HandbookReference
What leaves your computer
PrismLCA works on your computer and makes no connection unless you switch a feature on, enter a key or click a button that says it will contact a server. This page lists every connection it can make, when, and what it sends.
The short version#
- No account, no cloud. Your models, databases, results, reports and chats are files on your computer.
- No telemetry, no crash reporting, no analytics, no licence server. PrismLCA does not report on how you use it.
- Nothing without you. Without a key and without a click, PrismLCA makes no request at all. No connection is open on first start, apart from the one-time download you are asked about.
- No identifiers. Where PrismLCA itself sends something, it carries no device, installation or user ID.
This page is a reader's summary. The binding text is the privacy notice, which ships with the app (SettingsAbout) and is on this website: privacy notice — the PrismLCA app.
Every connection#
| Connection | When it happens | Goes to | What is sent |
|---|---|---|---|
| Update check | Only when you choose Check for updates under SettingsAbout. A download starts only after you confirm it. | GitHub (USA), which hosts PrismLCA's releases | Your IP address and the PrismLCA version you run. |
| News on the start page | When you click Load news from prismlca.com on the start page, or at every start if you turned on Load news from prismlca.com at every start (off until you turn it on). | prismlca.com, hosted in Finland, delivered through Cloudflare (USA) | Your IP address and the time of the request. Server logs are kept no longer than seven days. |
| Search model download | Once, on first start, after you choose Download in the dialog “Search model needed”. Without it PrismLCA does not run; the alternative is to quit. | Hugging Face (USA), huggingface.co | Your IP address and the download library's user agent (versions of that library, Python and PyTorch). Nothing about you or your work. Afterwards the model runs from your disk only. |
| AI assistant, report writer, import matching Needs an API key | Once you enter a key under SettingsAIProvider: with every message you send, every chapter you let the assistant write, every import you let it match. | The provider you chose: OpenRouter (USA) or OpenAI (USA), under your own contract with them | Your message and the conversation so far, the parts of your model and results being worked on, what the tools return (which can include names and values from your background databases), attachments, skills and report text. |
| Voice input | When you click the microphone in the chat (with a key present). Recording starts and stops on click. | The same provider as the assistant | The audio you recorded and the language you picked. The transcript is then sent as your chat message. |
| Transport distances Needs an API key | Once you enter a key or token under SettingsTransport distances: when you use the Distances sheet, its address suggestions while you type, or the assistant's distances tool. | HeiGIT (Germany) for openrouteservice, or Mapbox (USA) if you chose it as geocoder, under your account | The place names and addresses you type, a country code if you set one, and coordinates for routing. |
| Waste statistics (Eurostat) | When the assistant uses its Eurostat tool — available while a provider key is present, until you switch it off under SettingsAIChat or in the chat's + menu. | The European Commission's Eurostat API (EU) | The dataset code and filters — country, waste and material codes, years. Nothing from your workspace. |
| External agents (MCP) | While Let external agents drive PrismLCA (MCP server) is on under SettingsAIMCP (off until you turn it on). | Nowhere by PrismLCA: the client on your computer connects over 127.0.0.1, which never leaves it | Whatever the client asks for: model contents, search results, calculation results, study metadata. What the client then sends to its own AI provider is governed by the client and your contract with that provider. |
| Links | When you click a link in PrismLCA. | Your browser opens the page | From there on, the page you opened applies its own rules. |
The tour on first start shows the same list as eight doors out: every one of them is opened by you.
Notes on the AI connections#
Because the assistant needs your own key, you are the provider's customer. PrismLCA has no server in between and never sees your key or your conversations. Some details are worth knowing:
- Web search, when it is on, runs on the provider's side. PrismLCA does not choose or know the search engine behind it.
- PDF attachments for a model that cannot read PDFs itself are converted to text by OpenRouter's parser, which runs at Cloudflare.
- Requests PrismLCA makes on your behalf: it asks OpenRouter for providers that do not collect data and for endpoints that retain nothing. Anthropic, OpenAI and Google models are exempt from the second request by default, because some of them have no such endpoint — the current default chat model is one of them, and so is every Gemini model, which Google serves only from its own endpoints (Vertex AI and Google AI Studio) that keep prompts for a limited time to detect abuse. They then run under the vendor's own retention terms. SettingsAILimits lets you make any of the three vendors strict. With OpenAI as provider, requests are sent without server-side storage. These are requests to the provider, not guarantees from PrismLCA.
What stays on this computer#
PrismLCA keeps all of this in your user folder and inside each workspace, and never uploads any of it:
- your settings, and your API keys — encrypted with the operating system's key store where one exists;
- the models and databases you imported, and the search index;
- the complete transcripts of your chats with the assistant, including what its tools returned, and copies of the files you attached;
- the assistant's research and review notes, your reports, and the audit log of changes.
Deleting a workspace removes its files; deleting the PrismLCA user folder removes the rest. Where these folders are is listed in Install PrismLCA.
Turning a connection off#
None of the features above is required; leaving one off only means that feature is unavailable.
| To stop … | Do this |
|---|---|
| News at every start | Untick Load news from prismlca.com at every start under SettingsGeneral. |
| The assistant | Remove the key under SettingsAIProvider. |
| Web search, voice input, Eurostat | Untick them under SettingsAIChat. |
| Transport distances | Remove the key for each service under SettingsTransport distancesAPI provider. |
| External agents | Untick the switch under SettingsAIMCP. |
Questions#
The privacy notice names who is responsible and your rights. Questions go to the contact form on the imprint page.