Privacy Policy

We collect what we need to run AlgoVizuals and to learn which problems and features help people. We don’t show ads, we don’t sell or share your personal data for advertising, and you can delete your account yourself at any time in Settings.

AlgoVizuals (algovizuals.com) is operated by its founder, an individual based in India (“we”, “us”). We decide why and how your personal data is processed, so we are the “data fiduciary” under India’s Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (DPDP Act) and the “controller” under the EU and UK GDPR. Contact for anything in this policy: admin@algovizuals.com.

• Account details: your email, name, username and password (stored only as a salted bcrypt hash). If you sign in with Google, your Google account ID and profile picture. Optionally your age, college, program and batch, if you add them.
• Your work: the code you run, submit or debug, the results, your solved problems, streaks, rank and study plans.
• AI features: when you ask for a hint or an AI study plan, the request (your code, the problem and the failing test case for hints; your goals for plans). When a Practice session ends, the code you wrote in it, to write your feedback.
• Consent records: which version of our Terms and this policy you accepted, and when.
• Technical data: your IP address and browser details in short-lived server logs, used for security, abuse prevention and debugging.
• Analytics: only as described in section 5.

If you add a college, other students on your college leaderboard can see your name, username, avatar, program, graduation year and rank. Your email, code and submissions are never shown to other users.

We don’t ask for, and you shouldn’t put in your code, sensitive information such as financial, health or government ID details.

• To provide the service you signed up for: run and grade your code, show visualizations, save your progress, send verification and password-reset emails. Basis: under the DPDP Act, the consent you give when you sign up; under the GDPR, our contract with you (art. 6(1)(b)).
• To keep it safe: rate limits, abuse and fraud prevention, security monitoring. Basis: under the DPDP Act, part of the purpose you consented to; under the GDPR, our legitimate interest in a secure service (art. 6(1)(f)).
• To improve it: analytics, only if you allow them (section 5). Basis: consent, which you can withdraw at any time.
• To meet legal obligations, such as responding to lawful requests.

We don’t use your data for advertising or sell it, and we don’t make automated decisions that have legal or similarly significant effects on you.

Your email and a password or Google account are needed to create an account; without them we can’t provide it. Everything else in your profile is optional. Some problems can be tried without an account; then we process only the code you run and technical data such as your IP address.

We use these service providers to run the Platform:

• Amazon Web Services (Mumbai, India): hosting, database, backups, the code-running sandbox, and Amazon SES for our emails.
• Google: Sign in with Google; Google Analytics (only with your consent); and the Gemini API, which generates AI hints, AI study plans and Practice feedback from the request described in section 2.
• Grafana Labs: service health monitoring (performance metrics, not your account data).
• Zoho Mail: our support inbox, when you email us.

AWS processes data only on our instructions. Google (for Sign in with Google and the Gemini API) also processes data under its own terms and privacy policy. Google, Grafana Labs and Zoho may store or process data outside India. Where they do, we rely on their contractual safeguards (such as the EU Standard Contractual Clauses for GDPR transfers), and we don’t transfer data to any country the Indian government has restricted.

We use Google Analytics 4 to understand which pages and features are used: page views, and actions such as opening a problem, running or submitting code, playing a visualization or starting a study plan. Google also records your browser, device type and approximate location (country or city, from your IP address).

• Until you accept, no analytics cookies are set. Google receives basic cookieless signals with no identifiers; your IP address reaches Google with the request but isn’t stored in Analytics.
• If you accept, Google Analytics sets cookies (_ga) and, when you’re signed in, we attach your internal account number so we can see how people progress over time. We never send your email or name to Google.

Change your choice any time with the switch above or in Settings; turning it off removes the analytics cookies from this browser. Your sign-in session and preferences (theme, narration, your analytics choice) are kept in your browser’s local storage; they’re needed for the site to work and aren’t used for tracking.

• Account data and your work: while your account exists. Deleting your account removes it from our live systems straight away.
• Database backups: kept for 90 days, then deleted automatically, so deleted data is gone from backups within 90 days.
• Server logs: rotated automatically. Only a small, fixed amount is kept, and older entries are overwritten as new ones arrive.
• Google Analytics data: up to 14 months, then deleted automatically.
• We may keep limited records longer where the law requires it.

We use HTTPS everywhere, store passwords only as salted hashes, run your code in an isolated sandbox with strict time and memory limits, restrict who can access production systems, rate-limit sign-in and other sensitive actions, and send standard browser security headers. No system is perfectly secure; if a personal data breach affects you, we’ll notify you and the authorities as the DPDP Act and GDPR require.

Wherever you live, you can:

• access the personal data we hold about you and how we use it;
• correct or update it (most of it directly in Settings);
• delete your account and data (Settings → Privacy and data → Delete account);
• get a copy of your data in a portable format;
• withdraw consent at any time: switch analytics off, or withdraw your sign-up consent by deleting your account (this doesn’t affect what happened before);
• object to or restrict certain processing;
• nominate someone to exercise your rights if you die or become incapacitated (DPDP Act);
• raise a grievance with us, and complain to a regulator (section 10).

Email admin@algovizuals.com from your account’s email address. We’ll respond within 15 days. Residents of California and other US states with privacy laws: we don’t sell or “share” personal information for cross-context behavioural advertising, and you have the same rights above.

AlgoVizuals is for people aged 13 and over. If you’re under 18, you may use it only with your parent’s or guardian’s agreement, which you confirm when you sign up. We don’t show ads or profile anyone for advertising, and analytics stays off unless you turn it on: if you’re under 18, please leave it off. If we learn that someone under 13 has an account, or a parent or guardian asks us to, we’ll delete it: contact admin@algovizuals.com.

Our Grievance Officer handles privacy questions, requests and complaints: admin@algovizuals.com. We acknowledge grievances within 24 hours and resolve them within 15 days. If you’re not satisfied after using this process, you can complain to the Data Protection Board of India, or, in the EU or UK, to your local data protection authority.

When we change this policy we update the date at the top. If the change is material, we’ll ask you to review and accept it the next time you use AlgoVizuals while signed in. If AlgoVizuals is transferred to a company (for example, one we set up), your data moves with it and stays protected by this policy. See also our Terms of Service.