Our privacy policy

Kiwi Type is a touch-typing course run by a small, independent team. Under the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020 we are the "agency" that holds the information described here.

Legal name: TODO-OWNER-LEGAL-NAME. Postal address: TODO-OWNER-POSTAL-ADDRESS. Privacy officer: TODO-OWNER-PRIVACY-OFFICER.

To ask a question, see or correct your information, or ask us to delete it, write to TODO-OWNER-CONTACT-EMAIL, or use the contact form.

Every learner

• A display name, and a handle made from the name plus four digits, which friends type to find each other.
• A resume code for profiles made with just a name. We keep only a scrambled version, never the code itself.
• Settings: time zone, daily goal, rest days (and past rest days, so old streaks stay right), keyboard layout, course, sound, music, motion and look.
• Typing results: lessons, stages, speed, accuracy, stars, medals, practice days and streaks.
• The key presses and their timings from each lesson, with the text we gave you and what was typed, so speed and accuracy can be worked out. You type only text we give you, so we never see free writing.
• Friends and friend requests, the streak friends share, results of practice games, and the Studio companions and clothes a learner has earned.

If you sign in with an account

Sign-in is run by Clerk, our sign-in provider. It can offer an emailed code, or a Google or Microsoft account. If you use a Google or Microsoft account, that company confirms who you are to Clerk and can pass Clerk details such as your name and email. Clerk also sees the IP address and browser you sign in with, and a Cloudflare Turnstile bot check runs at sign-up. From Clerk we receive and keep only the email address and Clerk's id for the account. We do not receive or keep a password. Clerk itself holds the account details you give it.

In a school

• Pupils: their school email if they have one (otherwise a resume code, kept scrambled), Google's id for them if the school links Google Classroom, the school and classes they are in, their homework tries, and a log of what staff changed for them and when.
• Staff: name, email, role and classes, and a log of what they changed.
• Parents who a school invites to the family page: their email, and which child they are linked to.
• If a teacher connects Google Classroom: a token from Google that lets us read their courses and class lists and post homework (kept encrypted), each linked course's id and name, and for each student on the class list their first name, the first letter of the family name, their email and Google's id for them, so the same student is matched next time.
• Parent links: a secret link that shows a parent a simple report of the last 7 days. We keep only a scrambled version of the link, who made it and when it ends.

If you use the contact form

Your name, role, school or organisation, email, phone (if you give one) and your question. We use them only to reply to you. A check from Cloudflare Turnstile stops spam; it sees your browser and, to do that, your IP address. A short copy of your message (your name, role, school, email, phone and the start of your question) goes to our staff as a private Telegram message so we see it quickly.

Giving us this information

A display name is needed to make a profile. An email is optional at home, but a school signs its pupils in with their school email. On the contact form everything except the phone number is needed, or we cannot reply. If you do not give something that is needed, we cannot provide that part of the service.

Counts about use of the service

• Server counts. We count requests, errors and how busy the server is, and keep daily visit totals: how many visits, how long they last, which part of the service they touched, whether the visitor was signed in as a pupil or as staff, and the visitor's country. The country is worked out from the IP address using DB-IP data, and then the address is thrown away. We do not store IP addresses for these counts.
• Click counter. This is off in the main service and used only in test versions. When switched on, the app counts which screen elements get clicked, to help us make screens easier. It keeps the screen name, the element, a rounded click position and window size, the look, the day, and whether the click did nothing or was one of several quick clicks. It keeps no names, accounts, visitor ids, typed text, IP addresses or browser details, and it sends no cookies. It stays off if your browser sends Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track.

To run the typing course: to work out speed and accuracy, to pick the next lesson, to keep streaks and medals, to show friends each other's streaks, and to let teachers set homework and see their class. Staff email is used to sign staff in and to reach the right school. Contact form details are used to reply. The counts help us keep the service running and improve it.

Support staff can see a school only when the school's admin opens access for one named person, with a reason, for 60 minutes. Every view goes in the school's audit log.

The Australian Privacy Act and its 13 Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) apply to Australian schools and to some other organisations. Whether they apply directly to a small overseas provider like us is a question for a lawyer, so we aim to meet them anyway. State and territory rules for government schools may add more. This is how the APPs line up with what we do:

• APP 1, open and transparent: this policy.
• APP 2, anonymity: a family profile uses any display name and needs no email.
• APPs 3 to 5, collection and notice: we collect only what the course needs, from you or from the school, and tell people as above.
• APP 6, use and disclosure: only for running the course for the school or family, as set out above.
• APP 7, direct marketing: we do not market to learners or use their information for it.
• APP 8, overseas: see "Where it is kept and who helps us".
• APP 9, government identifiers: we collect none.
• APPs 10 and 11, quality and security: as for principles 5, 8 and 9 above. We delete or de-identify what we no longer need, as set out in "How long we keep it".
• APPs 12 and 13, access and correction: ask the school, or write to us.

A Children's Online Privacy Code is being developed in Australia. We will review it when it is final.

Our main service runs on AWS in Sydney, Australia (region ap-southeast-2). Our test and demo versions run on our own server. Offsite backups to AWS Sydney are being set up. Other companies help us run the service:

TODO-OWNER-CONFIRM-HOSTING: the owner must confirm where the service and its backups are hosted before this policy goes live.

• Clerk (United States) runs sign-in. It sees the email address, IP address and browser used to sign in, and what Google or Microsoft passes it if you use those accounts, but never typing results.
• Google and Microsoft (United States), if you choose to sign in with one of their accounts: your own account provider confirms who you are.
• Cloudflare (United States) runs the Turnstile bot check on the contact form and on the sign-up step of sign-in. It sees your IP address and browser.
• Telegram carries the private notice to our staff when you send the contact form, including your name, role, school, email, phone and the start of your question. Telegram keeps messages on servers around the world, and we do not delete them there.
• Google (United States) receives website visits only if you say yes to Google Analytics, and Google Classroom information if a teacher connects Classroom.
• DB-IP provides a country list that our own server uses to turn an IP address into a country. No IP address is sent to DB-IP.

Sending information overseas. For people in New Zealand, Australia counts as overseas too, so keeping New Zealand schools' information on AWS in Sydney is also a transfer abroad. Several providers are in the United States or run servers around the world, where privacy law may not protect information the same way. Under NZ Information Privacy Principle 12 we send personal information abroad only if the receiver is bound to protect it in a similar way (for example by contract), or the person has been told the protection may differ and agrees. We rely on the terms we have with these providers for Clerk, AWS, Cloudflare and Telegram, not on a choice by pupils or families. For Google Analytics we ask for your agreement first.

TODO-OWNER-LAWYER: confirm that these provider terms meet IPP 12 and the Australian rules for overseas transfers.

You can ask to see the information we hold about you or your child, ask us to correct it, and ask us to delete it. Write to TODO-OWNER-CONTACT-EMAIL. We will answer as soon as we can and within 20 working days, as the Privacy Act requires.

In a school, the school admin can delete a pupil's profile, lessons, homework tries, friends and sign-ins straight away: choose Delete data in the pupil's row. The audit log keeps only the line "deleted a student's data". Teachers can also download a class's results as a CSV file.

At home, there is no delete button for a family profile yet. Write to us with the profile's name, and for a profile that signs in with an email, that email, and we will delete it. We may ask a question to check that you are the right person.

For anything that must also leave Clerk, Google, Microsoft or Telegram, we remove our side, and you can ask those companies to remove theirs.

If we change this policy we will put the new version on this page with its date, and tell schools we work with before a change that affects them.

Write to TODO-OWNER-CONTACT-EMAIL, or use the contact form.

Not legal advice: have this reviewed before it is published.