Terms of service

1. Who we are

Dead Ringer is made and sold by No404 (Pty) Ltd, a company registered in South Africa ("we", "us"). Payments are processed by Paddle.com Market Ltd ("Paddle"), which is the merchant of record for your purchase. Paddle's own terms apply to the payment itself.

2. What you are buying

Dead Ringer is a desktop application that runs on your own computer and imitates the WhatsApp Cloud API and inbound email providers for development and testing. It does not connect to WhatsApp, Meta, or any mail provider. You are buying a licence to use the software, not the software itself, and not a hosted service. The software is closed source.

3. Independence and trademarks

Dead Ringer is an independent product and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Meta Platforms, Inc. WhatsApp is a trademark of Meta Platforms, Inc. Other product names are trademarks of their respective owners.

We are not an official, certified, approved or partner product of Meta Platforms, Inc., and we do not claim to be. Dead Ringer imitates a published HTTP interface; it is built independently and holds no connection to Meta's services.

4. What testing against Dead Ringer proves

Dead Ringer is a development tool, not a certification. Passing your tests against Dead Ringer does not guarantee acceptance, delivery, or behaviour on Meta's live platform. One real end-to-end pass before go-live is still your responsibility, and we do not warrant that an integration which works against Dead Ringer will work against the live API.

5. Licence term

A paid licence runs for one year from the date of purchase. It renews automatically for further one-year terms through Paddle unless you cancel before the renewal date. You can cancel at any time in the customer portal; the current term runs to its end. Each renewal issues a new key with a new expiry.

A trial licence runs for 14 days from issue, includes every feature, and needs no payment details. One trial per person.

6. Seats and activations

A single-developer licence is for one named person. A team licence covers the number of seats bought, each for one named person. Each seat may be active on up to 2 machines at a time. You may deactivate a machine in the customer portal to free the slot. Seats may be reassigned when a person leaves your team.

7. When a licence lapses

If you stop renewing, the version of the software you already have keeps working indefinitely on the machines it is activated on. You stop receiving updates and cannot activate new machines. Each key carries an "updates until" date, and any build we released before that date will run on that key. Builds released after it will not. A lapsed licence is not revoked; only the cases in section 8 are.

8. Activation and the update check

The software validates your key once, when you activate a machine, by sending the key and a hashed machine fingerprint to our activation service and receiving a signed token. After that it works offline.

Every six hours or so, when it has a connection, it asks deadringer.dev whether a newer version exists and whether the licence still stands. That call carries the key id, the hashed fingerprint and the app version, nothing else. If it cannot reach us for any reason the software runs as normal; nothing about your network or our servers can stop it.

We revoke a licence when the purchase is refunded or charged back, when a key is used beyond the seats bought, or for a breach of section 9. A revoked licence stops the software when it next checks in, which can be while it is running; builds before 0.4.4 stop at their next launch instead. Deactivating a machine in the portal is not a revocation; it frees the slot and leaves that machine running. What we hold is described in the privacy policy.

9. What you may not do

• Share a key beyond the seats you bought, or publish it.
• Reverse engineer, decompile or modify the software, or remove the licence check, except where law allows it regardless of this clause.
• Redistribute, resell, rent or sublicense the software.
• Use the software to send messages to real WhatsApp users. It cannot, and it is not meant to.

10. Updates and support

We release updates when we have them. There is no schedule. Support is by email, on a best-effort basis, with no service-level agreement, as set out on the support page. The documentation is the primary support channel.

11. Refunds

Purchases can be refunded within 14 days, no questions asked. The full terms are in the refund policy. Refunds are processed by Paddle, the merchant of record.

12. Warranty and liability

The software is provided as is. We do not promise that it matches every behaviour of the live API, that it is free of bugs, or that it suits your purpose. It is a development tool and is not a substitute for testing against the live API before you go live, as set out in section 4.

To the extent the law allows, our total liability to you for any claim connected with the software or these terms is limited to the amount you paid us in the twelve months before the claim. We are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, lost profits, or lost data. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

13. Changes

We may update these terms. Material changes are announced by email to licence holders at least 30 days before they take effect and do not apply to a term already paid for.

14. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of South Africa, and any dispute is subject to the jurisdiction of its courts. Nothing in this clause removes protections you have as a consumer under the law of the country where you live.

15. Contact

No404 (Pty) Ltd, Kraaibosch Manor, George, 6530, South Africa. [email protected]