Privacy Policy
Effective Date: January 30, 2026
This Privacy Policy describes how Dissertation (Pre)Checker ("we," "us," or "our") collects, uses, and shares your personal information when you use our document analysis service.
1. Information We Collect
Account Information
When you create an account, we collect your email address and authentication credentials through our authentication provider, Clerk. We may also collect your name if you provide it.
Uploaded Documents
When you use our service, you upload dissertation chapters or documents for analysis. These documents are processed to identify structural issues, citation problems, and style concerns.
Payment Information
If you subscribe to our paid service, payment information is collected and processed by our payment provider, Polar (which uses Stripe). We do not store your full credit card details on our servers.
Usage Data
We collect information about how you use our service, including the number of documents analyzed, features used, and timestamps of your activity.
2. How We Use Your Information
We use the information we collect to:
- Provide and maintain our document analysis service
- Authenticate your account and manage your subscription
- Process your payments through our billing provider
- Analyze your documents to identify issues and provide feedback
- Improve our service and develop new features
- Communicate with you about your account and service updates
- Comply with legal obligations
3. Third-Party Service Providers
We share your information with the following third-party service providers who help us operate our service:
Clerk (Authentication)
Handles user authentication and account management. Their privacy policy is available at clerk.com/legal/privacy.
Polar / Stripe (Payments)
Processes subscription payments securely. Their privacy policy is available at polar.sh/legal/privacy.
AWS S3 (Document Storage - Pro Users)
For Pro subscribers, temporarily stores uploaded documents for up to 24 hours after analysis to enable one-click export with comments. Documents are encrypted at rest (AES-256) and automatically deleted after 24 hours or immediately upon export. Free tier users' documents are not stored; they must re-upload for export. AWS maintains GDPR compliance through their Data Processing Addendum. See aws.amazon.com/compliance/gdpr-center.
Google Gemini API (AI Analysis)
Powers our AI-based document analysis features (Pro tier). Document content is sent to Google's Gemini API for analysis. We use the paid API tier, which means your data is not used to train AI models. See ai.google.dev/gemini-api/terms.
Vercel (Hosting)
Hosts our web application. Their privacy policy and DPA are available at vercel.com/legal/privacy-policy.
4. Academic Integrity
Turnitin-Safe
Your work is never submitted to plagiarism detection databases. Using our service will not affect your Turnitin originality score or create any record in plagiarism databases.
Why We're Turnitin-Safe
Our analysis is performed entirely through Google's Gemini API. We use the paid API tier, which explicitly states that customer data is not used to train or improve Google's AI models. Your document content:
- Is never submitted to Turnitin, iThenticate, or any plagiarism detection service
- Is never added to any plagiarism database
- Is not used by Google to train AI models (paid API tier policy)
- Is processed only for the purpose of providing you feedback
- Is not stored for free tier users (processed in memory only)
- For Pro users: is temporarily stored (up to 24 hours) only to enable one-click export
Your Intellectual Property
You retain full ownership of your work. We claim no rights to your document content. The analysis results and feedback are provided as a service to help improve your writing.
5. Data Retention
Uploaded Documents
Free Tier: Your documents are processed in memory and not stored on our servers. Free users can view feedback in the web interface and download PDF summary reports. Word export with embedded comments is a Pro-only feature.
Pro Subscribers: Your documents are temporarily stored for up to 24 hours after analysis to enable Word export with embedded comments. Pro documents are:
- Encrypted at rest using AES-256 encryption
- Stored in isolated, user-specific paths
- Automatically deleted after 24 hours
We do not retain copies of your dissertation chapters beyond this 24-hour window.
Account Data
Your account information (email, preferences, analysis history metadata) is retained while your account is active. You can request deletion of your account and associated data at any time.
Analytics Data
We do not currently use third-party analytics services. If this changes, we will update this policy and implement appropriate cookie consent mechanisms.
6. Your Rights
Under applicable data protection laws, including the GDPR (for EU residents) and CCPA (for California residents), you have the following rights:
- Access: Request a copy of the personal data we hold about you
- Correction: Request correction of inaccurate personal data
- Deletion: Request deletion of your personal data ("right to be forgotten")
- Portability: Request your data in a machine-readable format
- Objection: Object to processing of your personal data for certain purposes
- Restriction: Request that we limit how we use your data
To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at the email address below.
7. International Data Transfers
Your data may be processed in the United States where our servers and service providers are located. For users in the European Economic Area (EEA), we ensure appropriate safeguards are in place:
- Our service providers maintain Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) for data transfers
- Clerk is certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework
- AWS and Vercel provide GDPR-compliant Data Processing Agreements
8. Data Security
We implement appropriate technical and organizational measures to protect your personal data, including encryption in transit (HTTPS/TLS), secure authentication, and access controls. However, no method of transmission over the Internet is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
9. Children's Privacy
Our service is not intended for children under 18 years of age. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe we have collected information from a child, please contact us immediately.
10. Changes to This Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of material changes by email and/or by posting a notice on our service. Your continued use of the service after such modifications constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy.
11. Contact Us
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or wish to exercise your data protection rights, please contact us at: