Privacy notice

Last updated 7 October 2026. In plain English, for pupils, parents and carers, and schools.

The short version

Etched never receives your name, email address, date of birth, photo or school.
Your teacher gives you a pupil code on an Etched card. With it, your progress and the minutes you spend learning are also saved online under a random code, so you can carry on on another device and your teacher can see you've done your time.
If your school uses the teacher page, the list of which code belongs to which pupil stays on the teacher's own device, locked with a PIN. It is never sent to Etched.
What you type in answers is marked on your device and never stored by us or sent to any AI service.
There are no adverts, no tracking cookies and no analytics.

Who is responsible

Etched is made by Emblem (Emblem for All, a sole trader), registered with the Information Commissioner's Office, reference ZC219242.

If you use Etched with a code from your school, your school decides how it's used and is the data controller; Emblem processes the data on the school's behalf. Otherwise, Emblem is the data controller.

What is kept on your device

Your progress: which steps and weeks are done, stars, the days you practised, and your settings (colour, sounds, spelling help, school week, and "Make it easier" choices like text size, font, page colour and read aloud).
Minutes waiting to be sent, if the device was offline. These are stored with the scrambled version of your code only, so they can still be sent after you sign out of a shared computer.
Your pupil code, if you have one.
A scrambled version (a hash) of the code you got in with, and a copy of the knowledge sheets, so Etched opens quickly and works offline.

On a school or shared computer, choose "School or shared computer" when you sign in. Etched then forgets your progress when the browser closes or after 30 minutes without use.

What is saved online, and only if you sign in with a pupil code

Your progress and settings, as listed above.
How many minutes you spent learning each week, in total, and when you last used Etched. Minutes only count while you're using it on a learning screen.
It's saved under a scrambled version of your pupil code. The code itself never leaves your device, so the database doesn't hold it.
We don't store your IP address, and nothing you type in an answer is saved.

To check a code when you sign in, your device sends only a scrambled version of it. Nothing is stored by that check.

Teachers, and parents and carers

Teachers. A school can use the teacher page to make pupil codes from its class list, print QR code cards, and see each pupil's minutes. The class list (names, classes and codes) is kept only on the teacher's device, encrypted and locked with a 4-digit PIN. The teacher's device asks Etched for minutes using each code's scrambled version, then matches them to names itself, so Etched never learns who anyone is. A teacher can download a backup of the class list; the school looks after that file under its own data protection policy. If the school has switched it on, a teacher can also keep an online backup of the class list. It is locked on the teacher's device with a recovery key that only the school holds, so Etched stores a scrambled copy it cannot read and cannot recover the key for. It is deleted when the teacher turns the backup off, and otherwise after about 18 months without use. When a pupil leaves, the teacher can delete their progress and minutes from Etched.

Practising with the school code. Without a pupil code, a school code lets a pupil practise. Nothing is saved online, minutes aren't counted, and the device forgets the session when the browser closes.

Parents and carers can type their child's code at secondary.etched.school/parent to see a read-only snapshot: minutes this week, the last few weeks, and what they're learning. Nothing is stored by doing this, and the code isn't kept on that device.

Questions uploaded by a school for a new term are saved online so every pupil gets them. They contain questions and answers only, never anything about pupils.

Where it is held

Etched is hosted by Vercel and online progress is held by Upstash, our database provider. Like any website, our host keeps short-lived technical logs (such as the time of a request) to keep the service secure and working.

How long it is kept

Progress and minutes saved online that aren't used for about 18 months are deleted automatically. You can delete them yourself at any time: Settings, Pupil code, "Delete my progress from the internet" (this deletes your minutes too), or your teacher can. Progress on your device stays until you clear it in Settings or clear your browser.

Your rights

You can ask to see, correct or delete your data. Because we don't know who any code belongs to, the quickest way is to use the options in Settings. You can also email hello@emblemforall.co.uk, or ask your school. If you're unhappy with how we handle data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office.

This notice is a draft that is being reviewed. Help for parents and carers is at etched.school.