Legal
Privacy Policy
Effective Date: April 2, 2026 · Last Updated: April 2, 2026
Sections: 1 Introduction · 2 Categories of Information We Collect · 3 Sensitive Personal Information · 4 How We Use Your Information · 5 What We Do NOT Do · 6 How We Share Your Information · 7 Financial Aid Award Letter Data · 8 Cookies, Local Storage, and Tracking Technologies · 9 Data Security · 10 Data Retention · 11 Notice of Financial Incentive · 12 How to Exercise Your Privacy Rights · 13 Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information · 15 Third-Party Links · 16 California Shine the Light · 17 Do Not Track · 18 Nevada Notice · 19 Children's Privacy · 20 Changes to This Policy · Contact Us
Introduction
CollegeLens ("we," "us," or "our") operates the college funding platform at collegelens.ai (the "Platform"). This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, share, and protect your information, and describes the rights available to you.
CollegeLens is a free educational tool. To sustain a free platform, we generate revenue through lender advertisements, lender matching features, and affiliate partnerships. This policy is transparent about those relationships. By using the Platform you agree to the practices described here. Questions? Email support@collegelens.ai.
Categories of Personal Information We Collect, How We Collect It, and Whether It Is Shared
The table below categorizes the personal information we collect, the manner in which we collect it, and how it is shared. These categories apply to all users regardless of state of residence.
| Category | Examples We Collect | Source | Purpose | Shared With |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Identifiers | Email address, session ID, IP address | You / Automatic | Account management, security, analytics | Infrastructure & analytics providers |
| Personal Records (Financial) | Award letter data: cost of attendance, grants, loans, expected family contribution | Voluntary upload | Generate funding plan analysis | OCR service provider (AWS Textract) |
| Protected Classification Characteristics | None actively collected | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Commercial Information | Funding goal, borrowing comfort, lender preferences, affiliate referral source | You / Automatic | Personalization, lender matching, affiliate attribution | Lender partners (opt-in only), affiliate networks |
| Internet / Network Activity | Pages visited, features used, clicks, time on page, navigation path | Automatic | Analytics, platform improvement | Analytics providers |
| Geolocation Data | Approximate location (state or country) inferred from device IP address — not precise GPS | Automatic | Compliance, analytics, contextual ads | Analytics providers, advertising partners |
| Professional / Educational Information | Intended major, degree type, enrollment status, expected start term, expected graduation year | You | Platform features, personalization | Not shared externally |
| Inferences | Estimated funding gap, likely borrowing need, college funding profile | Derived from your inputs | Personalized recommendations | Not shared externally |
| Sensitive Personal Information | Limited — see Section 3 | See Section 3 | See Section 3 | See Section 3 |
We collect only the information reasonably necessary to operate the Platform and provide the features you use. Award letter upload and profile completion are optional and user-initiated.
Sensitive Personal Information
Certain categories of personal information are classified as sensitive under applicable state privacy laws. The table below identifies each recognized category and states whether CollegeLens collects it.
| Sensitive Category | Examples | Does CollegeLens Collect? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Government-Issued ID Numbers | Social Security, driver license, state ID, passport | No | We do not request or store government ID numbers. |
| Financial Account Credentials | Bank account numbers, debit/credit card numbers, access codes | No | We do not collect payment credentials. The Platform is free. |
| Precise Geolocation | GPS coordinates, exact street address | No | Only data about the location of your device, which may be imprecise (i.e., inferred from your device's IP address). |
| Citizenship or Immigration Status | Country of citizenship, visa status, immigration documentation | No | Not collected. |
| Racial or Ethnic Origin | Race, ethnicity, national origin | No | Not collected. |
| Religious or Philosophical Beliefs | Religion, faith, philosophical views | No | Not collected. |
| Union Membership | Labor union affiliation | No | Not collected. |
| Genetic Data | DNA sequences, genetic test results | No | Not collected. |
| Biometric Data | Fingerprints, facial recognition, voiceprints | No | Not collected. |
| Health Information | Medical records, conditions, prescriptions | No | Not collected. |
| Sex Life or Sexual Orientation | Sexual orientation, gender identity | No | Not collected. |
| Communications | Contents of mail, email, or texts not intended for us | No | Not collected. |
| Commercial Information: Financial Aid & Award Letter Data | Cost of attendance, grants, loans, expected family contribution, funding gap | Yes — voluntarily uploaded | Processed only to generate your funding plan. Shared with our OCR service provider (AWS Textract) solely for extraction. See Section 7. |
How We Use Your Information
4.1 To Operate the Platform
- Authenticate your session and save your funding plan across visits.
- Analyze uploaded award letters and generate cost estimates, gap analyses, and repayment projections.
- Pre-populate your funding plan with profile information you have provided.
- Send transactional account communications (e.g., session verification).
4.2 To Improve the Platform
- Understand usage patterns using data from third-party analytics tools.
- Identify bugs, test new features, and optimize the user experience.
4.3 For Advertising and Lender Matching
- Display lender advertisements relevant to your general funding situation (e.g., state of residence, degree type).
- Facilitate opt-in lender matching features that connect you with relevant lenders based on information you voluntarily provide.
4.4 For Affiliate Attribution
- Track affiliate referrals to measure partner effectiveness and calculate commissions.
- Record click-through referrals when you navigate from CollegeLens to a partner site.
4.5 For Security and Legal Compliance
- Detect and prevent fraud, abuse, and security threats.
- Comply with applicable laws, regulations, and legal processes.
What We Do NOT Do With Your Information
We do NOT:
- Sell your personal information to data brokers, marketing list companies, or any third party for their own direct marketing purposes. See the California "Shine the Light" notice in Section 16.
- Share award letter documents or specific financial figures contained in them with lenders, advertisers, or affiliate partners without your explicit consent.
- Automatically submit you to a lender matching feature — lender matching is always user opt-in.
- Send unsolicited marketing or promotional emails unless you have explicitly opted in.
- Allow advertising or affiliate partners to use your personal data for their own independent marketing purposes.
- Discriminate against users who opt out of advertising, lender matching, or affiliate tracking.
Financial Aid Award Letter Data — Special Protections
When you upload financial aid award letters — which may include images, scanned documents, or non-searchable files (collectively, "Documents") — to our Platform, we use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and intelligent document processing to convert those Documents into machine-readable text and extract specific data fields. This process is necessary and used solely to extract cost and financial aid data to provide you with your funding plan.
Types of Data Extracted
- Identity Information: Names and signatures appearing on the award letter.
- Financial Data: Cost of attendance, tuition and fees, room and board, grants, scholarships, federal and private loans, work-study amounts, expected family contribution (EFC) or Student Aid Index (SAI), and net cost figures.
- Contact Details: Addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses found in the text.
Use of Service Providers
Data Training and Human Review
- No Training: We do not use your uploaded Documents or the resulting extracted data to train internal machine learning models or those of our third-party providers without your explicit consent.
- Human-in-the-Loop: In cases of low-confidence extraction, our support team may manually review fragments of the extracted text to ensure accuracy.
Retention and Security
- Temporary Storage: Original Document files are retained only for the period reasonably necessary to perform extraction and confirm accuracy, after which they are deleted in accordance with our internal retention practices.
- Encryption: All Documents are encrypted in transit and at rest using industry-standard encryption.
- Not shared with lenders, advertisers, affiliate partners, or analytics providers.
- Not used to target you with ads or submit you to lender matching without your affirmative consent.
- Deletable at any time: email support@collegelens.ai with subject "Delete My Award Letter Data."
- Not used to assess your creditworthiness or facilitate any financial transaction without your explicit consent.
Data Security
We use reasonable information security measures, including physical, administrative, and technical safeguards to secure your information. No electronic system is completely secure. If you believe your account has been compromised, contact support@collegelens.ai immediately.
Data Retention
We will keep the personal information we collect about you for as long as necessary to carry out the purposes set forth in this Privacy Policy or any other notice provided at the time of data collection, but no longer than as required or permitted under applicable law or our internal CollegeLens policy. We dispose of the personal information we collect in accordance with CollegeLens' retention policies and procedures.
- You may request deletion at any time at support@collegelens.ai — processed within 30 days.
- Analytics data is subject to each provider's retention policy.
- Affiliate and ad interaction data is retained as long as needed to calculate and audit commissions.
- Anonymized, aggregate, non-identifiable data may be retained indefinitely for platform improvement.
- Data may be retained longer as required by law or to resolve disputes.
Notice of Financial Incentive
In the future, if we provide a financial incentive, we will provide you with the details, including how the incentive is related to your data, before you participate so that you may make an informed decision about whether and how to participate. In the event you decide to take advantage of a financial incentive, you will always have the right to withdraw from participation, and we will provide you with instructions on how to do so.
11.1 How to Opt Out or Withdraw Your Consent
- Analytics tracking: Use browser settings or provider opt-out tools (see Section 8.4).
- Lender matching: Simply do not use lender matching features — they are opt-in only.
- Advertising cookies: Opt out via industry tools at optout.networkadvertising.org.
- Affiliate tracking: Decline cookies in your browser or use browser privacy settings.
- Delete your account: Email support@collegelens.ai.
Opting out of certain data uses may limit some Platform personalization but will not prevent you from using core tools (college comparison, award letter upload, or cost estimates).
How to Exercise Your Privacy Rights
Regardless of your state of residence, you can exercise privacy rights by contacting us using the methods below. We honor rights requests from all users.
12.1 How to Submit a Request
- Email: Send to support@collegelens.ai with subject line "Privacy Request - [Request Type]"
- Request types include: Access · Correction · Deletion · Opt-Out of Sale/Sharing · Limit Sensitive PI · Portability · Appeal
12.2 What to Include in Your Request
- Your email address associated with your CollegeLens account.
- The type of request (e.g., "I am requesting deletion of all my personal data").
- A brief description of the specific information or action requested.
12.3 Verification
12.4 Response Timelines
| Request Type | Initial Response | Max Extension | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Right to Access / Know | 45 days | +45 days | We will notify you if we need an extension. |
| Right to Deletion | 45 days | +45 days | Some data may be retained as required by law. |
| Right to Correction | 45 days | +45 days | We will confirm corrections were made. |
| Right to Portability | 45 days | +45 days | Provided in a portable, machine-readable format. |
| Opt-Out of Sale / Sharing | 15 business days | None | Effective as soon as practicable. |
| Limit Sensitive PI (CA) | 15 business days | None | Effective as soon as practicable. |
| Appeal of Denied Request | 45 days | +60 days | We will explain our decision in writing. |
12.5 Right to Appeal
12.6 Authorized Agents — How Do I Submit a Request Using an Authorized Agent?
Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information
CollegeLens does not sell your personal information to data brokers. You may still opt out of advertising, affiliate tracking, and similar sharing signals by using the Manage Cookie Preferences control in the site footer or by emailing support@collegelens.ai.
13.1 Your Privacy Rights
- Right to Know: Know what categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected, the sources, the purposes, and the categories of third parties with whom it is shared.
- Right to Access: Obtain a copy of the specific personal information we have collected about you in the prior 12 months.
- Right to Delete: Request deletion of your personal information, subject to certain exceptions.
- Right to Correct: Request correction of inaccurate personal information.
- Right to Opt Out of Sale / Sharing: Opt out of the sale of your personal information and the sharing of your personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising. Use the "Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information" link on our website or email us.
- Right to Limit Use of Sensitive PI: Limit our use and disclosure of sensitive personal information to what is necessary to perform the services you request.
- Right to Data Portability: Receive your personal information in a portable, machine-readable format.
- Right to Non-Discrimination: We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of these rights.
- Right to Appeal: Appeal our decision if we deny your request.
- Opt-Out of Automated Decision Making: Where applicable under your state's law, you may opt out of certain automated decision-making processes.
Use subject line "Privacy Request" when emailing us.
Third-Party Links and Partner Sites
The Platform contains links to third-party websites including lender sites, affiliate partner destinations, the U.S. Department of Education, colleges, and informational resources. When you click through to a third-party site, that site's own privacy policy governs how your information is handled. We are not responsible for third-party privacy practices. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of any external site before providing personal information.
Notice to California Residents (California's “Shine the Light” Law)
We do not share your personal information with third parties who we know or have reason to know may use your personal information for direct marketing purposes as contemplated by California's "Shine the Light" law (Civil Code Section § 1798.83).
Managing “Do Not Track”
As required by the California Online Privacy Protection Act (CalOPPA), our systems are currently able to recognize browser "Do Not Track" signals.
Notice to Nevada Residents
We do not exchange your personal information for monetary consideration with anyone who will license or sell your personal information to third parties.
Children's Privacy
This website is not directed towards or designed for use by children under the age of 16. This website and the information contained on it is specifically designed for individuals at least 16 years of age. If you are under the age of 16, you must not access this website or perform any of the actions on it, except through the involvement of a parent or legal guardian as described in our Terms of Use.
We do not knowingly collect, use, store, or share personal information from children under the age of 16 without parental consent. If you know or have reason to believe that we have collected data from anyone under the age of 16 without such consent, please contact us using the contact details provided for removal of that data.
Changes to This Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy to reflect changes in our practices, commercial relationships, technology, or legal requirements. When we make material changes, we will update the "Last Updated" date at the top of this page and notify you via email (if provided) or a prominent Platform notice. Continued use after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.
Contact Us
For privacy questions, requests, appeals, or opt-out requests:
CollegeLens - Privacy Officer
Email: support@collegelens.ai
Subject Line: "Privacy Request - [Request Type]"
Website: collegelens.ai
By using CollegeLens, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this Privacy Policy, including how your information is used to sustain the free Platform.