Privacy Policy

We collect your information for these reasons:

• To Provide the Service: We need your information to create your account, run competitions, and show your scores.
• To Protect the Platform: We use data to prevent cheating, detect fraud, and keep the Service secure.
• With Your Consent: For anything else, we ask your permission first.
• Legal Requirements: Sometimes the law requires us to keep or share certain information.

We use your information to:

• Run Competitions: Grade your submissions, calculate scores, and show results.
• Manage Your Account: Let you log in, update your profile, and reset your password.
• Send Important Emails: Confirm your registration, remind you about competitions, and notify you of your scores.
• Prevent Cheating: Use proctoring data to detect rule violations.
• Keep the Service Secure: Monitor for suspicious activity and unauthorized access.
• Show Leaderboards: Display names, schools, and scores publicly on rankings.
• Improve MathLinks: Analyze how people use the Service to make it better.

We do not sell your personal information. Period.

We share your information only in these situations:

• Service Providers: Companies that help us run MathLinks (hosting, email, payments, file storage). They can only use your data to provide services to us.
• Public Results: Your name, school, and scores appear on leaderboards and award announcements. This is public.
• Your School or Coach: If you registered through a school or coach, they can see your participation and scores.
• Legal Reasons: If the law requires it, or if we need to protect MathLinks, our users, or the public from harm.
• Business Changes: If MathLinks is acquired or merges with another organization, your data transfers to the new owner.

MathLinks uses these external services:

• Vercel: Hosts our website and stores uploaded files.
• MongoDB Atlas: Stores our database.
• Email Provider: Sends emails like registration confirmations.
• Payment Processor: Handles competition fees when applicable.

Each service has its own privacy policy. We choose providers with strong security practices.

We take security seriously:

• Password Protection: We never store your actual password. We store a secure hash that cannot be reversed.
• Encryption: All data sent between you and MathLinks is encrypted (HTTPS).
• Access Limits: Only authorized team members can access user data, and only what they need.
• Account Protection: We require email verification and lock accounts after multiple failed login attempts.
• Monitoring: We log security events to detect and investigate problems.

No system is 100% secure. We do our best, but we cannot guarantee absolute security. Keep your password secret and contact us if you suspect your account has been compromised.

• Account Data: We keep it while your account is active. If you delete your account, we remove or anonymize your data within 30 days (unless the law requires us to keep it longer).
• Competition Records: Scores and rankings are kept permanently for historical records.
• Security Logs: Login and security logs are kept for 90 days.
• Payment Records: Kept as long as tax law requires.

You have the right to:

• See Your Data: Request a copy of the information we have about you.
• Fix Errors: Ask us to correct wrong or incomplete information.
• Delete Your Data: Ask us to delete your information (with some exceptions).
• Get Your Data: Request your data in a format you can take elsewhere.
• Object: Tell us to stop using your data for certain purposes.

To use these rights, contact us (see Section 11). We may need to verify your identity first. We will respond within 30 days.

MathLinks serves students of all ages, including children under 13. We comply with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).

For children under 13: We require a parent or guardian's consent before collecting their information. Schools and coaches who register students confirm they have the proper consent to do so.

Parents: You can review your child's information, ask us to delete it, or stop us from collecting more. Contact us to make these requests.

We only collect information necessary for our educational competition services.

We use cookies (small files stored on your device) for:

• Essential Functions: Keeping you logged in and remembering your session. Required for the site to work.
• Preferences: Remembering your settings.

We do not use advertising or tracking cookies. You can block cookies in your browser, but some features may not work.