Filtered, not erased: what happens to the message record

The first question most practitioners ask about a message filter is a good one: if hostile words are removed before my client sees them, has my client lost evidence? The answer is no, and this page explains why, and where the limits are.

Two copies of every message

When a message arrives at your client’s FenceChat email address or number, FenceChat saves the message exactly as it was received before the filter reads it. The filter then produces the version your client is shown, with hostile wording taken out and the facts left in.

Both versions sit side by side in your client’s encrypted Archive. In their Dashboard, one view shows “What they actually sent” and the other shows “What you received”. Your client never has to choose between protecting their peace and keeping the record. The original is always there when they, or you, need it.

What the filter removes, and what it keeps

The filter is built to take out insults, contempt, blame and manipulation. It is built to keep the facts: times, places, arrangements for the children, money owed, requests and answers.

If a message is mostly hostile with one line of logistics, your client sees the line of logistics. A real threat is never softened: the threatening words are replaced with one plain line saying exactly what was threatened, so your client is warned without having to read it. The message is also flagged as a possible threat when it is delivered, and if your client has texts sent to their phone, they get a short text alert as well. If the filter can’t run at all, the message is delivered unfiltered with a note saying so, rather than held back, so nothing important is lost to a technical fault.

If your client chooses to have their replies filtered, each reply passes through a check of its own before it is sent. That check takes out hostile wording and keeps the facts and information.

Sealed in order

Shortly after a message arrives, it is fingerprinted and sealed into the Archive. Each sealed message is linked to the one before it, so the Archive forms a single unbroken sequence.

That has two practical effects:

1. If a sealed message were changed later, its fingerprint would no longer match.
2. If a message were removed from the middle, the break in the sequence would show.

Neither your client nor the sender can delete individual messages from the Archive. Messages leave it only when the plan’s keeping period ends or the account is closed.

Where messages are deleted under the plan’s keeping period, FenceChat keeps a small record that a message existed and why it was removed, without its content. A check of an export shows those removals rather than hiding them.

Checking an export yourself

On the Legal plan, your client can export their Archive as a time-ordered PDF formatted for legal proceedings. With it comes a small check file. The check file holds a fingerprint of each message and FenceChat’s signature. It holds no message text.

Anyone holding both can check them at FenceChat.com/verify. The check runs in their own browser and nothing is sent to FenceChat. It confirms the export matches what FenceChat sealed and that nothing in the list has been changed, reordered or removed since.

What the pattern labels mean

When the filter removes wording, it also records the kinds of language it found, using plain labels such as hostile language, contempt, blame reversal or controlling language. The labels draw on well-known research into how conflict escalates in relationships.

A label describes the wording of that one message. It is not a finding about a person, and it doesn’t decide whether any law has been broken. The Legal plan export says so on its own pages, so nobody reading it is misled.

Your client stays in control of the filter

If the filter removes something your client wanted to see, they can mark it to be kept in future. If something slips through, they can mark it to be filtered next time. These choices apply only to their own account and only to future messages. They never change a message already sealed in the Archive.

Your client also chooses how strongly the filter works, from three levels: Mild, Moderate and Strict, from taking out only clear insults through to passing on the facts alone.

Every answer from the filter is checked before anything is passed on. If an answer is incomplete or can’t be read, it is tried again. If it still fails, the message is kept in the Archive and your client is told, rather than being passed on half-filtered. Before any change to the filter goes live, it is tested against a set of example messages.

The limits worth knowing

• Keeping periods vary by plan. Essential keeps delivered messages for 30 days, Protected for 90 days and Legal for 24 months. For a client in, or heading towards, proceedings, Legal is the plan that keeps a useful history.
• Removed files are not kept. Photos and most files are delivered by default. If your client chooses to have files removed, FenceChat doesn’t keep a copy, so an important file should be asked for again or kept elsewhere. Where safety is a concern, we suggest leaving files on.
• Texts from numbers your client hasn’t added are never stored. Those are turned away at the door, so there is nothing to produce.
• The record starts when FenceChat does. Messages sent before your client set FenceChat up, or sent to their old address or number, are not in the Archive.

Who keeps the record

The Archive is held by ROHAJO Pty Ltd t/a FenceChat, an Australian company, under Australian privacy law, with our main database in Sydney. See FenceChat’s accountability and complaints handling on our For Professionals page.