Documentation
Help & FAQ
This is the directory for Subter, the app for messages hidden in plain sight. You publish a signed identity; anyone can resolve it for free and verify it offline — so people can find and trust you before the first message.
Guides
Getting started
The two halves (account vs keys), the lifecycle, and what’s live today.
Keys & recovery
Back up your keys — and why lost keys can’t be recovered by anyone.
Verifying your identity
Connected accounts and domain verification (DNS / .well-known), step by step.
Sharing & verifying
Hand out your identity, and verify a contact for real (out of band).
Your data & privacy
What’s public, what stays private, and how to delete your identity.
Billing
Publish paid, resolve free — what a subscription unlocks and how to manage it.
The basics
What Subter is
A signed, public business card keyed by your fingerprint. It holds the identities you choose to publish — socials, email, domains, wallets — never your messages, contacts, or private keys.
Publish paid, resolve free
Publishing (and re-publishing) your identity requires an active subscription. Resolvinganyone’s identity — fetching their card, document, or key log — is free and needs no account.
Your keys never leave your device
Enrollment proves control of your keys without ever sending a private key. The service only stores public keys, signatures, and the documents you publish.
How this fits the Subter app
The Subter app hides your messages in plain sight and encrypts them with keys that stay on your device — the service never touches your private keys. But steganography still needs a recipient: someone has to hold your key to write to you. This directory is where they find and verify it. Same keys, same fingerprint, same promise — just the public side of it.
Verifying an identity
The fingerprint is the identity. Real verification means comparing it out of band— in person or over a channel you already trust — not taking a web page’s word for it.
A linked account on a profile is directory-attested: Subter checked the link and signed a statement about it. That is its own trust tier — useful, but weaker than comparing the fingerprint yourself. Documents and key logs are self-contained and self-signed, so they verify offline.
Want to add your own? The verification guide walks through connected accounts and domain verification (DNS / .well-known) step by step.
Look someone up
For developers
Everything resolvable is a plain REST read. Verification is offline, so you don’t depend on Subter being up to trust a document you already hold.
GET /@handleorGET /p/<fingerprint>— the human profile page.GET /card/<fingerprint>— the text contact card.GET /doc/<fingerprint>— the signed identity document (JSON).GET /kel/<fingerprint>— the key event log.GET /resolve/subter/<handle>— handle → fingerprint.GET /.well-known/subter-service-key— the verify key to pin.
FAQ
Do I need the Subter app to use this?
To publish, yes — your identity is signed by the keys the app holds on your device, so enrolling and publishing happen with the app in hand. To resolve anyone, no: looking up a handle or fingerprint is a plain, free web read that needs no app and no account.
Is my data private?
Everything in a published document is public by design — that is the point of a directory. What stays private is everything you don’t publish: your messages, your contacts, and your private keys, which never leave your device. Read paths keep no per-user logs.
Can anyone look me up without an account?
Yes. Resolving is free and unauthenticated — that’s the honest answer to “who can see this?”: everyone. Your profile only appears once you’ve enrolled a key and have an active subscription.
What happens to my identity if I stop paying?
Your account and key are kept, but your public presence is withdrawn from discovery until you re-subscribe. Contacts who already have your fingerprint can still resolve you.
Does a verified badge here mean I’ve verified someone?
No. A directory attestation is not out-of-band verification. To actually verify someone, compare their fingerprint through a channel you already trust.
Do you ever see my private key?
Never. No endpoint accepts a private key. Enrollment proves you control your keys using signatures and a challenge — the secret stays on your device.
Can I change my theme?
Yes — use the Theme menu in the top bar. The five themes mirror the Subter app, each with light and dark variants. The choice is stored in your browser.
Still stuck? Go to your account, read the API reference, or email tubers@subter.app.