Pathly Legal
Trust and Legal Center
Everything that governs how Pathly works and how it handles data, in one place. Written to be read by the person it affects, not only by a lawyer. If you are evaluating Pathly for a school, a district, or a practice, start with the data inventory and the subprocessor list.
- Documents
- 8 published
- Last change
- July 30, 2026
- Entity
- Pathly Labs, Inc.
- Questions
- legal@pathly.com
Where to start
- Using Pathly as a student? The Privacy Policy is the one that matters, especially Section 10 on what your counselor can and cannot see.
- Evaluating Pathly for a school? Read the data inventory and the subprocessor list. They answer most of a security review before you have to ask.
- Subscribing as a counselor? The Subscription Terms cover billing and cancellation. The DPA covers data.
01 For everyone
| Document | What it covers | Version |
|---|---|---|
| Terms of Service | The agreement between you and Pathly. Eligibility, accounts, your content, AI guidance, acceptable use, liability, disputes. | 2.0 |
| Privacy Policy | What we collect, why, who sees it, how long we keep it, and your rights. | 2.0 |
| Cookie Notice | What the website and the app set, and how to turn it off. | 1.0 |
| Data Inventory | Every field the platform collects, field by field, with retention periods. | 1.0 |
| Subprocessor List | Every third party that touches platform data, what each one sees, and where to verify its security posture. | 1.1 |
02 For counselors
Independent educational consultants, private counselors, coaches, and advising practices on a paid Counselor plan.
| Document | What it covers | Version |
|---|---|---|
| Counselor Subscription Terms | Plans, pricing, seats, student capacity, free trial, billing, renewal, cancellation, refunds. | 1.0 |
| Counselor Data Processing Addendum | Data roles, how a connection works, what you can see and enter, your obligations, security, incidents. | 1.0 |
How acceptance works
Both documents take effect when you accept them at checkout. No signature is required or offered. Pathly records the version you accepted with the date and time, and an executed copy is available in your account under Legal.
03 For schools and districts
Partner School agreements are negotiated and signed rather than accepted online. The commercial terms live in a signed Order Form with its own privacy addendum.
Four documents on this site apply to a school relationship and answer most of what a security review asks:
- The data inventory, which is the same for every channel
- The subprocessor list, which is Exhibit B to the Partner School privacy addendum
- The Privacy Policy, which governs the student accounts underneath any school agreement
- The Terms of Service, Section 12, on institution-linked accounts
Two things worth knowing before procurement
Student accounts are not school property. They belong to students and survive the end of a school agreement. Schools license counselor and analytics tools, not student access.
Counselors never see conversations. Not transcripts, not excerpts, not topics. That holds for school counselors exactly as it holds for independent counselors.
To request the standard Partner School agreement package for review, write to partnerships@pathly.com.
04 For students and families
The whole point of Pathly is that a student can use it without anyone paying for it and without giving up control of their own information. The three things worth knowing:
- Your conversations are yours. No counselor, school, or parent can read them through Pathly. See Privacy Section 10.
- Your account is yours. It does not belong to your school or your counselor, and it stays with you when either goes away. See Privacy Section 11.
- You can leave with your data. Export or delete everything from account settings, any time. See Privacy Section 12.
Parents and guardians: Privacy Section 13 covers your rights, and the one exception where we will disclose more than usual.
05 Standing commitments
These appear across the documents above. They are collected here so they are easy to find and easy to hold us to.
We will
- Keep the student experience free to students
- Give 30 days' notice before a material change or a new subprocessor
- Publish every version and every change on this page
- Link every security claim to a source you can check
- Tell you plainly what we do not have, including certifications
We will not
- Sell personal information
- Show advertising to students
- Accept payment for placement or ranking in recommendations
- Let AI providers train on platform data
- Show a student's conversations to a counselor, school, or parent
06 Version history
Every document carries a version and an effective date. Prior versions are retained. To request a specific prior version, or a copy of the version in force on a particular date, write to legal@pathly.com and we will send it.
| Document | Version | Effective |
|---|---|---|
| Terms of Service | 2.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Privacy Policy | 2.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Cookie Notice | 1.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Counselor Subscription Terms | 1.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Counselor Data Processing Addendum | 1.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Data Inventory | 1.0 | July 30, 2026 |
| Subprocessor List | 1.1 | July 30, 2026 |
07 Changelog
Every substantive change to any document on this page, newest first.
July 30, 2026
Terms of Service 2.0 and Privacy Policy 2.0. Rewritten and restructured. The Terms become a universal baseline that plan-specific terms sit on top of.
- Operating entity updated to Pathly Labs, Inc., a Delaware corporation, with address and contact details corrected throughout.
- Added Section 6 of the Terms covering free and paid plans, including a commitment not to begin charging for anything a user already has for free.
- Added Section 7 of the Terms, how Pathly makes money, including a commitment that recommendations are never paid placement.
- Removed all references to sponsored content and sponsored quizzes. Pathly does not run them.
- Removed claims of GDPR and CCPA compliance. Pathly is directed to users in the United States, and now extends access, correction, portability, and deletion rights to every user as a matter of policy rather than by statute.
- Corrected the description of academic data. Pathly holds self-reported GPA and test scores only, never official transcripts or verified score reports.
- Corrected the statement on IP addresses, which are logged briefly for rate limiting and security.
- Added an explicit safety exception to the parental rights section.
- Narrowed the content licence granted to Pathly, and removed transferability.
- Removed indemnification obligations for students.
- Moved liability disclaimers out of the Privacy Policy and into the Terms.
New documents. Cookie Notice 1.0, Counselor Subscription Terms 1.0, Counselor Data Processing Addendum 1.0, Data Inventory 1.0, Subprocessor List 1.1.
Subprocessor List 1.1. Added Stripe for subscription billing. Added a column showing whether each data processing agreement is separately executed or incorporated into accepted terms, with verification links for every provider.
08 In progress
Published here when ready, with notice under the usual process:
- Family Subscription Terms, at launch of the family plan
- Partner School standard agreement, as a read-only reference copy for procurement review
- Security overview, consolidating the controls described across these documents
- Privacy request form, as a self-serve alternative to email
- Accessibility statement, expanding on Section 21.5 of the Terms
09 Contact
| Privacy requests and questions | privacy@pathly.com |
|---|---|
| Legal notices and these documents | legal@pathly.com |
| Security and vulnerability reports | security@pathly.com |
| Billing and subscriptions | billing@pathly.com |
| Schools and districts | partnerships@pathly.com |
| Everything else | hello@pathly.com |
| Pathly Labs, Inc. 885 Gold Hill Rd #3142 Fort Mill, SC 29708 |
