Privacy Policy

StatusClock ("we," "our," or "us") operates statusclock.com, an immigration information platform designed to help international students and professionals navigate the U.S. immigration system through checklists, AI-assisted guidance, and deadline tracking.

We are not a law firm. Nothing on this platform constitutes legal advice. For immigration decisions specific to your situation, please consult a licensed immigration attorney or accredited representative.

If you have questions about this policy, contact us at privacy@statusclock.com.

2.1 Information You Provide Directly

• Account registration: When you create an account via Clerk, we collect your name, email address, and optionally a profile photo if you sign in with Google.
• AI Assistant conversations:Messages you send to the AI Assistant are transmitted to Anthropic's Claude API. We do not permanently store your conversation history on our servers unless you use a Save feature. Anthropic may retain messages per their own privacy policy.
• Checklist & tool data: If you are signed in, we save your checklist completion state, OPT tracker dates, and tool preferences to your account.
• Community content: Any posts or comments you submit in the Community section are stored and may be publicly visible.
• Support communications: If you contact us by email, we keep a record of that correspondence.

2.2 Information Collected Automatically

• Log data: Server logs include IP address, browser type, operating system, referring URL, pages visited, and timestamps.
• Usage data: We track feature interactions (e.g., which tools you use, which guides you read) to understand how the product is used and improve it.
• Device information: We collect device type, screen resolution, and browser version for debugging and compatibility.
• Cookies and local storage: We use session cookies for authentication, preference cookies to remember your settings, and analytics cookies to measure usage (see Section 7).

2.3 Payment Information

Payments are processed by Stripe, Inc. We never see or store your full credit card number, CVV, or billing address on our servers. Stripe provides us with a tokenized reference and basic billing details (last 4 digits, card brand, expiration). Stripe's privacy policy governs how they handle payment data.

• To create and manage your account and authenticate your identity
• To save and sync your checklist progress, tool data, and preferences across devices
• To generate AI responses to your immigration questions via the Claude API
• To process payments and send receipts and billing notifications
• To send transactional emails such as password resets and important account notices
• To improve StatusClock by analyzing aggregate, anonymized usage patterns
• To debug errors, investigate abuse, and maintain platform security
• To respond to your support inquiries and feedback
• To comply with legal obligations and enforce our Terms of Service

We do not use your data to train AI models, sell to third-party marketers, or send unsolicited marketing emails without your consent.

If you are in the European Economic Area (EEA) or UK, we process your data under the following legal bases:

• Contractual necessity: Processing required to provide the Service you signed up for (account management, checklist syncing, payments).
• Legitimate interests: Analytics and product improvement, security monitoring, fraud prevention — balanced against your privacy rights.
• Consent: Marketing communications and non-essential cookies, which you can withdraw at any time.
• Legal obligation: Compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

We share data only in the following circumstances:

• Service providers: We share data with vendors who help operate StatusClock (see Section 6). These vendors are contractually bound to use data only to provide services to us.
• Legal requirements: We may disclose data if required by law, court order, or government request, or to protect the rights and safety of StatusClock, our users, or the public.
• Business transfers: If StatusClock is acquired or merges with another company, your data may be transferred as part of that transaction. We will notify you before your data is subject to a materially different privacy policy.
• With your consent: We may share data in other ways with your explicit permission.

We do not sell your personal data.

We use three categories of cookies:

• Strictly necessary: Session and authentication cookies required for you to log in and use the Service. These cannot be disabled.
• Functional: Cookies that remember your preferences (e.g., dark/light mode, checklist state for guest users). Disabling them may reduce functionality.
• Analytics: Cookies from Vercel Analytics that help us understand aggregate usage. No cross-site tracking or advertising profiles are built.

You can manage cookies through your browser settings. Blocking all cookies will prevent you from signing in.

• Account data: Retained while your account is active.
• Checklist & tool data: Retained while your account is active; deleted within 30 days of account deletion.
• AI chat messages: Not stored on our servers beyond the active session. Anthropic retains messages per their policy.
• Billing records: Retained for 7 years to comply with tax and accounting laws.
• Support emails: Retained for 2 years after the issue is resolved.
• Server logs: Retained for 90 days, then automatically deleted.

Depending on your location, you may have the right to:

• Access: Request a copy of personal data we hold about you.
• Correction: Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete data.
• Deletion: Request deletion of your account and associated personal data (right to be forgotten).
• Portability: Request your data in a machine-readable format.
• Restriction: Object to or request restriction of certain processing.
• Withdraw consent: Opt out of marketing emails or analytics cookies at any time.

California residents may also exercise rights under the CCPA, including the right to know, delete, and opt out of the sale of personal information (we do not sell personal information).

To exercise any of these rights, email privacy@statusclock.com. We will respond within 30 days. We may need to verify your identity before processing the request.

We implement industry-standard security measures including TLS encryption in transit, AES-256 encryption at rest (via Supabase), access controls, and regular security reviews. Clerk handles authentication with industry-leading security practices including MFA support.

No system is 100% secure. If we become aware of a data breach that affects your rights, we will notify affected users within 72 hours as required by applicable law.

StatusClock is operated from the United States. If you access the Service from outside the U.S., your data will be transferred to and processed in the U.S. For users in the EEA, UK, or Switzerland, such transfers are made under Standard Contractual Clauses or other appropriate safeguards.

StatusClock is intended for users 13 and older. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children under 13. If you believe a child under 13 has created an account, please contact us and we will delete the account and associated data promptly.

We may update this Privacy Policy periodically. When we do, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top. For material changes, we will notify you by email or by posting a prominent notice on the site at least 14 days before changes take effect. Continued use of StatusClock after the effective date constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

For privacy-related questions, requests, or complaints:

If you are in the EEA and are not satisfied with our response, you have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority.