Privacy and local access

By default, every listener in Loggerhead binds 127.0.0.1. The root receiver, the HTTP API, and the MCP server all stay on your Mac.

Defaults

Listener	Bind	Auth
Root receiver (gRPC and HTTP)	127.0.0.1	None needed. Loopback peers are always exempt.
HTTP API	127.0.0.1, OS-assigned port	None.
MCP server	stdio, started by your tool	Talks to the API on 127.0.0.1 only.

When you expose the root

To accept a branch from another machine, set the bind host to 0.0.0.0 or to one interface, and turn on the token. Do it in Settings → Ingest, or through the settings API.

Setting	Purpose
ingest_require_auth	Require Authorization: Bearer <token> on every non-loopback request.
ingest_token	The accepted token. Rotate it at any time. No restart.
ingest_tls_cert_file, ingest_tls_key_file	Serve the receiver over TLS. Both set means TLS on.

The engine logs a warning at start when it binds a non-loopback interface with no token or no TLS. It never exposes an open receiver in silence.

A container on the same Mac is a loopback peer

Docker Desktop and OrbStack present a container as a loopback peer. The token check does not apply to it. Any container on your Mac can send to the root.

What the AI features send

• Telemetry linting runs on rules with no network call.
• Analyse with AI sends the rule findings and a window summary to the provider you chose. Your API key stays in the macOS Keychain and is redacted by the API.
• The MCP server sends nothing anywhere. Your coding tool decides what to do with the data it reads.