Privacy policy

Chanak Academy is a curriculum-led learning platform for East African secondary education. It connects lessons, practice, AI-supported tutor help, classwork, family visibility, school tools, and academic records around the pathway learners already meet at school.

The Platform is operated by Chanak EdTech Ltd. In this Privacy Policy, “Chanak,” “we,” “us,” and “our” refer to Chanak EdTech Ltd and the authorized operators of Chanak Academy.

This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, store, share, and protect personal data when people use Chanak Academy.

This Privacy Policy applies to personal data processed through Chanak Academy, including data collected from or about:

• Students.
• Parents and guardians.
• Teachers, tutors, school administrators, and school staff.
• Individual subscribers and guest learners.
• Schools, institutions, and education partners.
• Website visitors, support contacts, service providers, and other users.

It applies to our website, web platform, mobile applications, AI tools, school dashboards, teacher tools, parent tools, payment flows, communications, support channels, and related services.

This Privacy Policy does not apply to third-party websites, payment providers, messaging services, video platforms, or external services that Chanak does not control, even if they are linked from the Platform.

In this Privacy Policy, the following words have these meanings unless the context clearly requires something different:

Personal data

— Information that identifies or can reasonably identify a person, directly or indirectly.

Student data

— Personal data relating to a learner, including account details, school information, class membership, academic activity, learning progress, assessment records, assignments, submissions, feedback, mastery data, and platform interactions.

Child data

— Personal data relating to a person who is considered a child or minor under applicable law.

Processing

— Any operation performed on personal data, including collection, storage, use, analysis, sharing, deletion, retrieval, alteration, or transfer.

School Account

— An account created, managed, sponsored, or authorized by a school or institution.

ChanAI

— Chanak Academy’s AI-supported tutor, teacher assistant, learning assistant, and related AI-enabled features.

Chanak Academy is built for education communities, so we treat privacy as part of learner safety and school trust. We process personal data according to these principles:

• Purpose limitation: we use personal data for clear educational, operational, safety, billing, support, and legal purposes.
• Data minimization: we aim to collect only what is reasonably needed to provide and improve the Platform.
• Student protection: we treat student and child data with heightened care.
• Transparency: we aim to explain what data we collect, why we collect it, and how it is used.
• Security: we use reasonable technical and organizational safeguards to protect personal data.
• Accountability: we maintain access limits, internal controls, and review processes to support responsible data handling.

When users create or manage accounts, we may collect account and identity information such as:

• Full name, username, email address, phone number, and authentication details.
• Profile photo, where provided.
• User role, such as student, teacher, parent, school administrator, or platform staff.
• Account status, preferred language, settings, verification status, and similar account details.

We use this data to create accounts, authenticate users, manage roles, protect access, and support Platform functionality.

For students, Chanak Academy may collect learning and academic data needed to provide lessons, practice, assignments, feedback, and progress visibility.

• School, class or grade level, subject selections, and curriculum pathway.
• Term, topic, subtopic, lesson activity, and learning outcome progress.
• Lesson completion, quiz responses, assessment scores, mastery levels, assignments, submissions, and teacher feedback.
• AI tutor interactions, revision activity, streaks, XP, badges, tasks, reminders, and academic support needs inferred from platform activity.

Student and learning data is used for educational purposes, progress tracking, teacher support, school records, parent or guardian visibility where authorized, and learner safety.

For teachers, school staff, and institutional users, we may collect information needed to manage classes, assignments, school dashboards, content, reporting, and support.

• School or organization name, role, title, subjects taught, classes managed, and class membership.
• Assignments created, content generated or uploaded, assessment materials, teacher feedback, student progress reviews, and administrative actions.
• School dashboard activity, onboarding information, and support requests.

This data helps schools and teachers use Chanak Academy responsibly and maintain appropriate academic visibility.

For parents and guardians, we may collect information needed to verify access, link learner profiles, provide progress visibility, communicate updates, and support payments where applicable.

• Name, phone number, email address, relationship to learner, verification details, and communication preferences.
• Linked learner information, learner progress views, notifications, support interactions, and payment information where applicable.

Parent and guardian access is intended to support learning and family visibility. We may require verification, school confirmation, or other safeguards before linking a parent or guardian to a learner profile.

We may collect content that users upload, submit, generate, or share through Chanak Academy.

• Lesson notes, questions, answers, assignments, student submissions, teacher feedback, class posts, comments, uploaded documents, images, files, external links, AI prompts and outputs, and support messages.

Users should avoid uploading unnecessary sensitive personal information about themselves or others unless it is lawful, necessary, and appropriate for the educational purpose.

Where paid access is used, we may collect billing and subscription information needed to process payment, activate access, issue receipts, manage plans, and provide billing support.

• Plan type, billing period, payment status, transaction reference, amount paid, payment method type, invoice or receipt details, school billing details, and subscription status.

We do not intentionally store full card numbers or mobile money PINs. Payment details may be processed by third-party payment providers under their own terms and privacy policies.

When people use the Platform, we may collect technical and usage data to keep Chanak Academy secure, reliable, and useful.

• Device type, browser type, operating system, IP address, approximate location derived from IP or settings, and app version.
• Pages visited, features used, session activity, login times, error logs, crash reports, security logs, referral source, network data, and performance data.
• Cookies, local storage, device identifiers, and similar technologies.

This data supports authentication, security, fraud prevention, diagnostics, analytics, performance, and product improvement.

When users contact us or interact with support, onboarding, or feedback channels, we may collect communications data.

• Support messages, complaints, feedback, survey responses, call or chat records where applicable, email correspondence, school onboarding communications, bug reports, and feature requests.

We use this data to respond to requests, improve service quality, resolve disputes, investigate issues, and support users.

We collect personal data in several ways, depending on how Chanak Academy is used:

• Directly from users when they create accounts, update profiles, submit work, make payments, contact support, or use ChanAI.
• From schools or institutions when they provide student, teacher, class, and administrative data to create accounts or manage learning.
• From parents or guardians when they provide learner details, contact information, payment information, or account-linking information.
• From platform activity generated through lessons, quizzes, assignments, dashboards, AI tools, notifications, and other features.
• From third-party services such as payment processors, authentication providers, cloud services, messaging providers, analytics tools, or school systems where integrated.

We use personal data to operate, provide, improve, secure, and support Chanak Academy. The main purposes include:

• Creating and managing accounts, authenticating users, and managing roles.
• Delivering lessons, quizzes, assignments, assessments, AI-supported tutoring, and teacher tools.
• Tracking learning progress, mastery, class activity, and school records.
• Connecting parents or guardians to learner progress where authorized.
• Sending notifications, reminders, account messages, support responses, and service announcements.
• Managing payments, subscriptions, receipts, fraud prevention, and billing support.
• Improving curriculum mapping, platform quality, safety, reliability, and learner experience.
• Complying with legal obligations, responding to lawful requests, and protecting legal rights.

We use learning data to support the educational purpose of the Platform.

• Showing students what they have completed and where they may need practice.
• Recommending revision, practice, or support within the curriculum.
• Helping teachers identify learning gaps, review work, and provide feedback.
• Helping schools monitor academic progress and class activity.
• Personalizing learning support while keeping the curriculum pathway clear and teacher-led.

Chanak Academy does not use learning data to guarantee grades, examination outcomes, or school placement. The Platform supports learning and academic visibility; it does not replace schools, teachers, guardians, or professional judgment.

Chanak Academy may use internal AI systems and third-party AI service providers to support tutoring, teacher tools, content generation, feedback, classification, moderation, and platform assistance.

When AI features are used, relevant user inputs, curriculum context, lesson activity, learning outcomes, assessment data, prompts, and outputs may be processed to generate responses and provide platform functionality.

We aim to limit the personal data sent to AI systems to what is reasonably needed for the feature. Where practical, we may use de-identification, access controls, safety filters, monitoring, and other safeguards.

AI interactions may be processed to generate responses, maintain conversation context, improve safety and accuracy, prevent misuse, debug issues, and improve platform quality.

AI outputs may be inaccurate or incomplete. Users should review AI-generated content before relying on it, especially in teaching, grading, official school decisions, or sensitive learner support.

Depending on the country, context, user type, and applicable law, we may process personal data based on one or more legal bases, including:

• Consent.
• Parent or guardian authorization.
• School or institutional authorization.
• Performance of a contract.
• Legitimate educational, safety, or operational interests.
• Compliance with legal obligations.
• Protection of vital interests or safety.
• Public interest or educational functions where applicable.
• Research, analytics, or statistical purposes where permitted and appropriately safeguarded.

For children and students, we apply additional care and rely on an appropriate authorization or lawful basis depending on the learner’s age, school arrangement, and applicable law.

Chanak Academy is designed for secondary education and may be used by learners who are minors.

We do not knowingly collect children’s personal data without an appropriate lawful basis, such as parent or guardian authorization, school authorization where legally permitted, contractual necessity, legal obligation, or another lawful basis recognized under applicable law.

When processing child or student data, we aim to:

• Collect only data needed for educational use.
• Restrict access to authorized users.
• Support parent, guardian, and school visibility where appropriate.
• Avoid unnecessary profiling.
• Protect learners from harmful interactions.
• Limit public exposure of student data.
• Apply security safeguards.
• Provide ways to request correction, access, restriction, or deletion where applicable.

Schools, parents, and guardians are responsible for ensuring they have authority to create, approve, or manage learner accounts where required.

Read the full Child & Student Data Notice.

We do not sell personal data. We may share personal data only where needed to provide Chanak Academy, support authorized education workflows, protect safety, comply with law, or operate the Platform.

Depending on account settings and school arrangements, data may be visible to authorized users such as the student, linked parents or guardians, assigned teachers, school administrators, school staff with authorized roles, and platform support staff where needed.

For school accounts, schools may access academic records, class membership, assignments, submissions, assessment results, mastery data, teacher activity, and other information needed for educational administration.

We may share data with trusted service providers who help us operate Chanak Academy, including:

• Cloud hosting and database providers.
• AI service providers.
• Payment processors.
• Email, SMS, and messaging providers.
• Analytics, customer support, security, monitoring, document processing, infrastructure, and development service providers.

These providers are expected to process data only for authorized purposes and under appropriate confidentiality and security obligations.

Where we work with education partners, funders, NGOs, research partners, or government-related programs, we aim to share aggregated, anonymized, or de-identified data where possible. We will not share identifiable student data with partners for unrelated purposes without an appropriate legal basis, authorization, or agreement.

We may share personal data where necessary to comply with law, respond to lawful requests, protect safety, investigate abuse, enforce our Terms, prevent fraud or security threats, or protect Chanak, users, schools, or the public.

If Chanak is involved in a merger, acquisition, financing, restructuring, asset sale, or similar transaction, personal data may be transferred as part of that process, subject to appropriate safeguards.

Chanak Academy may use cookies, local storage, device identifiers, and similar technologies to support Platform functionality.

• Keep users signed in.
• Remember preferences.
• Secure accounts.
• Analyze usage.
• Improve performance.
• Detect errors.
• Prevent fraud.
• Support payments.
• Improve user experience.

You may be able to control cookies through your browser or device settings. Disabling some cookies may affect Platform functionality.

We keep personal data only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, unless a longer period is required by law, school agreement, accounting rules, dispute resolution, safety obligations, or legitimate educational record needs.

Retention periods may vary depending on the type of data:

• Account data may be retained while the account is active.
• Learning records may be retained to support progress tracking and school records.
• Billing records may be retained for accounting and tax purposes.
• Security logs may be retained for abuse prevention and audit purposes.
• Support communications may be retained for service quality and dispute resolution.
• Anonymized or aggregated data may be retained for analytics and improvement.

Where a school account is involved, deletion or export of records may depend on the school’s instructions, legal obligations, and academic record requirements.

We use reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect personal data against unauthorized access, loss, misuse, alteration, disclosure, or destruction.

These measures may include:

• Access controls.
• Authentication systems.
• Encryption where appropriate.
• Secure cloud infrastructure.
• Monitoring and logging.
• Role-based permissions.
• Staff confidentiality obligations.
• Backups.
• Security testing.
• Incident response procedures.

No digital platform can guarantee absolute security. Users also have responsibilities, including keeping passwords private, using secure devices, and reporting suspicious activity.

Chanak Academy may use cloud, AI, payment, messaging, analytics, and support providers located in different countries. This means personal data may be stored or processed outside your country, including outside Uganda or East Africa.

Where applicable law requires safeguards for cross-border transfers, we will take reasonable steps to comply. These safeguards may include contractual protections, service provider due diligence, access controls, security measures, or other legally recognized transfer mechanisms.

Depending on applicable law and your relationship to Chanak Academy, you may have rights to:

• Access personal data held about you.
• Request correction of inaccurate data.
• Request deletion of data.
• Object to certain processing.
• Restrict certain processing.
• Withdraw consent where processing is based on consent.
• Request data portability where applicable.
• Request information about how data is used.
• Complain to a data protection authority.

For students who are minors, some rights may need to be exercised by a parent, guardian, school, or legally authorized person, depending on the context and applicable law.

To make a request, contact us using the details in this Privacy Policy. We may need to verify your identity or authority before responding.

Where a student account is created or managed by a school, certain privacy requests may need to be handled through the school.

For example, requests relating to class records, assignment history, assessment data, or school-managed accounts may require school involvement because the school may have educational, legal, or recordkeeping responsibilities.

Chanak may cooperate with schools to respond to valid access, correction, deletion, portability, or restriction requests.

You must not upload or submit personal data about another person unless you have authority to do so.

Teachers, schools, parents, and students should avoid uploading unnecessary sensitive information, such as medical details, family issues, disciplinary matters, identity documents, or private communications, unless the information is necessary, lawful, and appropriate for the educational purpose.

Chanak Academy may use aggregated, anonymized, or de-identified data for research, analytics, product improvement, reporting, and impact measurement.

This may include reporting on:

• Learner engagement.
• Mastery improvement.
• Subject usage.
• Teacher adoption.
• School activity.
• Regional learning trends.
• Platform performance.

Where we work with partners, funders, researchers, or institutions, we aim to share anonymized or aggregated data where possible. Identifiable student data will not be used for unrelated research or public reporting without appropriate authorization or lawful basis.

We may use contact details to send product updates, newsletters, offers, events, or partnership communications. You may opt out of marketing communications where available.

We will not publicly use a student’s name, photo, school, testimonial, image, or identifiable story for marketing without appropriate consent or authorization.

Schools, teachers, parents, and partners should also avoid publicly sharing identifiable student data obtained through Chanak without proper authorization.

Chanak Academy may include links to third-party websites, video platforms, learning resources, payment pages, documents, or communication channels.

We are not responsible for the privacy practices of third-party services that we do not control. Users should review third-party privacy policies before submitting personal data to those services.

Teachers and schools are responsible for ensuring that external resources shared with learners are appropriate and lawful.

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our services, legal requirements, operations, safety controls, or data practices.

If we make material changes, we will take reasonable steps to notify users, schools, or account owners through the Platform, email, or other appropriate channels.

The updated Privacy Policy will apply from the effective date stated at the top of the page. Continued use of Chanak Academy after the update means you acknowledge the updated Privacy Policy.

For privacy questions, data requests, account concerns, child data concerns, school data issues, or security reports, contact us through the official support channels provided on the Chanak Academy website or application.