This article applies to macOS and Windows.
Where is my Recovery Card?
macOS
You likely downloaded a Recovery Card if you enabled syncing in Arc for macOS at any time after January 18, 2024 or if you reset your Password after that same period. You were shown a screen similar to the below, which encouraged downloading a file before continuing:
- Your Recovery Card should be in your Downloads folder, unless you selected to save it elsewhere.
- You can access your Downloads folder by:
- selecting the Finder app
- selecting “Downloads” on the left side of the Finder app
- and locating a file that has the name: ArcRecoveryPhrase.png
- You can access your Downloads folder by:
Windows
You can view your Recovery card in Arc for Windows by going to Arc menu > Settings, enabling Arc Sync and then clicking “Recovery Card”.
From there you can click Copy to copy our Recovery Phrase to your clipboard and paste it into a secure note or click Save to save the Recovery Phrase as a .txt file in your PC’s Documents folder.
When would I use my Recovery Card?
Your Recovery Card may be needed when you log in to your account on a new device after changing your password, and you have no access to other devices that have previously synced.
- If it is required, you will be automatically prompted to enter it on the screen shown below:
-
- This screen will appear when you sign in for the first time on a new device, only after changing your password.
- If you have not changed your password, only the Recovery Card will be displayed for download. No data will need to be entered.
- You may alternatively be prompted with a toast (small notification banner) to go to Settings, and asked to click a button to enter more information, as shown below:
-
If you skip these prompts, you will need to enter the information later:
- Arc > Settings in the Mac menu bar
- Select "Enter info" as shown below:
- If you just need your card to see the recovery phrase:
- Arc > Settings in the Mac menu bar
- Selecting “Recovery Card" as shown below
What if I don’t have my Recovery Card?
-
-
If you did not activate syncing in Arc, you will not have a Recovery Card.
- If you are being asked for a Recovery Card but do not have one because you did not choose to sync your data, simply skip the step.
-
If you need to find your Recovery Card again, select:
-
- Arc > Settings in the Mac menu bar or Arc menu > Settings on Windows
- Selecting “Recovery Card" as shown below
-
-
If you lose your Recovery Card, you will not be able to restore your old Sidebar data.
- This is a security feature designed to protect you and keep your data private.
- We do not have any means of recovering your data without the Recovery Card.
- Please store your Recovery Card in a secure place to avoid losing your data.
-
If you did not activate syncing in Arc, you will not have a Recovery Card.
Why do I need to provide my Recovery Card?
-
- Your Recovery Card is a kind of secret key that will let you decrypt your sync data after you’ve changed your password.
- It is part of the end-to-end encryption of your data - this means that only you have access to your data. Using a Recovery Card allows us to store your data in a way that ensures no-one - including BCNY - can read your member data.
Technical Details
To ensure both the privacy and confidentiality of our members, we want syncing to have full end-to-end encryption for all sidebar data. This design seeks to solve this while also keeping the user experience and performance in mind. The flow uses a combination of symmetric and asymmetric encryption which allows Arc to handle the encryption with speed.
What encryption algorithms do you use?
- We use Argon2 as the key-derivation function to generate the key to encrypt the public/private key pair.
- We use Libsodium sealed boxes for the asymmetric encryption which encrypts your data.
How can I find out more / I have other technical questions?
We welcome your questions! Please use "Contact the Team" at the bottom of this webpage, then select "Security/Privacy" and use the subject line: "Technical Detail Question about Arc Sync".