Scholar Proxy Terms of Service

Effective Date: July 31, 2026 · Version 3.0

Executive Summary for Scholars & Organizations

These Terms of Service govern your use of Scholar Proxy ("Scholar Proxy", "we", "us", or "our"). By creating an account, subscribing, or using our platform, you ("User", "Researcher", or "Organization") enter into a legally binding contract with us. We have crafted these terms to protect our platform while ensuring complete transparency, intellectual property protection, and commercial clarity for scholars, principal investigators, and academic institutions worldwide.

1. Nature of Service & Operational Scope

Scholar Proxy operates an AI-assisted research career orchestration platform. Our software provides academic opportunity discovery, research fit scoring, application tracking, and automated draft synthesis (including CV tailoring, Statements of Purpose, research statements, and outreach communication).

Important Business Disclaimer: Scholar Proxy is strictly an authoring, analytical, and productivity tool. We are not a university admissions office, employment agency, or hiring authority. We do not guarantee admission, tenure-track placement, interview invitations, or grant funding.

2. Academic Integrity & Human Verification Policy

Rigor and honesty are fundamental to academic research. To maintain trust across universities and research institutions:

Sole Responsibility: You retain 100% sole responsibility for reviewing, fact-checking, and verifying any AI-generated drafts (CVs, letters, emails, proposals) before submitting them to third parties.
Authenticity Representation: You warrant that all uploaded credentials, degrees, publication records, and biographical details are authentic and accurate. Using Scholar Proxy to fabricate academic records or misrepresent contributions is strictly prohibited.
Institutional Compliance: You agree to ensure that your use of AI drafting tools complies with the policies of your target institution, university, or grant-funding body.

3. Intellectual Property & Document Ownership

We respect academic ownership and intellectual property rights:

Your Content & Outputs

You and your institution retain complete, unencumbered ownership of all original documents, publications, research datasets, and generated text outputs. Scholar Proxy claims zero ownership or copyright over your work.

Scholar Proxy Rights

Scholar Proxy retains all right, title, and interest in and to our platform software, source code, user interfaces, branding, proprietary vector indexing, and match scoring algorithms.

4. Acceptable Use Policy & Platform Safeguards

To ensure security and protect academic communication channels, you agree not to:

Use automated scripts, scrapers, or bots to harvest data from our platform or overload external university job boards.
Send automated mass communications, unsolicited bulk messages, or spam to faculty members, PIs, or university administrators.
Attempt to reverse-engineer, decompile, or copy the matching models or software infrastructure of Scholar Proxy.
Share individual user account credentials outside your licensed organization or department.
Upload malicious code, spyware, or material that infringes upon third-party copyrights or patents.

5. Commercial Terms, Subscriptions & Refunds

Scholar Proxy offers free access plans alongside paid individual and institutional subscription tiers:

Billing Cycle: Paid subscriptions are billed in advance on a recurring monthly or annual basis. Standard plan rates and features are detailed during checkout.
Cancellation: You may cancel your subscription at any time via your account dashboard. Upon cancellation, your subscription remains active through the conclusion of your current paid billing period.
Refund Policy: Subscription fees are generally non-refundable except where required by mandatory consumer protection law, in instances of documented service failure exceeding 48 continuous hours, or within 14 days of an annual subscription purchase if no premium documents have been synthesized.

6. Institutional Procurement & University Partnerships

For universities, research institutes, laboratory groups, and academic departments procuring Scholar Proxy licenses for multi-user teams:

Central Management: Designated institutional administrators manage seat allocations, user access, and departmental billing.
Custom DPAs: We provide standard Data Processing Addendums (DPAs) tailored to meet university data compliance standards.
Invoicing: Annual institutional billing via Purchase Orders (PO) or direct invoice is available by contacting our business desk at [email protected].

7. Warranty Disclaimers & Limitation of Liability

SCHOLAR PROXY AND ITS SERVICES ARE PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS. TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, WE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.

IN NO EVENT SHALL SCHOLAR PROXY, ITS DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, OR AGENTS BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES—INCLUDING LOSS OF ADMISSION OPPORTUNITIES, MISSED GRANT DEADLINES, REJECTION OF CANDIDACY, OR LOSS OF DATA. OUR TOTAL AGGREGATE LIABILITY SHALL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF $100 USD OR THE TOTAL FEES PAID BY YOU TO SCHOLAR PROXY IN THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS PRECEDING THE CLAIM.

8. Informal Dispute Resolution & Governing Law

Prior to initiating formal legal proceedings, you and Scholar Proxy agree to attempt to resolve any dispute informally by contacting [email protected]. If the dispute is not resolved within 30 calendar days, it shall be settled in accordance with standard commercial arbitration procedures or courts of competent jurisdiction.

Contact Legal & Institutional Operations

For legal notices, institutional procurement inquiries, compliance verification, or terms clarification, please reach out to our legal & operations department:

[email protected]