Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how LinkEdu ("LinkEdu," "LinkEdu.AI," "we," "us," or "our") collects, uses, shares, retains, and protects personal data when individuals access or use LinkEdu.AI, including its websites, applications, APIs, student and university portals, AI-powered features, communications, and related services (collectively, the "Platform").

This Policy applies to students, university users, visitors, and other authorized users of the Platform. It does not govern a university's independent processing of personal data outside LinkEdu.AI. This Policy should be read together with the Terms of Service, Cookie Policy, AI Use & Transparency Policy, Subscription & Billing Policy, Acceptable Use Policy, and any applicable document-processing acknowledgment.

1. LinkEdu.AI's Privacy Model

LinkEdu.AI is an AI-powered, automation-first SaaS platform that connects prospective students with universities. Students use the Platform free of charge. Universities may use a Free plan or purchase SaaS subscriptions.

LinkEdu does not sell personal data, does not charge students for access to Platform features, does not operate an admissions-placement agency, and does not receive enrollment commissions or success fees.

Routine Platform operations may be performed through software, deterministic rules, scheduled automation, and artificial intelligence. These operations may include matching, support, notifications, monitoring, document extraction, summaries, workflow reminders, and other service functions. Exceptional, sensitive, security-related, legal, billing, or unresolved matters may be escalated for human review.

2. Personal Data We Collect

Depending on how you use LinkEdu.AI, we may collect the following categories of personal data.

2.1 Account and Identity Data

• name and email address;
• password in hashed form;
• account role and organization;
• account status, verification status, and authentication information;
• team membership and authority information for university accounts; and
• account-security and access records.

2.2 Student Profile and Academic Data

Students may provide information such as:

• education history, institutions attended, degree level, field of study, GPA, grades, or similar academic indicators;
• standardized or language-test scores;
• study interests, preferred programs, locations, destinations, intake, and academic goals;
• budget, tuition preferences, scholarship interests, and related financial preferences;
• career goals, extracurricular interests, and other profile information the student chooses to provide; and
• profile completeness and source information associated with confirmed profile fields.

2.3 Application and Document Data

We may process:

• applications and application status information;
• transcripts, CVs/resumes, test reports, personal statements, recommendation materials, and other uploaded documents;
• extracted information generated from uploaded documents, subject to user review and confirmation where the Platform provides that workflow; and
• application, invitation, pipeline, and related workflow history.

2.4 Communications and Support Data

We may process:

• in-Platform messages;
• invitation responses;
• support requests and support-session history;
• draft communications created by users or generated with AI assistance; and
• related timestamps, delivery status, and operational metadata.

2.5 AI and Matching Data

To provide AI-assisted and matching functionality, we may process:

• prompts, questions, and other inputs submitted to AI features;
• AI-generated responses, explanations, summaries, or draft content;
• deterministic and evidence-based matching inputs and outputs;
• admission-probability inputs and results where sufficient evidence exists;
• qualitative competitiveness labels, confidence indicators, and missing-data indicators;
• candidate-ranking and recruitment-assistance inputs; and
• workflow outputs, usage records, model/provider metadata, latency, and estimated cost information used to operate and monitor AI services.

AI and automated outputs are assistive and do not constitute admissions decisions. Universities remain responsible for their own admissions, scholarship, enrollment, and institutional decisions.

2.6 University and Institutional Data

We may collect or process:

• university and institutional profile information;
• program, tuition, scholarship, deadline, intake, eligibility, and related information;
• staff names, roles, team permissions, and account-management information;
• subscription, entitlement, usage, invitation, recruitment, pipeline, analytics, and campaign-related information; and
• institutional verification and onboarding information.

2.7 Technical, Security, and Operational Data

We may automatically collect or generate:

• IP address;
• browser, device, operating-system, and session information;
• authentication, security, audit, and access logs;
• error, performance, health, and uptime telemetry;
• rate-limit, anti-abuse, fraud-prevention, and security signals; and
• operational records necessary to run scheduled jobs, automation, and exception handling.

2.8 Billing and Subscription Data

For university subscriptions, we may process:

• plan and subscription status;
• invoice, refund, cancellation, renewal, and billing-history metadata;
• Stripe customer, subscription, or transaction identifiers; and
• limited payment-related metadata received from Stripe.

Full payment-card details are processed by Stripe and are not stored by LinkEdu.AI.

2.9 Consent, Privacy, and Preference Records

We may maintain:

• legal-document versions accepted;
• consent or acknowledgment status and timestamps;
• privacy settings, including discoverability, invitations, and invitation-email preferences;
• cookie and analytics preferences;
• unsubscribe and communication preferences; and
• privacy-preserving evidence such as salted or hashed network identifiers where implemented.

3. How We Use Personal Data

We use personal data as reasonably necessary to:

• create, authenticate, secure, and maintain accounts;
• verify email addresses, users, institutions, roles, or authority;
• provide student profiles, discovery, matching, comparison, invitations, applications, messaging, documents, and related workflows;
• provide university SaaS functionality, recruitment tools, pipelines, analytics, subscriptions, and team administration;
• provide AI-assisted support, explanations, summaries, document extraction, candidate prioritization, and draft communications;
• calculate deterministic or evidence-based match results and confidence indicators;
• deliver account, security, legal, service, invitation, application, and billing communications;
• provide optional engagement communications subject to applicable preferences and unsubscribe rights;
• process and administer university subscriptions and billing;
• prevent fraud, spam, abuse, unauthorized access, and misuse of student data;
• monitor Platform health, reliability, security, and performance;
• operate scheduled automation and the Founder Exception process for issues requiring human attention;
• respond to support, privacy, legal, security, and billing requests;
• maintain auditability, legal-document versioning, and consent history;
• enforce our Terms and policies;
• comply with applicable legal obligations; and
• improve the Platform, provided that such improvement is consistent with this Policy and applicable law.

Depending on the jurisdiction and processing activity, LinkEdu may rely on performance of a contract, legitimate interests, consent, legal obligations, or another lawful basis recognized by applicable law. Where consent is required, users may withdraw consent subject to lawful limitations and without affecting processing already lawfully completed.

4. Student Discoverability and University Access

Student profiles are not automatically made broadly public.

Students control available privacy settings governing:

• whether they may be discovered by universities;
• whether universities may send invitations; and
• whether invitation-related emails may be sent.

When discoverability is enabled, authorized universities may receive limited profile information relevant to matching and recruitment. LinkEdu is designed to reveal only information appropriate to the current workflow and permissions.

Additional information may become available to a university when a student expresses interest, applies, communicates with that university, provides documents in a permitted workflow, or otherwise authorizes additional interaction.

Turning discoverability or invitations off restricts future discovery or invitation activity as enforced by the Platform. Certain historical or integrity records may remain as described in this Policy.

Universities may not sell, scrape, repurpose, or use student data for unrelated purposes, and may use such information only as permitted by LinkEdu.AI, applicable agreements, and applicable law.

LinkEdu does not sell personal data.

5. AI and Automated Processing

LinkEdu.AI uses deterministic rules, evidence-based scoring, automation, and AI systems to provide or support Platform functionality.

Data submitted to AI-assisted features may be processed through LinkEdu's configurable AI-routing layer and selected third-party AI providers for the purpose of producing the requested output or operating an approved Platform workflow.

LinkEdu applies controls intended to:

• minimize unnecessary disclosure of personal data;
• keep permissions and business rules deterministic rather than delegating them to AI;
• prevent AI from expanding authorization or accessing data outside the user's permitted scope;
• cache or reuse outputs where appropriate to reduce unnecessary processing;
• track model/provider use, latency, usage, and estimated cost; and
• allow core Platform functions to continue where reasonably possible if an AI provider is unavailable or rate-limited.

AI providers are not authorized by LinkEdu to use customer content for unrelated advertising. Provider-specific retention, training, and service terms may vary and are governed by LinkEdu's arrangements with those providers and their applicable service terms.

AI output may be retained as part of a user's account, support history, application workflow, matching history, audit record, or other operational record where reasonably necessary to provide, secure, explain, or improve the service.

6. How We Share Personal Data

We may share personal data only as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this Policy.

6.1 Universities and Institutional Users

Student information may be shared with authorized universities in accordance with the student's privacy settings, matching and invitation workflows, applications, communications, and other authorized interactions.

Universities are responsible for their own lawful use of personal data they receive through LinkEdu.AI.

6.2 Service Providers and Subprocessors

LinkEdu relies on third-party providers for services such as cloud infrastructure, databases, content delivery and security, payments, email, monitoring, analytics, authentication, and AI processing.

Material providers currently used or expected to be used in production may include:

• MongoDB Atlas;
• Emergent and associated cloud infrastructure;
• Google Cloud services;
• Cloudflare;
• Stripe;
• Resend;
• Sentry;
• UptimeRobot;
• OpenAI;
• Anthropic;
• Google AI services; and
• Google Analytics, only when enabled in accordance with applicable consent settings.

We may change providers as the Platform evolves. Where appropriate, LinkEdu will update its disclosures or subprocessor information when material changes occur.

Service providers may process personal data only as needed to provide their services to LinkEdu and subject to applicable contractual, security, and legal obligations.

6.3 Legal, Security, and Corporate Requirements

We may disclose information where reasonably necessary to:

• comply with law, regulation, legal process, or valid governmental request;
• protect users, institutions, LinkEdu, or others from fraud, abuse, security threats, or unlawful activity;
• investigate or enforce our agreements and policies;
• establish, exercise, or defend legal claims; or
• support a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization, sale of assets, or similar corporate transaction, subject to applicable law and appropriate safeguards.

We do not sell personal data.

7. Cookies, Analytics, Monitoring, and Email Tracking

LinkEdu uses cookies and similar technologies as described in the Cookie Policy.

Technologies that are strictly necessary for authentication, account security, fraud prevention, session management, service reliability, or similar essential functions may operate without optional analytics consent where permitted by law.

Optional analytics or session-replay technologies are activated according to the consent controls presented by the Platform. For example, Google Analytics and Sentry Session Replay are intended to operate only when the applicable optional consent is enabled.

LinkEdu may use first-party operational analytics to understand feature usage, reliability, and service performance. Such analytics are not used to sell personal data or conduct targeted advertising.

Email delivery providers may process delivery, bounce, complaint, and similar operational data. Where enabled, email-open or link-click information may also be processed for service, engagement, or deliverability purposes. LinkEdu will provide consent or preference controls where required by applicable law.

8. Data Retention

We retain personal data only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this Policy, including providing the Platform, maintaining security and integrity, meeting contractual obligations, resolving disputes, and complying with law.

Retention periods vary by data type and purpose.

When an eligible user confirms an account-deletion request, LinkEdu disables the account and associated discovery or engagement activity and provides a 30-day recovery period. After the recovery period, LinkEdu's automated deletion process is designed to purge personal data and anonymize records that must remain for integrity, legal, security, billing, fraud-prevention, dispute-resolution, consent, or audit purposes.

Certain information may therefore be retained after account deletion where reasonably necessary or legally required. Examples may include billing records, fraud or security records, anonymized application or pipeline history, legal-consent evidence, and audit records.

Backup copies may remain until they expire through routine backup rotation and recovery processes. LinkEdu does not ordinarily use backup copies to restore a deleted account after the applicable recovery period except where necessary for disaster recovery or legal obligations.

9. Data Export, Correction, and Account Deletion

Eligible authenticated users may use available self-service tools to:

• export account data;
• review or update certain profile information;
• adjust privacy and communication preferences; and
• request account deletion.

LinkEdu may require authentication, password confirmation, identity verification, or other safeguards before completing sensitive requests.

University deletion requests may be restricted where an account is the last administrator of an institution or where an active subscription or other unresolved obligation requires action first.

Where a request cannot be completed automatically, it may be escalated for human review.

10. Security

LinkEdu uses administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards designed to protect personal data, including measures such as:

• encryption in transit;
• authentication and email-verification controls;
• account lockout and security controls;
• least-privilege access;
• private or restricted data storage;
• production and non-production environment separation;
• secret and credential management;
• audit logging;
• security and operational monitoring;
• rate limiting and abuse prevention;
• backup and recovery controls; and
• automated exception detection and escalation.

No system can be guaranteed to be completely secure. Users are responsible for maintaining the security of their own credentials and devices and for notifying LinkEdu promptly of suspected unauthorized access.

11. International Data Transfers

LinkEdu is operated from the United States and may process personal data in the United States and in other locations where its service providers operate.

Where applicable law requires a recognized transfer mechanism, contractual safeguard, notice, or other protection for international transfers, LinkEdu will use an appropriate mechanism or safeguard applicable to the relevant processing.

LinkEdu does not rely solely on a user's general use of the Platform as consent to international data transfers where applicable law requires another legal mechanism.

12. Privacy Rights

Depending on where a user lives and the law that applies, the user may have rights concerning personal data, including rights to:

• access personal data;
• correct inaccurate personal data;
• request deletion;
• obtain a portable copy of certain personal data;
• restrict or object to certain processing;
• withdraw consent where processing is based on consent;
• opt out of certain forms of processing where applicable; and
• appeal certain privacy-request decisions where provided by law.

LinkEdu does not sell personal data and does not use personal data for targeted advertising as part of its current business model.

Many requests can be completed through available account controls, including data export and account deletion. Other privacy requests may be submitted to admin@linkedu.ai.

LinkEdu may verify identity before fulfilling a request and may deny, limit, or retain information where permitted or required by applicable law.

13. Users Under the Age of Majority

LinkEdu.AI is intended for prospective higher-education students and institutional users. Under the Terms of Service, users must be at least 16 years old.

A user who is under the age of legal majority in their jurisdiction may use the Platform only with any parent or guardian authorization required by applicable law.

LinkEdu does not knowingly seek to collect personal data from children below the minimum age permitted under the Terms. If LinkEdu becomes aware that an account was created in violation of applicable age or consent requirements, LinkEdu may restrict or delete the account and associated personal data as appropriate.

Age, parental-consent, and child-privacy requirements vary by jurisdiction. Where additional age assurance or parental authorization is legally required, LinkEdu may implement reasonable measures appropriate to the relevant jurisdiction and service.

14. University Data Responsibilities

Universities and institutional users are responsible for their own lawful processing of student information received through LinkEdu.AI.

Depending on the specific workflow and applicable law, LinkEdu and a university may act as independent data controllers/businesses, or LinkEdu may process certain personal data on a university's behalf.

Where required, LinkEdu and a university may enter into a Data Processing Addendum or other appropriate data-protection terms.

Universities must not use LinkEdu student data for unrelated marketing, resale, unauthorized profiling, scraping, discrimination, or any purpose not permitted by the Platform, applicable agreements, or applicable law.

15. Security Incidents and Data Breaches

LinkEdu maintains monitoring and incident-response processes designed to identify, investigate, contain, and remediate security incidents.

If a security incident results in a personal-data breach for which notification is legally required, LinkEdu will provide notices to affected users, institutions, regulators, or other parties as required by applicable law and within applicable legal timeframes.

LinkEdu does not promise a universal notification period where different laws impose different requirements.

16. Automated Decisions

LinkEdu uses automation, deterministic rules, evidence-based scoring, and AI-assisted functionality, but the Platform is not intended to make final university admissions, scholarship, enrollment, visa, or other legally significant institutional decisions on behalf of universities or government authorities.

Matching scores, admission probabilities, competitiveness labels, candidate rankings, summaries, and recommendations are assistive outputs. Universities and users remain responsible for material decisions and verification.

Where applicable law gives users rights relating to certain solely automated decisions, LinkEdu will provide applicable information or mechanisms required by law.

17. Changes to This Privacy Policy

LinkEdu may update this Privacy Policy as the Platform, business model, providers, or legal requirements change.

Material changes will be communicated as required by applicable law and through LinkEdu's versioned legal-document system. Where renewed acceptance or consent is legally or contractually required, users may be asked to review and accept the updated version.

Historical versions may be retained for audit, legal, and consent-history purposes.

18. Contact

For privacy questions, privacy-rights requests, security concerns, legal notices, billing matters, or other communications relating to LinkEdu.AI:

• Email: admin@linkedu.ai
• Platform: LinkEdu.AI
• Operator: LinkEdu
• Jurisdiction: Commonwealth of Virginia, United States

LinkEdu may establish additional specialized email aliases in the future. Unless otherwise stated, communications sent to such aliases may be routed to the same administrative contact.