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Privacy-first IP, DNS & email tools · 20+ years of serving your IP

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The IP Cow team changelogfeaturesprivacy

What's new: accounts, monitoring, secure sharing & more

Since the rebrand we've shipped a lot — free zero-knowledge accounts, SSL and domain monitoring, encrypted file and secret sharing, a URL shortener, API keys, docs, and paid plans. Here's the full rundown. Still no trackers, still privacy-first.

When we relaunched ipcow.com with a new look and a fleet of privacy-first tools, we said it was just the start. Since then we’ve been heads-down shipping — and the promise hasn’t budged: no trackers, no third-party lookup APIs, no big tech, and any personal data encrypted so thoroughly that even we can’t read it.

Here’s everything new.

Accounts — optional, and zero-knowledge

The free tools are still 100% no-login. But if you want monitoring, history, or higher API limits, you can now create a free account — and the catch is that there isn’t one.

  • Zero-knowledge encryption. Your password derives your encryption keys in your browser. We only ever store ciphertext, so we genuinely can’t read your data or recover it for you. That’s why you get a one-time recovery key at sign-up — keep it somewhere safe; it’s the only way back in.
  • Email verification with a 6-digit code at sign-up.
  • Two-factor authentication (TOTP) — works with Google Authenticator, 1Password, or any other authenticator app.
  • Change your email or password whenever. And if you’re ever locked out, your one-time recovery key is the way back in — we never email you a password-reset link (a common way accounts get hijacked), so there’s nothing for an attacker to intercept.

Monitoring — know before it breaks

  • SSL-expiry monitors. We check your certificates daily and email you before they lapse. Pick exactly which thresholds to be warned at (30 / 14 / 7 / 3 / 1 days) and add extra recipients.
  • Domain parking. Park spare domains on IP Cow with automatic HTTPS.

Secure sharing — encrypted, no account needed

Three new privacy-first tools, all no-login:

  • Quick File Share — share up to 10 files / 250 MB, encrypted at rest and auto-deleted when they expire. You get a short code and a QR to hand off; multiple files come down as one zip.
  • Send a Secret — a one-time, end-to-end-encrypted link for a password or private note. The decryption key lives in the link and never reaches us; once it’s viewed out, it’s gone for good.
  • URL Shortener — tidy links on shortcow.com (and n9a.us / n48.us). First-party, no click-tracking, no middlemen.

Signed in? Your file and secret shares show up in your dashboard so you can keep tabs on them.

Your dashboard

  • Favorites — pin the tools you reach for most.
  • History — opt-in tool history, plus a record of the shares you’ve created.
  • One tidy home for billing, security (password + 2FA), and your API keys.

For developers

  • API keys. Call any tool over a simple REST API with a bearer token. The free tier includes 60 requests/hour across the general tools — plus a separate 1,000 DNS lookups/hour, since DNS resolves on our own first-party resolver with no query logging. Paid tiers get much more headroom.
  • Docs. A proper documentation site — including a reference for every single tool.

Plans

The flagship promise stands: the tools are free, forever. For folks who watch a lot of domains, we added paid tiers — Hobby, Professional, and Enterprise — plus à-la-carte add-ons for extra parking spots and SSL monitors. See the pricing.

How we measure traffic (without watching you)

Most websites measure their traffic by loading a third-party tracker that ships your visit off to someone else’s servers. We don’t. IP Cow’s analytics are first-party and cookieless: a tiny beacon tells our own server that a page was viewed, and that’s the whole story. No cookies, no fingerprinting, no third-party scripts, no personal data. Even the “unique visitors” number uses a daily-rotating, one-way hash, so it can’t be linked across days — or back to you. None of it ever leaves our hardware. (Could we have dropped in a hosted analytics service? Sure — but even the privacy-friendly ones still send your visit to a third party, so we built our own instead.)

Still ours, still private

None of this changes the deal. No trackers. No third-party lookup APIs. No big tech holding your data. Everything runs on our own hardware, your personal data is encrypted with your password, and the free tools will never ask you to log in.

More on the way. Got a tool you wish existed? Tell us.