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Alcyone Secure is a cybersecurity software company focused on protecting devices in real world situations. Our flagship is Rashnova, the evidence layer for Windows: it keeps a tamper evident record of what happens on your machine: every day, and especially when it leaves your control. We also ship CipherSuite (a workspace for security professionals), the Risk Awareness Platform, and a DPDP compliance service. See the product catalogue.

Rashnova joins two words. Rashnu is the judge of souls in the Zoroastrian tradition of ancient Persia, called “the straightest”, whose golden scales favour no one: “as much as a hair’s breadth it will not turn”. Nova is a star that suddenly shines bright. Our company is named after Alcyone, the brightest star of the Pleiades, and Rashnova is the new light beside it. Together the name says what the product does: an honest record of what actually happened, whoever did it. The whole story, with sources.

rash · NO · vuh. The stress is on the middle syllable, NO.

Yes. It is the same recorder from the same team, with a new name and the same promises: the recorder is free forever, it records activity and never the content of your files, and nobody but you can read your logs. People still describe it as a black box for your laptop, which is a fair picture of what it does. Its name is Rashnova.

Yes, the recorder is free, forever. Always on tamper evident recording, the weekly Readout, Monitor Now, Repair Mode, Handover Mode, USB storage blocking, every USB device and every copy to one on record, and seven days of local history all run on your device at no cost, with no card and no trial clock. Personal, coming soon at a planned ₹199 / $6 a month, will add the cloud layer: encrypted off device backup, two years of history, evidence bundle export, and up to three devices. Full breakdown on the pricing page.

It carries a real, documented risk. A 2022 University of Guelph field study found technicians snooped on customer data at 6 of 16 shops tested for a simple battery job, and in 2021 Apple paid a confidential multimillion-dollar settlement after repair technicians leaked a customer’s private photos. See the full evidence on the case files page.

From the download page, free. You sign in with a free account to download, because the app sends us nothing and that is the only way we know how many people use it; the app itself never asks you to sign in. The installer brings everything Rashnova needs, including its own copy of Microsoft's .NET 10, so nothing else is downloaded during setup; recording works offline.

Because the installer is not code signed yet: we do not have a code signing certificate yet. Your browser may say the file isn't commonly downloaded, because each new version is a new file with no history yet: choose Keep in your browser's downloads. When you run it, Windows SmartScreen may warn about it, as it does about any unsigned installer; choose More info, then Run anyway. Before you do, you can check the file is the one we published: its SHA-256 is listed on the download page. In PowerShell run Get-FileHash "$env:USERPROFILE\Downloads\Rashnova-1.2.1.msi" and compare the long value with the one on the page. They must match exactly.

It can, once you switch it on. Continuous recording is off until you choose it; after that there is no session to remember to start. It runs as a quiet Windows service, survives reboots, and seals every event into the same hash chain. Repair Mode is the extra step on top: when the device is about to leave your hands, you arm it, and that window is watched closely and sealed into a report at the end. Everything remains a switch you control. If you would rather it did not run continuously, you can stop it, nothing here is forced on you.

No: it is the opposite of spyware in every way that matters. Spyware hides from the device owner and reports to someone else. Rashnova runs visibly on your machine and records for you. The record stays on your device; the second copy is encrypted, and Rashnova opens it only after your PIN is checked. Ending a Repair session, exporting a report and deleting data all need your PIN. You own the data, the settings, and the exports. Nothing is collected behind your back, and nothing from your record leaves your device.

USB devices plugged in and removed (with VID, PID and serial), files read, copied, renamed and deleted, programs and PowerShell launched, sign ins, boots, changes to important Windows settings, browser window titles (not URLs or page content), and the integrity of its own record. It does not record keystrokes, clipboard contents, passwords, message contents or your screen. Everything stays on your computer.

The Readout is your weekly statement about your own machine. In aviation, extracting and interpreting a recovered flight recorder's data is called the readout: this is the same thing for your computer. It opens with one honest verdict, usually “nothing unusual this week”, then shows at most three things worth a look: a USB device you have never used before, an app reading a folder for the first time, a machine that started at 02:14 with nobody signing in. It is built on your machine from your own log, and nothing is uploaded to produce it.

Yes. It is on by default because most people want it, but it is a switch like everything else, and you choose which day it arrives on. Turn it off and the recorder keeps running exactly as before: your log, your hash chain and your reports are unaffected. The same applies to always on recording. Rashnova is built so the owner decides what runs: start what you want, stop what you don't. A recorder you cannot control would just be surveillance with better branding, which is the opposite of the point.

Yes, and it is the most useful thing you can do with it. Every item the Readout raises carries two buttons: That was me, and That wasn't me. Marking something as yours stops it being raised again, so the Readout gets quieter and more accurate the longer you use it, the opposite of tools that grow noisier over time. Marking something as not yours takes you straight to the sealed evidence for that moment, which you can export. Those labels stay on your device. They are never uploaded and never used to build a profile of you.

You can check them, which is better. Each Readout says whether the part of the record it summarises verified intact, so it is not just a rendered summary, it is a sealed statement you could hand to someone else. If the chain is broken anywhere in that window, the Readout marks itself unverified rather than presenting the counts as fact. And if part of the week is missing, it says so instead of quietly showing a smaller number.

Monitor Now is a thirty second scan showing what is touching your files right now, which processes are reading and writing, which folders they are working in, and what is currently connected. It answers a specific question: something feels off, what is happening on this machine at this moment? It runs entirely on your device, needs no account, and uploads nothing. Its findings are recorded, but it is a live look rather than a sealed session. For evidence you intend to hand to someone else, use Repair Mode, which seals the whole window into a verifiable report.

Repair Mode is the posture you arm before your device leaves your hands, at a repair counter, during a handover, any time someone else will be alone with the machine. While it is on, every file opened, copied, renamed or deleted, every program started and every USB device plugged in, with every file copied to it, is recorded, and everything from the moment you arm it until you disarm it is sealed into a single session. At the end you get a report with a verdict. USB storage blocking during Repair Mode arrives in an update soon. It is free, and it is the one moment where the recorder stops being a mirror and becomes a witness.

Yes. From version 1.2, switch on USB storage blocking in Settings with your PIN, and memory sticks and external disks no longer open, fast USB 3 drives included. If someone switches USB storage back on outside Rashnova, that is recorded as tampering and it is blocked again within seconds. Like everything else it is a switch you control, off until you turn it on, and every USB device plugged in is still recorded, with its VID, PID and serial number.

Not in this version. Rashnova records no location and makes no location lookups at all. Location recording comes in a later version, with the optional cloud backup, and will be off until you switch it on.

Yes. Recording, the Readout and reports need no internet. Rashnova makes two small requests, neither carrying anything from your record: a daily check for a newer version, and a check of the time against Microsoft's time server during a Repair session.

Yes. Rashnova supports Windows 10 (build 1903 and later) and all Windows 11 versions, both consumer and professional editions. Minimum requirements: 30 MB RAM, 50 MB disk.

Very little. The record is kept compressed on your computer, typically 5 to 50 MB depending on how much happens on the machine and how long history is kept.

It captures browser window titles, not URLs or page contents. A title like ‘HDFC NetBanking. Login’ is logged as high-risk activity for the audit trail; the actual URL and page content are never read or stored. Private/incognito windows log only that private browsing occurred, with no title content.

No. Rashnova does not capture keystrokes, clipboard contents, or screen pixels. It captures metadata about activity: which programs ran, which commands executed, which USB devices were inserted, which registry keys changed. It records metadata about activity, not the content of your life.

It records PowerShell being started, and during a Repair or Handover session the commands and scripts that run, so a script someone ran while you were away is on the record. It records what was run, never what it printed. Rashnova turns on Windows' own PowerShell script logging only while a Repair or Handover session runs, and puts it back as it was when the session ends.

No, and not as a promise, as an architecture. Your record is encrypted on your device, and the key never leaves it. When Personal arrives, what our servers hold will be ciphertext we cannot open. A breach of our own infrastructure would leak nothing readable. The website never displays log content for the same reason: there is nothing readable to display.

Not unless you turn it on. Today nothing from your record leaves your device at all: cloud backup is not in this version. When Personal arrives, encrypted copies of your logs will be mirrored to tamper evident cloud storage so they survive even if the device is wiped. Encryption happens on your machine before upload; the cloud only ever receives ciphertext.

Once Personal launches: request your logs from your account, the request has to come from the email you signed in with. We review each request by hand before releasing anything, then send your encrypted file to that address. It opens only in the Rashnova app, and only with your password. We never see the contents: what we hold is ciphertext we cannot open, so the manual review is a check on who is asking, never on what is inside. On the free tier the log lives only on the device, which is exactly the gap Personal exists to close. The flow is described on the pricing page.

Yes. Reports and logs export from the app at any time, analyse them with your own tools, hand them to a forensic expert, or preserve them as evidence.

Yes. The second copy of your record is encrypted on your device, and it cannot be opened without your PIN on this machine. The record is also sealed, so it cannot be changed without that showing. The key never leaves your computer. We use well established, standard cryptography and nothing of our own invention.

Not silently. A Repair session ends only with your PIN. Stopping the recorder needs administrator rights, and if it is stopped anyway, Windows starts it again within seconds, the session carries on, and the report shows the gap and how long it lasted.

It cannot be recovered: not by us, and not by signing in, because a way to recover it would be a way around it for anyone who has the computer. Starting a Repair session, exporting a report and deleting data need the PIN. Turning recording off never needs it, so a forgotten PIN can never keep you being recorded. See known limits.

Each entry is sealed to the one before it. Edit or delete one entry and every entry after it stops matching; the break itself is the proof. Tamper evidence becomes a mathematical property of the file, not a policy that depends on anyone behaving.

It is built to make things provable rather than to stop them, with one real barrier: USB storage blocking, a switch in Settings. Its core job is evidence: a cryptographically verifiable record that tampering happened, when, and how. In most disputes, evidence beats prevention: you can't un copy a file, but you can prove it was copied.

Antivirus watches for malicious code. Rashnova watches for people. A technician who opens your photo folder, an intern copying the shared drive, a coworker at your unlocked desk: none of that triggers antivirus, because it's all done with legitimate access. Rashnova records it into a log that can't be quietly rewritten. Antivirus catches viruses; Rashnova catches people.

On your own device: yes. Recording activity on hardware you own is lawful in most places, and in India the DPDP Act 2023 does not apply to data an individual processes for personal or domestic purposes. Recording other people is different: tell everyone who uses the machine (the app itself reminds you to), and never use it to watch a partner, a family member or anyone without a lawful basis. Nothing leaves your computer, so Alcyone never receives your record. This is not legal advice; consult counsel for your situation.

It provides one of the technical controls regulators expect from a serious data fiduciary: tamper evident records of who did what on a device. We unpack the practical work in the DPDP guide for businesses, and offer a full advisory service at DPDP Compliance.

They are built to be useful as evidence: captured at the moment of the event, sealed so any alteration shows, and exported with a fingerprint of the chain. In India, electronic records are admitted under Section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, which asks for a certificate describing the device and how the record was produced; a sealed report gives that certificate something concrete to point to. Admissibility is always decided by the court under the rules that apply to your case, but a tamper evident record is far stronger than a screenshot or a memory. This is not legal advice.

It depends on your jurisdiction, what you tell employees, and whether the device is company owned. In India, an organisation that records staff activity is a data fiduciary under the DPDP Act 2023: it needs a lawful basis (the Act allows processing for employment purposes, including protecting the employer from loss or liability and keeping trade secrets confidential), a clear notice to the people affected, and reasonable security for the record. Written disclosure is the sensible baseline everywhere. We do not provide legal advice; consult a qualified lawyer before deploying monitoring in a workplace.

A free, live cybersecurity workspace for pentesters, bug-bounty hunters, SOC analysts, and security students: findings, evidence, notes, and AI assisted reports in one place. Read more at /products/ciphersuite.

AI powered security awareness training and DPDP compliance auditing for organisations, role based dashboards, scenario assessments, automated reports. Details at /products/awareness.

A technical advisory service for Indian businesses working toward DPDP Act 2023 compliance: assessment, gap analysis, and a documented remediation roadmap. NDA-first, vendor-neutral. Tiers and pricing at /products/dpdp.

Yes, and each stands alone. Rashnova produces device level evidence. CipherSuite is the professional workflow on top of evidence. Awareness builds the human layer. The DPDP service ties it to the legal layer. No bundle lock in.

To download it, yes: a free account, so we know how many people use Rashnova (the app sends us nothing). The app itself runs without one and never asks you to sign in. The same account will carry Personal when it arrives: cloud backup, log retrieval, and multiple devices under one identity. Sign up at /signup.

Yes. The free tier is per device, and the app needs no account. Personal, coming soon, will cover multiple devices under one account. For team and fleet deployment, email contact@alcyonesecure.com.

The recorder keeps working on your device, free, forever: cancellation never touches local protection. Your cloud copies are returned to you as an encrypted archive, then deleted from our servers after a 30 day grace window.

Download the Rashnova evidence collector and run it in PowerShell as administrator. It changes nothing on your computer and gathers only counts and facts about your install, never file names or anything from your record unless you choose to add them. You look at the folder it makes and decide what to send to support@alcyonesecure.com.

Email support@alcyonesecure.com for general help (24 hour response target). Security disclosures: report a vulnerability privately on GitHub, or email contact@alcyonesecure.com. Privacy: privacy@alcyonesecure.com. Sales: contact@alcyonesecure.com.

Yes: volume pricing, centralised deployment, dedicated support, and custom configuration for organisations. Email contact@alcyonesecure.com to discuss.