1. Who is responsible
Invent Priority is a research and invention evidence service operated from Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The legal operator is: Legal operator name has not yet been published.. The service domain is inventpriority.com. For privacy enquiries and requests, use admin@inventpriority.com.
This policy describes how this version of the service handles personal information. It is informed by the Australian Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs). Whether particular statutory obligations apply depends on the operator’s circumstances, including applicable small-business exemptions and exceptions. This policy does not assert an exemption, certification or a statutory right that does not apply. Where the Act applies, its requirements prevail.
2. What we collect, and why
Accounts and contact
We collect an email address, a password at registration/sign-in, an account identifier and creation time. Passwords are stored as Argon2 hashes, not plaintext. We store hashed session identifiers and expiry times, and an identity-status field (currently unverified). This beta does not verify email ownership or legal identity, process payments, or send automated emails. Correspondence sent to the operator’s published contact address is handled through that mailbox and its provider.
We use account data to provide access, associate deposits and watches with your account, maintain security, respond to requests and meet applicable legal obligations. You may browse public evidence and use public lookup without an account. Author labels can be pseudonyms where lawful; they are not evidence of verified identity.
Deposits
We process the author label, title, exact text and disclosure/comparison choices you submit. The database retains the author label and title in readable form even when you keep them off the public ledger. It stores encrypted content, its nonce and salt, a hash of the reveal token, the owner-account link, and public event data described below. We do not need government identity documents or unrelated sensitive personal information. Do not include them, patient/client records or another person’s information without a lawful basis and appropriate authority.
Public evidence
Anyone can retrieve the content’s unsalted SHA-256 hash, byte length, event number, server-recorded time, linked event hashes, encryption identifiers, comparison opt-in status and relevant integrity commitments. Public author/title fields appear only when you choose them. An opted-in deposit can also publish a similarity snapshot: scores, matching record numbers and public or redacted titles. Revealing a deposit makes the exact content publicly retrievable. Hashes are not guaranteed anonymous: a person who guesses a short text can hash it and check for a match.
Monitoring
To create a watch we receive its title and plaintext source text, calculate a MinHash sketch, and retain the title and sketch, not the source text. We store matches, bibliographic metadata, review states and scan times. Sketches are not encryption and can leak linguistic information. Deposit comparison is off by default; monitoring watches and comparison are separate choices.
Requests, cookies and local processing
Network services receive IP addresses and request metadata. Application/reverse-proxy or hosting logs can contain request paths, lookup hashes, times, status codes and, depending on hosting configuration, browser/device information. The application does not intentionally log deposit bodies, passwords or reveal tokens. Operators must keep request-body logging disabled.
The reg_session cookie supports sign-in, expires after seven days and is HttpOnly and SameSite=Strict. It is Secure in HTTPS production mode. It is not an advertising cookie. This version has no analytics pixels, advertising SDKs or third-party fonts. The browser hash calculator reads a selected file or text locally; only a hash is sent when you choose to look it up. Downloaded receipts and reveal tokens are stored wherever you save them on your device; the service cannot control those copies.
3. How sealing and encryption work
The server sees plaintext at deposit time. It also processes plaintext when you create a monitoring watch and processes your reveal token when you choose to reveal. This is server-side encryption at rest, not end-to-end or client-side encryption and not a zero-knowledge service. HTTPS protects transport in the documented production deployment; local HTTP development mode does not provide that transport protection.
The app generates a random 256-bit reveal token, derives a 256-bit key using HKDF-SHA256 and a random salt, and encrypts the deposit content using AES-256-GCM with a fresh nonce. The database stores a hash of the token rather than the token itself. The token is returned once with your receipt. A database-only copy should not allow content decryption without that token, assuming the cryptography is sound, but a compromised live server could capture plaintext or tokens. Account fields, titles, author labels, sketches and operational data are not encrypted by this application.
Keep the token, original text and receipts securely outside the service. Losing the token can make your encrypted content unrecoverable; password access alone does not recover it. This beta has no token-recovery function. A legal or access request cannot make a lost cryptographic key recoverable.
Access controls, password hashing, CSRF protection, strict same-site cookies and a restrictive Content Security Policy reduce risks but do not guarantee security. Hosting security, backups, staff access, incident response and any disk/backup encryption require operational controls beyond the app.
5. Retention and deletion — what this beta actually does
There is no automatic account, deposit or ledger expiry in this software. Records remain until reviewed administrative action is taken. Long-lived evidence is the intended purpose of the ledger, but that is not a blanket entitlement to retain all personal information forever. We assess ongoing need, your request, applicable legal duties and the effect on evidence integrity. Where required by applicable law, information no longer needed is destroyed or de-identified unless a lawful retention requirement applies.
- Accounts and sealed deposits
- Stored while needed to provide your account/evidence service and subject to lawful retention and request handling. No self-service account or deposit deletion endpoint exists in this beta. Contact the operator for review. “Delete account” is not equivalent to removing a public event.
- Sessions
- Authentication expires after seven days; logout deletes the current server-side session. Expired session rows are not automatically purged from the database in this version.
- Monitoring watches and findings
- The Remove action deletes the watch and its saved findings from the active database. It does not delete deposited evidence, historical similarity snapshots, database journal remnants, backups or previously exported information.
- Ledger entries, reveals and timestamps
- The ledger is designed to be append-only. Rewriting an event can invalidate its hash chain and evidence links. Correction, removal or access restriction requests require individual review rather than a guaranteed in-place edit. Public reveal is effectively irreversible once others have copied it; this does not displace any legal duty to act on a valid request.
- Logs, backups and correspondence
- These depend on the chosen infrastructure and documented operator schedule. The app neither creates a managed backup service nor enforces log/backup expiry. Logical deletion does not guarantee immediate physical erasure from SQLite journals, storage media, backups or recipients’ systems.
Deployment-specific log and backup retention periods, deletion procedures and review intervals have not yet been published. The software does not automatically purge these records. These details must be set before public launch.
6. Access, correction and your choices
You can keep public metadata and deposit comparison disabled, browse without an account, remove monitoring watches, avoid optional public reveal, and save your deposit receipt and independent timestamp proof. Request access to personal information, correction, account closure, deletion/de-identification review or a copy of this policy using the contact below. We may reasonably verify authority to protect the account; do not send a password or reveal token with a routine request.
We will consider requests within a reasonable period and meet any applicable statutory requirements. Access may be limited where the law permits or requires, including to protect others. Where a request cannot be granted, we will explain the reason and available complaint route where required. A historical event cannot be silently edited without changing its evidence; appropriate correction or restriction must be assessed. There is no blanket Australian right to erase all public evidence on demand, nor does using this service waive any rights that do apply.
7. Contact, complaints and data incidents
Contact: admin@inventpriority.com. Identify the account email or relevant public record number and describe the request without including confidential invention text unnecessarily. We aim to acknowledge and investigate complaints promptly and respond within 30 days; any shorter legal requirement takes precedence. If more time is needed, we will explain why and provide an update.
Where the OAIC has jurisdiction, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner if you are not satisfied with the response or have not received a response within 30 days. See the OAIC privacy complaint process.
We assess suspected data breaches and take reasonable containment and remedial steps. Where the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme applies and an eligible breach occurs, we notify affected individuals and the OAIC as required. A beta label does not remove applicable duties.
8. Policy changes
We publish a dated version here. Material changes to processing or disclosures will be explained before they take effect where practicable, with additional notice or consent where required. A policy update does not silently authorise a new use of previously deposited confidential content. This service is intended for adult professional and research users, not children.
Further guidance: Australian Privacy Principles · Privacy Act coverage and small business.