Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how interKanect (“we,” “us”) handles information in connection with interKanect (the “Service”). interKanect is a professional research tool that indexes California public records for verified investigative users. Two very different kinds of information are involved, and we treat them differently: information about our users, and public-record information about the subjects our users research.

1. Information about our users

When your firm signs up and uses the Service, we collect:

• Account and identity data: name, email, firm details, and professional license information.
• Verification documents you upload (e.g., a professional license and photo ID), stored in a private, access-controlled bucket and used only to verify eligibility.
• Billing information, processed by our payment provider (we do not store card numbers).
• Usage and audit data: the searches you run, the permissible purpose you declare, and the IP address you run them from, retained in an audit log on the schedule described in section 7.

2. Public-record information about research subjects

The Service indexes information already published in government and other public records — for example, business-entity filings, UCC liens, county assessor property records, fictitious business name (DBA) filings, professional license records, FAA aircraft registrations, and court records. We did not collect this information from the individuals it concerns; it originates from public sources. We make it searchable to verified professionals for the lawful purposes described in our Terms of Service. Where we link or cross-reference records from different sources, the resulting derived data is subject to the same access restrictions, suppression mechanisms, and prohibited-use rules as the underlying records. Output from the Service is not a consumer report or investigative consumer report and may not be used for any purpose governed by the Fair Credit Reporting Act or California’s ICRAA/CCRAA.

3. How we use information

• To provide, secure, and improve the Service.
• To verify user eligibility and prevent misuse.
• To process payments and administer subscriptions.
• To send transactional messages (verification decisions, alerts you configure, and account notices).
• To maintain the compliance audit log and respond to lawful requests.

4. Service providers

We share information with a small set of vendors who process it only to provide their service to us, under contract:

• Clerk — user authentication.
• Stripe — payment processing.
• Cloudflare R2 — private document and file storage.
• SendGrid (Twilio) — transactional email delivery.
• Sentry — error monitoring (configured to exclude personal search data).
• Railway and Netlify — application and database hosting.

We do not sell user account information. We may disclose information when required by law or to protect our rights, users, or the public.

5. Record suppression: Delete Act (DROP) and safety removals

Because we make public-record information about individuals searchable, we expect to be treated as a data broker under California’s Delete Act (SB 362). We will register with the California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA) when the registration requirement applies to us, and we will honor deletion requests submitted through the CPPA’s Delete Request and Opt-out Platform (DROP) on the statutory schedule. When a verified request matches, we remove the associated name from our searchable index and suppress it from future ingestion, so it does not reappear. The underlying government records remain public at their source; what we remove is searchability within interKanect. We publish live deletion metrics on our Compliance page.

Separately from DROP, we maintain a documented suppression process for safety-based removal requests, with three tracks: (1) written demands under California Government Code section 6254.21, which allows elected and appointed officials to require that their home address and telephone number not be made available online; (2) requests from participants in California’s Safe at Home confidential address program; and (3) other documented safety requests, such as those supported by a protective order. Requests must identify the requester and the records at issue and include supporting documentation (for example, proof of Safe at Home enrollment or a copy of the order). We aim to respond within 10 business days, act faster where the law requires it, and may temporarily restrict credible matches while an urgent request is under review. Verified requests use the same suppression mechanism as DROP: the associated record is removed from our searchable index and suppressed from future ingestion. Requests may be sent to the safety contact in section 11.

6. Your privacy rights (CCPA/CPRA)

Depending on your relationship to us and applicable law, you may have rights to access, correct, or delete personal information, and to opt out of certain processing. Consumers seeking deletion of public-record information from our index should use the CPPA DROP process above; other requests can be sent to the contact below. We will not discriminate against you for exercising these rights.

7. Data retention

We retain user account data for as long as your firm maintains an account and as needed for legitimate business and legal purposes. The compliance audit log of searches is append-only by design and is retained for seven years from the date of each entry, after which entries are moved to restricted archive, de-identified, or deleted; longer retention applies only under legal hold, active investigation, or another documented exception. Public-record data is refreshed and superseded on each ingestion cycle, subject to DROP and safety suppressions.

8. Security

We use industry-standard measures including encrypted transport, access-controlled private storage, scoped credentials, and least-privilege API keys. No system is perfectly secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

9. Children

The Service is a professional tool not directed to anyone under 18, and we do not knowingly collect information from children.

10. Changes

We may update this Policy from time to time; material changes will be communicated through the Service or by email, and the “last updated” date above will change.

11. Contact and deletion requests

Privacy questions or requests: support@interkanect.com. Safety-based suppression demands (Government Code section 6254.21, Safe at Home, protective orders): safety@interkanect.com. California consumers may also use the CPPA DROP platform to request deletion of public-record information from our index.