Privacy Policy

This policy explains what information IE Ashot Sargsyan ("we"), based in Kapan, Armenia, collects when you use The Answer Key, why we collect it, and what we do with it. We decide how this information is used, so we are responsible for it.

We handle personal data in line with the Law of the Republic of Armenia on Protection of Personal Data. Many of our students live or study abroad, so we give everyone the same rights — to see, correct and delete their data and to object to how it is used — similar to those under the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). See section 10.

1. What we collect

Information you give us

• Your name and email address — to create and identify your account. When you sign up we email you a short code to confirm that the address is really yours.
• Your password — stored only as a cryptographic hash (bcrypt). We cannot read it, and nobody at the company can tell you what it is.
• Your agreement — when you sign up, we record when you accepted the Terms and this Privacy Policy, which version you accepted, and that you confirmed you are at least 13.
• Your examination date and study goals, if you choose to provide them — used to generate your study plan and suggest a plan length. These are optional.
• Your email address, if you ask for the free trick on our homepage — used only to send it, and recorded together with your consent.
• Problem reports — if you use "Report a problem" under a question, we store which question it was, the reason you chose, any message you write, the page you were on and the answer you had picked. If you are logged in, the report is also linked to your name and email address, so that we can reply.
• Reminder settings — whether you want daily reminders by email or Telegram, and at what hour.

Your practice history

When you are logged in, our server records:

• Every answer you give: which question, which choice you picked, whether it was right and when
• How long you spent on each question. The clock only runs while the page is open in front of you and you have been active in the last few minutes.
• Questions you looked at but skipped
• The practice sets and tests you take, including the diagnostic, and their scores
• The points you earn, and the questions on your weak-spot list
• Whether you have hidden yourself from the leaderboard
• What you bought: the plan, the amount and currency, the date, and until when your access runs — and any free days you received as a prize or invite reward
• If you joined through a friend's invite link: who invited you. If you invite friends: your invite code, how many joined and which rewards you received.

This is what makes the weak-spot analysis, score tracking, points and leaderboard work. We also use it to work out your projected score on the dashboard. That number is an estimate made by our own model from your answers and tests on this site — it is not an official College Board score. Without this data the service cannot tell you what to study.

Information sent by your browser

• Your IP address — used on each visit to work out which country you are in, so we can show prices in the right currency and offer the Armenian version of the site. We do not store it for this purpose. To limit repeated login attempts, bulk sign-ups, repeated free tests and similar abuse, we keep a count of requests per address for a short time — at most 24 hours.
• A network fingerprint when you sign up — when you create an account we store a one-way fingerprint (a hash) of the network address you signed up from. It cannot be turned back into the address. We use it only to stop people inviting themselves through their own invite link to get free days. We do not use it to track you.

What we do NOT collect

• Card details. Card data is entered on the secure payment page of our bank, Ameriabank, not on our website. We never see, receive or store your card number, expiry date or CVC.
• We do not collect identity documents, home addresses or telephone numbers.
• We do not use advertising cookies, third-party analytics, tracking pixels or social-media trackers.

2. Why we collect it

Data	Purpose
Email and password	To let you log in and keep your account secure
Email confirmation code	To check that the email address belongs to you
Record of your agreement	To show what you agreed to and when
Answer history, timing and skipped questions	To show your progress, find weak topics, award points and estimate your projected score
Points	To run the leaderboard and the weekly prizes
Examination date	To size your study plan
Purchase record	To know what you bought and until when access runs
Problem reports	To find and fix mistakes in our questions, and sometimes to tell you what we did
Invite records and network fingerprint	To give invite rewards fairly and prevent self-referral
Reminder settings and Telegram chat ID	To send the reminders you asked for, and nothing else
Free-trick email address	To send the one email you asked for
Request counts by IP address	To protect accounts and the site from abuse
Site statistics	To see which pages and steps work and which need improving

In short: we use your data because it is needed to provide the service you signed up for, because you asked for something (such as reminders or the free trick), or to keep the service secure and fair.

3. The free diagnostic without an account

You can take the free diagnostic test without creating an account. When you start it, we put a random code in a cookie (gid) on your browser and store your answers, timings and result on our server, linked only to that code — not to a name or email address. The score is shown once you create an account or log in.

• If you sign up or log in on the same browser within 7 days, the test, its answers and its score move into your account and the cookie is deleted.
• If you don't, the test is deleted after 7 days.

4. What other people can see

• The leaderboard. Students who are logged in can see the leaderboard, which shows your first name, the first letter of your last name (for example "Ashot S.") and your points. It never shows your email address. You can hide yourself at any time in your account Settings; hidden students are also not ranked for weekly prizes. We may remove a student from the leaderboard if we believe they cheated.
• Weekly winners. Each week's top three are listed on the leaderboard as "Last week's winners", by first name and last initial, with their points. This list is public: it can be seen without logging in. Winners' prize days are added to their accounts automatically.
• Invites. If you joined through a friend's link, your friend can see that someone joined, and when they earn a reward for it, your first name and last initial.
• Score images. The shareable images of your score, rank or streak are made inside your own browser. We do not upload or post them; they are only shared if you choose to download or share them yourself.
• The site's administrator can see account details, practice history, reports and the email addresses of weekly winners, and uses them only to run the service — for example to answer a report, fix a problem or check a prize.

5. Emails and reminders

We send emails only through our email provider's mail servers (SMTP). We send:

• Account emails — the code that confirms your email address, and password reset codes when you ask for them.
• Replies to problem reports — if you reported a problem while logged in, we may email you about what we found.
• The free trick — once, and only if you asked for it.
• Daily reminders, which are opt-in. Nobody gets one until they switch it on in their account. Every reminder email has an unsubscribe link, and you can turn reminders off on your account page at any time. A reminder includes your streak, how many weak spots are waiting and your points this week.
• Telegram — if you choose to connect Telegram for reminders, we store the Telegram chat ID our bot needs to send you messages, and when you connected. You can disconnect at any time in Settings, or by sending /stop to the bot; the chat ID is then removed. Messages sent through Telegram are also handled by Telegram under its own privacy policy.

We do not send advertising emails, and we do not give your address to anyone to send them.

6. Site statistics

To understand how the site is used, we keep simple counts on our own server — for example how many times each page is visited, and how many people start and finish the free diagnostic, sign up or buy a plan. This counting does not use cookies, does not involve any outside analytics company, and is used only in total, not to build a profile of you.

One exception: if you arrived through a link that names where it was shared (for example a post on our Facebook page), we note that source on your account when you sign up, so we can tell which posts bring students who go on to buy a plan. It is the name of the link (such as "facebook"), never your browsing history.

7. Who we share it with

We do not sell your data, and we do not share it for advertising.

Your data is shared only with:

• Our bank, Ameriabank — which processes card payments on its own secure page. It receives the amount and order reference, and the card details you enter there. We pass no study data to it.
• Our email provider — the company whose mail servers (SMTP) deliver our emails. It receives your email address and the content of each message, only to deliver messages such as confirmation codes, password reset codes, report replies and reminders.
• The companies that host our servers and store our backups — they store the data on our behalf and may not use it for anything else.
• Telegram — only if you connect it, and only the reminder messages sent to your chat.
• Armenian authorities, where we are legally required to do so.

Some pages also load content from other companies. When that happens your browser contacts them directly, and they receive standard request data such as your IP address and browser type:

• Desmos — when the graphing calculator is built into the page, it loads from desmos.com. If it opens in a separate window instead, you are on Desmos's own website. Either way, Desmos's privacy policy applies to what it receives. We do not send your account details or answers to Desmos.
• Google Fonts — the fonts on our pages load from Google's servers, under Google's privacy policy.

8. How it is stored and protected

• The site is served over an encrypted HTTPS/TLS connection.
• Passwords are hashed with bcrypt and are never stored in readable form.
• Sessions use secure, HttpOnly cookies which cannot be read by scripts in your browser.
• Changing your password signs out every other device.
• We back up the database once a day and keep only the most recent backups — 14 days' worth unless we change this setting — so that data is not lost if something goes wrong. A copy of each backup may also be kept in a separate, off-site storage location that we choose, for safety.

9. How long we keep it

Data	How long
Account, answers, scores and points	While your account exists
Free diagnostic taken without an account	Up to 7 days, unless it moves into your account
Login session	30 days, or until you log out
Password reset codes	15 minutes
Email confirmation codes	30 minutes
Request counts by IP address	At most 24 hours
Telegram chat ID	Until you disconnect Telegram
Free-trick email address	Until you ask us to remove it
Weekly winners list	Up to 26 weeks
Daily database backups	About 14 days

If you ask us to delete your account, we remove your personal data, including your name and email address from any problem reports you sent. We keep only a one-way fingerprint of the address (a salted hash that can't be turned back into it), so the same inbox can't take the free trial again. Backups are replaced one by one, so deleted data drops out of them within about two weeks. We retain transaction records for the period required by Armenian law and by the bank's terms.

10. Your rights

Some things you can do yourself on your account page: change your name, hide yourself from the leaderboard, turn reminders off, disconnect Telegram, download a copy of your data and delete your account.

You may also ask us to:

• Access — tell you what data we hold about you and give you a copy
• Correction — correct anything inaccurate
• Deletion — delete your account and personal data
• Objection — stop using your data for a particular purpose, such as showing you on the leaderboard or sending you emails you did not ask for

Where we rely on your consent (for example reminders or the free-trick email), you can withdraw it at any time; this does not affect what we did before.

Email sargsyanashot611@gmail.com and we will respond within 30 days. We may ask you to confirm the request from the email address on your account. If you are not happy with our answer, you can complain to the data protection authority in Armenia or in the country where you live.

11. Cookies and storage on your device

We use only the cookies the service needs to function:

Cookie	Purpose
sid	Keeps you logged in. HttpOnly, so scripts on the page cannot read it. Expires after 30 days.
gid	Links a free diagnostic taken without an account to your browser. HttpOnly. Expires after 7 days, and is deleted when the test moves into your account.
currency	Set only if you choose to see prices in AMD or USD, to remember that choice. Expires after one year.

Your browser also stores some things locally on your own device (in "local storage"): your light or dark theme and your language choice, the lessons you have completed, your study plan, saved and flagged questions, recent activity, a copy of your basic account details so pages load quickly, and — if you arrived through a friend's invite link — the invite code (tak_ref), kept for up to 30 days. The country we detected is also remembered until you close the tab, so each page doesn't have to ask again. The invite code is sent to us when you create an account, so your friend can be credited. Questions you flag are also added to your weak-spot list on our server. You can clear local storage at any time in your browser settings.

We do not use advertising cookies or third-party tracking.

12. Children and parents

The service is intended for students preparing for university entrance examinations, who are typically 15–19 years old. You must be at least 13 years old to create an account, and you confirm this when you sign up. If we learn that an account belongs to someone under 13, we will delete it.

If you are under 18, please use the service with a parent or guardian's knowledge and permission. A parent or guardian may contact us at sargsyanashot611@gmail.com to see, correct or delete their child's data. We do not knowingly collect more data than is described above from anyone.

13. Changes

If we change this policy we will update the date at the top of this page. If a change significantly affects how we use data you have already given us, we will also tell you on the site or by email.