In 2018, Gradescope joined Turnitin, a leading provider of academic integrity and writing assessment solutions. Since that time, as we’ve continued to improve and support the Gradescope product you know and love, we’ve also been settling into our new home. This has included improving our policies and practices, including but not limited to those around privacy and security. As a result, we are adopting a new, companywide privacy policy, which you can find below. If you have any questions or concerns about the changes, as always please reach out to us at help@gradescope.com.
Turnitin respects your privacy and vigorously protects your personal data. We work hard to achieve extremely high levels of security through the use of appropriate technical and organisational measures which are described below. Turnitin complies with the relevant security standards of the US, EU and Switzerland. The Privacy Policy below is reviewed regularly in line with changes in global legislation. For the purposes of this policy, ‘personal data’ shall have the meaning ascribed to it under the definition of ‘personal data’ under the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) (GDPR).
Privacy Pledge
Integrity is at the heart of all we do; it defines us.
- Chris Caren, CEO of Turnitin
The Privacy Policy below covers the kind of personal data we collect (and how), what we do with it, and how we protect any personal data you provide. Protecting your personal data is our top priority. We are fully committed to transparency and using technology responsibly, no matter what changes emerge from our rapidly evolving digital world; As we strive to create new possibilities in education, we hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards. We strive to adhere to the strictest privacy practices so that your trust is well-deserved; and Because your peace of mind is important to us, we guard your personal data with the utmost care. We use it only for lawful reasons.
Privacy Policy
Last Updated: 12th October 2022
This Privacy Policy applies to all businesses and group companies of Turnitin. This policy describes how Turnitin collects, uses, shares, and secures the personal data you provide. It also describes your choices regarding use, access, and changes to your personal data. Data collected through our service will be limited solely to the purpose of providing the service for which you (the Client) have engaged Turnitin. If and when a third-party company provides a related service to support our service, such as language translation, we make sure that when personal data is processed by them, we require that those third-party companies meet our security standards and those of the applicable legislation that applies from time to time. We refer to the collective sites run by Turnitin as the “Site.”
Why we collect personal data
When you create an account with us, or when a student has their work processed by Turnitin, we process personal data (such as name, email address, job title, and school) so that we can correctly administer your account and provide you with the best customer service. All personal data we process is directly linked to a specific purpose, such as requesting access to our academic content database, sending grading data to your LMS or requesting web content (i.e. a newsletter, case study, video, etc.). At any time, you can access, update, rectify or erase any personal data by logging into your account and clicking “User Info” (“Edit Account” on Gradescope) or contacting Customer Support. Please see our Privacy Policy for more detailed information about how we protect your personally identifiable information.
Protecting your data
We endeavor to keep your personal data safe and secure at all times. Depending on the Turnitin solution used, personal data is processed either:
both in Europe and in the United States, in the case of most products
entirely within Europe, Canada, Australia, or the United States depending on the institution’s preference, except for text recognition performed on handwritten formulas, which requires some data processing within the US, in the case of the Gradescope product
In all of the cases above, we have robust technical and organizational safeguards in place to protect such personal data. Passwords are required to access your personal data, so please remember to keep your password confidential. Even with the best security systems, it is impossible to guarantee 100% protection from hackers and unauthorized third parties who capture information provided over public networks.
When a paper is submitted to any of Turnitin’s products with the exception of Gradescope, it is compared against a vast, secure proprietary database of licensed source material, including millions of periodicals, academic journals, books, and web pages. Turnitin also maintains a separate repository of student papers. Each institution (at the discretion of his or her school administrator) can determine whether or not to include student papers in the repository and whether or not to give students the option to opt out. We can remove student papers from the standard repository at the request of a school administrator.
When a teacher, professor, or other representative acting on behalf of a school or other institution uploads data to Gradescope, this may include personally identifiable information about students. We may then collect an email address and password from these students, which is combined with student information received from the teacher and/or school. We use the personal information we collect to operate, maintain, and provide the features and functionality of Gradescope, to analyze our offerings and functionality, and to communicate with our users: teachers, schools, students and website visitors. We retain user data on the Gradescope service only as long as necessary to deliver our services. Data associated with a given account is retained until the account owner or an institution, on behalf of the account owner, submits a deletion request.
What’s most important
1. Compliance
Turnitin serves a global community of educators and students, whose views on data privacy may differ significantly. Our products and services, as well as our privacy policies, are regularly audited and inspected by both employees and external consultants to ensure that we meet, and exceed where possible, privacy expectations and requirements. Turnitin conducts periodic compliance reviews to verify that this Privacy Policy is accurate, comprehensive, prominently displayed, lawful, complete, implemented, and accessible. Any employee who violates this Privacy Policy will be subjected to disciplinary action.
2. Personal data
Because we provide education services, we are vocal advocates for safeguarding student data and privacy and want to make sure that parents, educators, and schools know this, which is why we took the Student Privacy Pledge, put forth by the Future of Privacy Forum (FPF) and the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA).
Data We Collect
When an institution’s administrator or instructor creates an account with us, we ask for their personal data such as name, email, phone, and job title, so that we can correctly administer their account and provide them with the best customer service.
Changes to this policy
We reserve the right to make changes to this Privacy Policy at any time. Please check the Privacy Policy when you use the Site to ensure that you are aware of any changes in our privacy practices. Our Privacy Policy will indicate the date it was last updated. If at any point we decide to use personal data in a manner different from that stated at the time it was collected, we will notify you via e-mail at the last email address you have provided to us. You will have a choice as to whether or not we use your information in this different manner. If you elect not to allow us to use your information in this different manner, we will continue to use such information in accordance with the Privacy Policy under which the information was collected.