use of the Products and Services does not create such a relationship. You agree and acknowledge that you are solely responsible for conducting legal, accounting and other due diligence review on the information posted by the Products and Services.

21. Warranties We strive to provide the best-in-class service. HOWEVER, OUR PRODUCTS AND SERVICES ARE PROVIDED ON AN AS-IS AND AS-AVAILABLE BASIS. YOU AGREE THAT YOUR USE OF THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES WILL BE AT YOUR SOLE RISK. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, WE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN CONNECTION WITH THE PRODUCTS SERVICES AND YOUR USE THEREOF, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. WE MAKE NO WARRANTIES OR REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES' CONTENT OR THE CONTENT OF ANY WEBSITES LINKED TO PRODUCTS AND PRODUCTS SERVICES AND WE WILL ASSUME NO LIABILITY OR RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY (1) ERRORS, MISTAKES, OR INACCURACIES OF CONTENT AND MATERIALS, (2) PERSONAL INJURY OR PROPERTY DAMAGE, OF ANY NATURE WHATSOEVER, RESULTING FROM YOUR ACCESS TO AND USE OF PRODUCTS AND SERVICES, (3) ANY UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO OR USE OF OUR SECURE SERVERS AND ANY AND ALL PERSONAL INFORMATION OR FINANCIAL INFORMATION STORED THEREIN, (4) ANY INTERRUPTION OR CESSATION OF TRANSMISSION TO OR FROM THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES, (5) ANY BUGS, VIRUSES, TROJAN HORSES, OR THE LIKE THAT MAY BE TRANSMITTED TO OR THROUGH THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES BY ANY THIRD PARTY, OR (6) ANY ERRORS OR OMISSIONS IN ANY CONTENT AND MATERIALS OR FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE OF ANY KIND INCURRED AS A RESULT OF THE USE OF ANY CONTENT POSTED, TRANSMITTED, OR OTHERWISE MADE AVAILABLE VIA PRODUCTS AND SERVICES. WE WILL NOT BE A PARTY TO OR IN ANY WAY BE RESPONSIBLE FOR MONITORING ANY TRANSACTION BETWEEN YOU AND ANY THIRD-PARTY PROVIDERS OF PRODUCTS AND SERVICES. ALBY MAKES NO GUARANTEE THAT YOUR USE OF THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES WILL COMPLY WITH ANY APPLICABLE LAW OR REGULATION.

22. Limitations of Liability Alby Inc. shall not be liable to you or anyone else for any loss or injury resulting directly or indirectly from your use of the Products and Services, including any loss caused in whole or part by any inaccuracies or incompleteness, delays, interruptions, errors or omissions, including, but not limited to, those arising from the negligence of Alby or contingencies beyond its control in procuring, compiling, interpreting, computing, reporting, or delivering the Products and Services. In no event will Alby be liable to you or anyone else for any decision made or action taken by you in reliance on, or in connection with your use of the Products and Services or the information therein. IN NO EVENT WILL WE OR OUR DIRECTORS, EMPLOYEES, OR AGENTS BE LIABLE TO YOU OR ANY THIRD PARTY FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, INCLUDING LOST PROFIT, LOST REVENUE, LOSS OF DATA, OR OTHER DAMAGES ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES, EVEN IF WE HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. NOTWITHSTANDING ANYTHING TO THE CONTRARY CONTAINED HEREIN, OUR LIABILITY TO YOU FOR ANY CAUSE WHATSOEVER AND REGARDLESS OF THE FORM OF THE ACTION, WILL AT ALL TIMES BE LIMITED TO THE AMOUNT PAID, IF ANY, BY YOU TO US DURING THE SIX (6) MONTH PERIOD PRIOR TO ANY CAUSE OF ACTION ARISING. CERTAIN US STATE LAWS AND INTERNATIONAL LAWS DO NOT ALLOW LIMITATIONS ON IMPLIED WARRANTIES OR THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF CERTAIN DAMAGES. IF THESE LAWS APPLY TO YOU, SOME OR ALL OF THE ABOVE DISCLAIMERS OR LIMITATIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU, AND YOU MAY HAVE ADDITIONAL RIGHTS. We are not responsible for loss of assets due to customer error. These include, but are not limited to, loss of recovery phrase, loss of credentials, configuring the same Products on other devices or recovering assets with existing backups. Furthermore, we are not responsible for loss of funds due to system outages. It is up to you to ensure proper backups and monitoring of your Products with us. We may elect to provide services that assist you with monitoring and backups from time to time, but such services are not intended to shift responsibility for monitoring and backups from you to us.

23. Indemnification You agree to indemnify, defend and hold harmless Alby and our parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, partners, officers, directors, agents, contractors, licensors, service providers, subcontractors, suppliers, interns and employees, from and against any claims, disputes, demands, liabilities, damages, losses, and costs and expenses, including, without limitation, reasonable legal and accounting fees arising out of your breach of these Terms of Service or the Terms of Service from a third party, or your violation of any law or the rights of a third-party.

24. Governing Law and Jurisdiction This Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of Switzerland under the exclusion of its conflict of law provisions and the International Convention on the Sale of Goods (CISG). The ordinary courts of Zug, Switzerland, shall have sole jurisdiction relating to any dispute arising out of or in connection with this Agreement. YOU AND WE AGREE THAT EACH MAY BRING CLAIMS AGAINST THE OTHER ONLY ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS, AND NOT AS A PLAINTIFF OR CLASS MEMBER IN ANY PURPORTED CLASS OR REPRESENTATIVE PROCEEDING. YOU AND WE EXPRESSLY WAIVE ANY RIGHT TO FILE A CLASS ACTION OR SEEK RELIEF ON A CLASS BASIS.

25. Dispute Resolution Any dispute, controversy, or claim arising out of, or in relation to, this contract, including regarding the validity, invalidity, breach, or termination thereof, shall be resolved by arbitration in accordance with the Swiss Rules of International Arbitration of the Swiss Arbitration Centre in force on the date on which the Notice of Arbitration is submitted in accordance with those Rules. The number of arbitrators shall be one; The seat of the arbitration shall be Zug; The arbitral proceedings shall be conducted in English.

26. Changes to the Agreement You can review the most current version of this Agreement at any time at this page. We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to update, change or replace any part of this Agreement to the website or via email. It is your responsibility to check our website and emails periodically for changes. Your continued use of or access to the Products and Services following the posting of any changes to this Agreement constitutes acceptance of those changes.

27. Termination The obligations and liabilities of the parties incurred prior to the termination date shall survive the termination of this agreement for all purposes. This Agreement is effective unless and until terminated by either you or us. You may terminate this agreement at any time when you cease using the Products and Services. If in our sole judgment you fail, or we suspect that you have failed, to comply with any term or provision of this agreement, we also may terminate this agreement at any time without notice and you will remain liable for all amounts due up to and including the date of termination; and/or accordingly may deny you access to the Products and Services (or any part thereof).

28. Miscellaneous This agreement and any policies or operating rules posted by us on getalby.com websites constitute the entire agreement and understanding between you and us. Our failure to exercise or enforce any right or provision of this agreement will not operate as a waiver of such right or provision. This agreement operates to the fullest extent permissible by law. We may assign any or all of our rights and obligations to others at any time. We will not be responsible or liable for any loss, damage, delay, or failure to act as a result of any act or event which occurs and is beyond our reasonable control, including, without limitation, acts of God, war, unrest or riot, strikes, any action of a governmental entity, weather, quarantine, fire, flood, earthquake, explosion, utility or telecommunications outages, Internet disturbance, epidemic, pandemic or any unforeseen change in circumstances, or any other causes beyond our reasonable control. If any provision or part of a provision of this agreement is determined to be unlawful, void, or unenforceable, that provision or part of the provision is deemed severable from this agreement and does not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions. There is no joint venture, partnership, employment or agency relationship created between you and us as a result of this Agreement or use of the Products and Services. You agree that this agreement will not be construed against us by virtue of having drafted them. You hereby waive any and all defenses you may have based on the electronic form of this agreement and the lack of signing by the parties hereto to execute this agreement..

29. Contact Information Questions about the Terms of Service should be sent to us at hello@getalby.com.