Alfred Scholar ("we", "us", or "our") is a research platform that helps you organize documents, ask questions about your papers, manage citations, check a manuscript for originality, and write it up. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, and your rights regarding your data.
Information We Collect
Account Information
When you create an account, we collect your name and email address. If you sign in with Google, Google gives us your name, email address, and profile picture so we can create or match your account. We never receive your Google password and we do not read anything else in your Google account. If you enable two-factor authentication, we store the verification data needed to secure your account.
Documents and Content
When you upload research papers, create manuscripts, add citations, take notes, or use Ask Alfred, we store that content in your workspace so you can get back to it. See Originality Checks for the one way an uploaded document is used beyond your own workspace.
Connected Accounts
You can connect a Zotero or Mendeley library so your references sync into your workspace. When you do, we store an access token for that account and a copy of the reference records we import. We never receive your password for those services, and disconnecting from your settings deletes the stored token.
You can also supply your own AI provider key if you would rather your AI usage run on your own account. That key is encrypted at rest, used only for requests from your workspace, and can be removed at any time.
Billing Information
On a paid plan we store your plan, billing country, subscription status, and the payment and subscription identifiers our payment provider returns to us. The payment itself happens on the payment provider's own systems: we never see or store your full card number, CVV, UPI PIN, or bank credentials.
Usage Data
We collect basic usage information such as pages visited, features used, and error reports. This helps us understand how the platform is used and where we can improve.
Referral Information
If you arrive through a partner's referral link, we record which partner referred you so we can attribute the referral and apply any welcome bonus to your account. Partners can see aggregate counts of the signups and subscriptions from their link, but never your name, email address, or any other personal details.
Cookies
We use essential and analytics cookies. Essential cookies include session cookies to keep you signed in, CSRF tokens to protect your account from unauthorized actions, and preference cookies to remember your display settings (such as light or dark mode). Analytics cookies help us understand how the platform is used so we can improve it. We do not use advertising cookies.
How We Use Your Information
- Provide the service: Process your documents, power AI features, run originality checks, and deliver the tools you use every day.
- Improve the platform: Understand usage patterns to fix bugs and build better features.
- Keep the platform safe: Detect and prevent abuse, fraudulent referrals, and misuse of trial accounts.
- Communicate with you: Send account and service emails such as verification, password resets, workspace invitations, and important updates. We also send emails tied to features you use, such as the scheduled digest for a research loop you set up or a notification when a referral bonus is applied. You can stop a feature's emails by turning off or deleting that feature.
We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it with advertisers.
Legal Bases for Processing
Where the law requires us to name a legal basis for processing your personal data (for example under the GDPR or the UK GDPR), ours are:
- Contract: Running the workspace, the AI features, and the billing you signed up for.
- Legitimate interests: Keeping the platform secure, preventing abuse, and understanding usage so we can improve the product.
- Consent: Optional things you switch on, such as connecting Zotero or Mendeley, or publishing a testimonial. You can withdraw consent at any time without affecting what we did before you withdrew it.
- Legal obligation: Keeping billing records for as long as tax and accounting law requires.
Originality Checks and the Shared Corpus
This section describes the one place where an uploaded document is used outside your own workspace, so it is worth reading in full.
The originality checker compares a manuscript against three kinds of sources: open-access scholarly literature, the public web, and documents that have been uploaded to Alfred Scholar. That third source is platform-wide, which means it includes documents held in other workspaces, and it works in both directions. Documents you upload form part of the corpus that other people's manuscripts are checked against, and their documents form part of the corpus yours is checked against. This is what makes the check able to catch reuse that a purely public-web search cannot.
To do this we generate a fingerprint of each uploaded document, a set of hashes derived from its text, and store it next to the document. A check compares fingerprints, never raw text.
When a manuscript matches a document held in another workspace, the report shows only the matching document's title and how strongly it matched. We never show the matched text, the passage around it, a link to the document, or anything at all about the workspace or the person it belongs to. That protection runs in both directions: nobody sees the wording of your documents through a report, and you do not see theirs. Matches inside your own workspace do show the text, because it is already yours.
If you delete a document, it stops being part of the corpus and cannot be matched again.
How We Store and Protect Your Data
Your data is encrypted both in transit and at rest. We use industry-standard security practices and host our infrastructure with trusted cloud providers. Access to your data is restricted to authorized systems and personnel only.
If we become aware of a security incident that affects your personal data, we will notify you and the relevant authorities without undue delay, tell you what we know, and tell you what to do about it.
Where Your Data Is Stored
Alfred Scholar is operated from India. Our application, database, and document storage run in our cloud provider's data centres in India, so that is where your documents and account data live.
A few of the services we depend on run elsewhere: product analytics, email delivery, and some AI processing operate from other countries, and limited data reaches them there. If you are in the EU, the UK, or another region with cross-border transfer rules, using Alfred Scholar involves your data being processed in India and in those providers' regions, under the data protection terms we have in place with each of them.
Third-Party Services
We use third-party AI providers to power features like Ask Alfred, writing assistance, and originality checking. When your content is sent to these providers for processing, it is used solely to generate a response for you. Your data is never used to train AI models.
We also use third-party services for payment processing, email delivery, product analytics, and infrastructure hosting. These providers process data on our behalf under their own privacy policies and data protection obligations. We share only what a provider needs to do its job.
Some pages show Instagram videos made with researchers. We host the still cover images ourselves, so nothing loads from Instagram until you choose to play one. When you play a video, Instagram receives your IP address and may set its own cookies, under Instagram's privacy policy rather than ours.
Analytics
We use PostHog, a product analytics platform, to understand how people use Alfred Scholar. This helps us identify which features are most valuable, where users get stuck, and how we can improve the experience.
Analytics data we collect includes:
- Page views: Which pages you visit and how you navigate the platform.
- Feature usage: Which features you use and how often (for example, uploading documents, using Ask Alfred, or exporting citations).
- Session recordings: Within the application (not on public pages), we record how you interact with the interface so we can identify usability issues. Text inputs such as passwords are automatically masked.
We do not sell analytics data or share it with advertisers. Analytics data is used solely to improve the platform.
Cookies
Alfred Scholar uses the following types of cookies:
- Session cookie: Keeps you signed in while you use the platform.
- CSRF token: Protects your account from unauthorized actions.
- Preference cookies: Remembers your display settings such as light or dark mode.
- Analytics cookies: Helps us understand how the platform is used so we can improve it. These cookies do not track you across other websites.
We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.
Testimonials
If you choose to leave a testimonial, we collect your rating, your comment, and the name, title, and institution you would like shown, along with an optional link to your professional profile. Nothing appears anywhere until you confirm it from a link we email you.
Once you confirm, the details you supplied are published publicly on our website and we may quote them elsewhere in our marketing. Only what you entered is published; we never add your email address or anything else from your account. You can ask us to take a testimonial down at any time by emailing us.
Your Rights
You have the right to:
- Access your data: View and download the documents, citations, and content in your account.
- Correct your data: Update your account information at any time through your settings.
- Delete your data: Delete your account and all associated data from your account settings. This action is permanent.
- Export your data: Export your citations in BibTeX and RIS formats. Additional export options are on our roadmap, and you can ask us for a copy of your other data in the meantime.
- Object or restrict: Object to processing we carry out on the basis of legitimate interests, or ask us to restrict it while we look into your objection.
- Withdraw consent: Turn off anything you switched on by consent, such as a connected reference manager or a published testimonial.
- Complain: Raise a complaint with us first, and if you are still not satisfied, with your local supervisory authority. In India, that is the Data Protection Board of India.
To exercise any of these, email us at hello@alfredscholar.com. We respond within 30 days.
Data Retention
We keep your data for as long as your account is active. If you delete your account, your data is permanently removed from our systems. We do not retain backups of deleted accounts beyond a short window needed for system recovery. Billing records are kept for as long as tax and accounting law requires, even after an account is deleted.
Children's Privacy
Alfred Scholar is built for researchers and is not intended for use by anyone under the age of 18. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with their information, please contact us and we will remove it.
Changes to This Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make significant changes, we will notify you by email or through a notice on the platform. We encourage you to review this page periodically.
Contact Us
Alfred Scholar is operated from India. If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, want to exercise any of your rights, or want to raise a grievance about how your data has been handled, contact us at hello@alfredscholar.com and we will get back to you.