Privacy Policy
Last updated: August 30, 2026 · Effective immediately for all IllumiU users
1. Student Ownership & Absolute Data Rights
Your college application journey belongs entirely to you. All essay drafts, personal reflections, Story Vault entries, academic transcripts, test scores, target college lists, and financial aid records created or uploaded to IllumiU remain your sole property.
IllumiU does not sell, rent, monetize, or broker student personal information to colleges, marketers, or third parties under any circumstances.
2. AI Model Training Boundaries
We believe student vulnerability in personal statements deserves uncompromising protection. Your private essay narratives, brainstorming notes, and personal story fragments are never used to train, fine-tune, or reinforce public or commercial foundation models.
When automated essay analysis or synthesis is requested, requests are executed strictly through ephemeral, enterprise-governed inference boundaries with zero data retention for model learning.
3. Architectural Security & Single-Tenant Isolation
IllumiU enforces database-layer security via PostgreSQL Single-Tenant Row-Level Security (RLS). Every query is cryptographically verified against your authenticated JSON Web Token (JWT), ensuring that no user or external request can inspect or access another student's records.
- All network communication is encrypted in transit via TLS 1.3.
- Database tables and user storage volumes are encrypted at rest.
- Authentication is powered by enterprise-grade cryptographic OAuth standards (Google OAuth and Supabase Auth).
4. Information We Collect
We collect only the minimum information required to operate your admissions command center:
- Account Identity: Your email address, name, and cryptographic user ID provided during sign-in.
- Application Data: Target colleges, admission decision plans, deadline tracks, and supplemental essay requirements you track.
- Telemetry & Error Diagnostics: Anonymized technical logs (browser type, client viewport, error codes) used strictly to diagnose software defects and maintain application reliability.
5. Data Retention & Account Deletion
You retain the right to delete your account at any time. Upon account deletion, all associated applications, essays, clusters, and profile records are permanently removed from our active database systems.
6. Contact & Data Privacy Inquiries
If you have questions regarding this Privacy Policy or your personal data rights, you may reach our engineering and privacy team directly at privacy@illumiu.com or submit a question via the in-app Help & Feedback tool.