Privacy policy — written in plain English, because that's the point.

Last updated: November 3, 2026.

The short version: the site is free, we don't run ads or deploy advertising trackers, the only account is an optional Google sign-in, and the most sensitive thing we touch is other people's names — which is exactly why this page explains them first-class. If anything here reads differently from what the product actually does, that's a bug in the policy; tell us.

What we collect — and what we don't

• Your account (optional). Sign in with Google and we receive your name, email address, and profile picture — that's the whole handoff. We never see or store your Google password.
• Your plan. Your quiz answers, progress, and picked sites are saved in your browser's own storage while you're signed out. If you sign in, the plan also syncs to our servers — stored as a small file identified by a one-way hash of your email, never the email itself.
• One cookie. A signed session cookie (researchinsiders_session, 30 days) that keeps you signed in. No advertising pixels, no ad networks, no data brokers. We run PostHog, a product analytics tool, in a cookie-less, autocapture-off mode: it does not store cookies, does not follow you across sites, and only records the events described below.

The events we record

These are the only actions that reach PostHog. Each is a single action with the role, filter or answer you picked — never an email, never a profile, never free text you typed:

Event	When	What it includes
pageview	You open a public page	The page path — never /search, /account or /alerts
search_used	You search or use a quick filter	Your query
plan_started	You start the 2-minute plan quiz	Which surface you started from
plan_completed	You finish the plan	Your answers, which are already on the plan page
message_copied	You copy the drafted first message	The job's role
alert_subscribed	You create a job alert	Role, setup, and whether you entered a location
linkedin_profile_opened	You open an insider's profile	The employer name

The event data is retained in PostHog for 7 days by default. If you set Do Not Track in your browser we do not initialize analytics at all.

• Job alerts (rolling out). While delivery is being switched on, signing up saves your email address and alert preferences but sends nothing. From the moment delivery goes live, those preferences are used for one thing only: sending the alerts you asked for, with a working unsubscribe in every email.
• Your outreach pipeline — what we store about the people you contact. When you track someone through the referral pipeline (the stages Reached out / Replied / Booked / Chatted / Referred), we store, for that person: their name and headline as shown on the public profile, the link to that profile, the stage you set, when you set it, the message template you used, and how you sent it (connection request, message, email, and so on). While you're signed out, this lives only in your browser's own storage and never reaches us. If you sign in, it syncs to a small server file keyed by a one-way hash of your email. The same rules apply everywhere: it powers your pipeline only, it's never sold or shared, and asking us to delete it (email below) deletes it.
• What we don't collect: payment details (the site is free — there's nothing to pay), your résumé, or your browsing elsewhere. To be precise about the one that sounds like an exception: we never read or store the messages you send to people on LinkedIn — the pipeline tracks that you reached out and at which stage, not what you wrote or what they answered.

The people data — our insiders feature, candidly

Some pages show the names of people who work at the companies listed, so you can start a conversation instead of applying cold. Here is exactly where those names come from:

• Public clinical trial records. Investigator and site-staff names and affiliations come from ClinicalTrials.gov, the U.S. government's public registry — public-domain data, exactly as registered.
• Public search results. Where we link to public LinkedIn profiles, those links come from search-engine results on public pages. We never log in to LinkedIn, never copy private or gated data, and never scrape behind a login.
• No endorsement implied. Being listed here means the public record associates you with an employer — nothing more. Nobody listed has endorsed Research Insiders, its users, or you.

Anyone listed can be removed, quickly and without questions — use the removal form (a profile URL or a name is enough) or email the address below. Removal takes effect on the next site update, and our removal blocklist means future data refreshes never re-add you.

Job listings

Listings are pulled from employers' own public career pages and re-checked every night. They can contain titles, locations, salary ranges, and descriptions written by the employers. We link out to each employer's own site to apply; we are not the employer, not a recruiter, and not an employment agency.

Where your data lives

Signed-in plans and pipelines are stored as small files on our server, keyed by a one-way hash of your email address. There is no marketing platform, data broker, or ad network in the loop — the roster of systems that hold your data is: your browser, our server, and PostHog (a product-analytics tool that sees the events below and nothing else).

Retention and deletion

• Your plan: delete it anytime from My plan — the on-device copy clears immediately; the signed-in server copy deletes on the same request.
• Your session: expires after 30 days, or immediately when you sign out.
• Your account data: ask us to delete it (email below) and we will — account, plan, outreach pipeline, and any server records, within thirty days.
• People listings: removed via the removal form — gone from every page on the next site update, and the blocklist keeps future data runs from ever re-adding you.

Your rights

Wherever you live, we'll treat these as universal: you can ask what we hold about you, have it corrected, or have it deleted — write to the address below and a human answers. If you're in a jurisdiction with specific statutory rights (like the GDPR or U.S. state privacy laws), those apply too, and this policy is our attempt to make exercising them obvious rather than an obstacle course.

Children

The service is intended for adults exploring careers, and isn't directed to children under 13 (or under 16 in the EEA/UK). We don't knowingly create accounts for children; write to us if you believe one exists.

Changes to this policy

When it changes, we update the date at the top of this page and the change lives here — no surprises by email.

Contact

Questions, corrections, deletions: privacy@researchinsiders.com. A person reads every message.