Privacy

Privacy notice

What UniSphere collects about you, why, who else handles it, how long it is kept, and what you can do about it. This page stands on its own: you do not need to read anything else to decide.

Version 2026-10-21.1, in effect from 21 October 2026. The longer privacy policy and your privacy rights are linked from the privacy centre.

Who is asking

UniSphere is run by the UniSphere team. It decides why and how your information is used. Privacy questions, requests and grievances go to Aditya Kumar Gupta, hello@unispheres.in. UniSphere has not appointed a Data Protection Officer.

What we collect

Only the account details are needed to open an account. Everything else is something you choose to add or do. “Required” means we cannot run an account without it.

Personal data UniSphere collects, by category
What	Items	Needed?	Why
Account details	Full name Username Email address Password (kept only as a one-way hash by the sign-in service)	Required	Create and secure your account, sign you in, send the confirmation and security emails.
Adult declaration	A yes/no statement that you are 18 or older, with the date you made it	Required	Apply UniSphere's age policy. No date of birth or document is collected.
Profile details you choose to add	Headline, bio, profile photo and cover image Colleges or schools, your role at each, department, programme and campus Skills, interests, links, availability and the roles you would collaborate in Year and semester (hidden from others unless you turn on show my class)	Optional	Show your profile to the people you allow, suggest people and posts, and help others find collaborators.
What you post and do	Posts, comments, reactions, bookmarks, follows and connections Projects, communities, events and opportunities you create or join Reports you file and feedback you send Daily Challenge answers, Orbits balance, streaks, badges and leaderboard position	Optional	Provide the features you use, in the audience you choose for each post.
Messages and attachments	Direct messages you send and receive Images and PDFs you attach	Optional	Deliver messages to the people you write to. Only the people in a conversation can read it.
Security and technical data	IP address, browser and device details of your sign-ins and requests Rate-limit counters and security logs A push notification address, only if you switch on notifications in your browser	Required	Keep your account and the service safe, stop abuse, and deliver notifications you asked for.
Notifications	In-app notification records Email notifications, only for the categories you enable	Optional	Tell you about activity that involves you. You choose the categories in Settings.
Messages to UniSphere	Name, email address and message you send through the contact or grievance form	Optional	Answer you and keep a record of how your request was handled.
Safety and moderation records	Reports made about your content or account Decisions, warnings and appeals	Optional	Keep the community safe and let you appeal decisions.
Text you submit to AI features	The draft or question you send to an AI feature, trimmed and with obvious contact details masked	OptionalNeeds your consent	Get the suggestion you asked for. Only sent after you have allowed AI features.
AI index of your public content	Numeric embeddings made from your public or college-visible posts, projects and profile summary	OptionalNeeds your consent	Let related ideas and people be found. Only made after you have allowed it.
Identity document and payment record (blue tick only)	A masked identity document you upload (never stored after the decision) Order and payment reference, amount, date and status from the payment provider (never your card, UPI or bank details)	OptionalNeeds your consent	Confirm who you are for the blue tick, and keep the accounting record of the payment.

What you agree to, one thing at a time

The first two are needed for an account. Each of the others is off until you turn it on, is not needed to use UniSphere, and can be turned off again in one step.

Needed for an account

Run my UniSphere account. Use the information I give UniSphere to run my account, show my profile and content as I choose, and deliver the features I use. If you withdraw it: Withdrawing this means UniSphere can no longer run your account, so it is done by deleting your account. After a 14-day grace period your data is erased, except the records listed in the privacy notice.
I am 18 or older. A declaration that I am an adult. UniSphere does not collect a date of birth or an identity document for this. If you withdraw it: This is a statement of fact, not a permission, so it cannot be withdrawn. If it is no longer true, tell the privacy team.

Optional

Use AI features on the text I submit. When I use an AI feature (writing help, idea discovery, summaries), send the text I submit for that request to the AI provider UniSphere uses, to get a result. Needed only for the AI features only. Everything else works without it. If you turn it off: AI features stop working for you. Nothing else changes. Text already sent is not recalled; see the processors list for what each provider keeps.
Let AI index my public posts and profile for discovery. Convert my public or college-visible posts, projects and profile summary into numeric embeddings with an AI provider, so related ideas and people can be found. Needed only for being found by semantic search and idea discovery. Keyword search works without it. If you turn it off: The embeddings derived from your content are deleted and no new ones are made. Your posts and profile are not changed.
Review my identity document for the blue tick. Let UniSphere reviewers open the identity document I upload, only to compare my name and photo with my profile for the blue tick. Needed only for the blue tick only. If you turn it off: Reviewers stop using the document and it is deleted. A tick that was already granted is not removed by this.

Accepting the Terms of Service is separate, and is never treated as one of these agreements. If this notice changes what any of them covers, you are told, and asked again where the law requires it; nothing is changed for you silently.

Who else handles it

These providers work for UniSphere. The list is generated from what is switched on for this site right now.

Supabase (Database, sign-in and realtime). Receives: Everything you give UniSphere: account, profile, content, messages, consent and request records. Why: To store your information and sign you in.
The hosting platform (Runs the website). Receives: Each request to UniSphere, including IP address and browser details, in server logs. Why: To serve the site and keep it available.
Cloudflare R2 (File storage). Receives: Photos, attachments and, for the blue tick, an identity document until it is reviewed. Why: To store the files you upload. Private files open only through short-lived links.
Resend (Transactional email). Receives: Your email address, name and the text of the email (confirmation, security and notification emails). Why: To send the emails you need or asked for.
A Redis cache (Rate limiting and short-lived cache). Receives: Counters keyed by IP address or account id, cached settings, and short-lived cached AI results (keyed by a hash of the request). Why: To slow down abuse and keep the site fast.
Groq (AI model provider). Receives: The text you submit to an AI feature (with obvious emails, phone numbers and ID numbers masked), only after you allow AI features. Why: To produce the suggestion, summary or search terms you asked for. Only if you have allowed “Use AI features on the text I submit”.
NVIDIA hosted models (AI model provider for the Daily Challenge). Receives: No member data. It drafts the daily quiz questions from UniSphere's own instructions. Why: To write the Daily Challenge.
Razorpay (Payment provider (blue tick only)). Receives: What you enter at checkout. UniSphere receives only the order and payment reference, amount and status. Why: To take the one-time blue tick payment.
Your browser's push service (Delivers notifications you switch on). Receives: A push address your browser creates, and the notification text. Why: To show notifications on your device. You can switch them off in your browser at any time.

Each provider handles information under its own terms, which UniSphere does not control, so UniSphere sends as little as it can. Some of them are outside India. UniSphere does not sell personal information and does not use your content to train any model of its own.

AI features, exactly

Off until you allow them. Allowing is a separate, unticked choice; refusing costs you nothing else.
Sent: the text you submit to an AI button, trimmed, with email addresses, phone numbers and ID-like numbers masked. For a summary: the already-visible post or discussion you asked about.
Never sent: private messages, private or connections-only posts, identity documents, your email address or password.
AI indexing (a separate choice) turns your public or college-visible posts, projects and profile summary into numeric embeddings. Turning it off deletes them.
UniSphere does not claim any provider forgets what it receives. Check the provider’s terms if that matters to you, or leave AI off.

How long we keep it

How long each kind of record is kept
Record	How long, and why
Your account, profile, posts, messages, files	While your account is active. When you delete it: 14 days to change your mind, then erased.
Optional consents	A record of each choice and its date is kept with your account and erased with it. Withdrawing stops the use at once.
Payment records (blue tick)	Kept after deletion, as long as accounting and tax law require. UniSphere does not set that period itself.
Identity document (blue tick)	Deleted as soon as the reviewer decides.
Reports about an account, with the content they quoted	While the report is open. After the account is erased, cleared 365 days after the report is closed.
Messages to the contact form	Once resolved, removed 365 days after they were sent.
Privacy requests and grievances	Closed requests lose their text and contact details 365 days after closing. The reference, kind, status and dates stay.
AI usage log (counts, task and time; never your text)	365 days.
Record that an account was erased (an anonymous id)	365 days, so a restored backup cannot bring an erased account back.
Audit log of staff actions (an anonymous id, no content)	Kept, so decisions can be reviewed.
Backups held by the database provider	Expire on the provider's schedule. They are not restored into the live service without re-applying every erasure.

The day counts above are set by UniSphere’s privacy team, are under review, and are shown as they are configured right now.

Your rights, and how to use them

Get a copy of your data and how it is used: Data & requests (sign in).
Correct it: Data & requests.
Delete it: Delete my account.
Withdraw a consent: Privacy settings.
Nominate someone to act for you if you die or cannot: Data & requests.
Complain: the grievance form. Open to everyone, with a reference you can track.

If you are not satisfied with our reply, you may complain to the Data Protection Board of India after using our grievance process. We aim to reply within 14 days and will resolve a grievance within 90 days.

Children

UniSphere is for people aged 18 and over. You tell us that you are an adult when you sign up; we do not ask for a date of birth or an ID. We have no way to get a parent’s verified consent, so we do not offer accounts to under-18s, and we never track or monitor children’s behaviour or aim advertising at them.

Earlier versions

Version 2026-10-21.1, from 21 October 2026. First notice written for India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and Rules, 2025: itemised data, separate purposes, optional AI choices, rights requests, grievances and breach handling.