Verifying Academic Quality
Verifying Academic Quality
Version 1.0 · 1 July 2026
CHILDREN AND UNDER-18 USER NOTICE Home School and Junior privacy, consent, visibility and safeguarding Operating entity
PARAMOUNT ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS (PTY) LTD
Important update: This Notice replaces the earlier universal 18+ launch restriction for the approved Home School and Junior products. The adult Student product may retain its own eligibility rules. Junior is for ages 12-17 only and Home School learner profiles are guardian-controlled.
This Notice applies when Veri-AQ processes the personal information of a person under 18 through Veri-AQ Junior, VeriAQ Home School, or an approved institution-controlled workflow.
POPIA generally prohibits processing a child's personal information unless an exception in section 35 applies. For direct Home School and Junior processing, Veri-AQ will ordinarily rely on the prior consent of a competent person where that is the approved basis. Other lawful grounds may apply in limited circumstances and must be documented before processing.
Product
Age / account model
| Student | Adult self-service product unless a separate approved rule applies. |
|---|---|
| Educator | Adult authorised user. |
| Home School | Guardian-controlled account with one or more child learner profiles. |
| Junior | Direct learner experience for ages 12-17 only, with verified age and approved guardian relationship/consent. |
| Institution | Access governed by the institution agreement, lawful authority and child-specific safeguards where minors are involved. |
•
Child name and date of birth/age; curriculum and academic records; assignments and assessments; attendance; mastery/progress information; learning-gap diagnostics; portfolio evidence, which may include photographs; guardian/co-guardian and household learner relationships; and AI Tutor session content where enabled.
How the learner’s account is created. The guardian creates it. The learner is given an internal sign-in address that has no mailbox, and the guardian sets the learner’s password and knows it. There is no separate email confirmation step, because there is no mailbox to confirm to — the authenticated guardian is the verification. Learners should understand that a guardian who set the password can sign in as them; what protects learner-private content is the visibility rules in section 7, not the password.
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Learner name and verified date of birth/age; academic submissions; AI Tutor conversation content; originality and writing-quality analysis results; and guardian relationship and consent records.
Consent is not treated as one blanket acceptance. Veri-AQ records consent per guardian-learner relationship and policy version. Separate scopes cover AI tutoring, academic-content processing/uploads and guardian visibility. Data export and deletion are handled as a recorded request and permission, not as a consent toggle. Consent records include grant time, verification method and revocation status.
Reconfirmation • • •
Consent must be reconfirmed when the policy materially changes. Consent must be reconfirmed when the guardian associated with the learner changes. Consent must be reviewed and reconfirmed on the annual consent cycle.
Junior privacy rule: A Junior learner's private AI Tutor conversations and draft work are not automatically visible to a guardian merely because that person is linked as the guardian. Visibility is determined by the approved visibility policy and the active consent/permission configuration. Guardians may receive account, safety, subscription, consent, progress or report information where the product configuration authorises it. Access to specific private content must be enforced server-side. A guardian must not be able to bypass the rule by altering URLs, API requests or account parameters.
The Junior and Home School AI Tutor may process educational prompts and learning context only for the approved purpose. Before any external AI processing, Veri-AQ must apply the approved Privacy Gateway/child-data controls, data minimisation and provider/transfer assessment. The Tutor must not receive unrelated billing data, family data, other learner data or account secrets.
Children's information is not subject to one blanket retention period. The Retention and Deletion Policy must define separate rules for learner profiles, academic uploads, Home School portfolio evidence, photographs, attendance/progress records, AI Tutor logs, originality/writing results, age-verification evidence and consent records. Any period not yet approved must be finalised and technically implemented before the corresponding production feature is enabled. Consent evidence may need to be retained longer than optional content to demonstrate the lawful basis that applied at the time.
Primary Veri-AQ hosting is intended to remain on controlled South African infrastructure. If an approved AI, analytics, payment, scholarly lookup or other provider processes personal information outside South Africa, Veri-AQ must document the purpose, destination, recipient, safeguards and POPIA section 72 basis before use. Child-data transfers must also undergo any applicable prior-authorisation assessment.
• • • • • • •
Request access to applicable personal information. Request correction of inaccurate information. Request deletion or destruction where applicable. Object to processing where the law permits. Withdraw consent for consent-based processing. Request human review or challenge a significant automated result. Receive age-appropriate information explaining the learner's privacy and available help routes.
1. The relevant consent scope is marked revoked and the change is audit logged. 2. New processing under that consent scope is blocked as soon as reasonably practicable. 3. Queued or scheduled processing that relies on the withdrawn consent is cancelled where technically possible. 4. Existing information is deleted, restricted or retained according to the approved retention schedule and any lawful retention obligation. 5. The guardian and, where appropriate, the learner are informed which features are no longer available. 6. Withdrawal does not invalidate processing that was lawful before the withdrawal.
Veri-AQ does not treat under-18 marketing as ordinary adult marketing. Behavioural advertising and unnecessary profiling should remain disabled for child users unless a specifically approved legal and safeguarding basis exists. Optional analytics must not receive AI Tutor text, assignment content, learner names, student numbers, guardian identifiers or other protected child content.
Contact details Contact
Detail
Website
www.veri-aq.com
Support
support@veri-aq.com
Privacy / POPIA
privacy@veri-aq.com
PAIA
privacy@veri-aq.com
Principal address
Hofmeyer Rd, Centurion, South Africa, 0157
Legal-reference note This draft is intended to support legal and privacy review. It is written to align with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA), the Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000 (PAIA), the Consumer Protection Act 68 of 2008 (CPA), the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002 (ECTA), and other applicable South African law. Mandatory statutory rights prevail over any inconsistent contractual wording. POPIA sections 34 and 35 deal specifically with the processing of children's personal information and the general authorisations that may permit it. Information Regulator (South Africa) | South African Government legislation portal
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