StudyDerm Privacy Policy
This is the version published 24 October 2026. Read the current version or all versions.
Last updated: 24 October 2026
1. Summary
This is the short version. The detail follows.
- Who we are. StudyDerm is run by FINTECH SERVICES LTD. We decide how your personal data is used (we are the "controller").
- What we collect. Your email address, so you can sign in. Your study progress and answers, so the app works. Subscription details from our payment provider, Stripe, so we know whether you have paid. Some security data to stop abuse.
- What we do not collect. We do not ask for your name, phone number, date of birth, job, employer or GMC number. Stripe collects your card and billing details on its own pages. We do not store them (section 3.3).
- No tracking. We do not use advertising, analytics or tracking tools. We set no cookies. The app keeps some data in your browser so you stay signed in and so answers you make offline are kept until you reconnect.
- Emails. We send you sign-in codes, order confirmations, renewal reminders and notices of price changes and of significant changes to our terms. Stripe sends its own payment receipts. We send no marketing emails, and we will ask for your consent before we ever do.
- Do not enter patient information. Never type anything that could identify a patient into StudyDerm.
- Who we share with. The service providers that run StudyDerm for us, and Stripe for payments. If you dispute a payment, your bank or card issuer, through Stripe. We do not sell your data.
- Your rights. You can ask to see, correct or delete your data, and more. Email privacy@studyderm.app. We reply within one month.
- Complaints. Tell us first if you can. You can also complain to the Information Commission (ico.org.uk). See section 13.
2. Who we are and how to contact us
StudyDerm is a trading name of FINTECH SERVICES LTD ("we", "us"), a company registered in England and Wales, company number 13338780. Registered office: Apollo House, Hallam Way, Whitehills Business Park, Blackpool, England, FY4 5FS. VAT number: GB378913351.
We are the controller of the personal data described in this policy.
- Privacy questions, requests and privacy complaints: privacy@studyderm.app
- General support: support@studyderm.app
- Post: the registered office address above, marked "Privacy".
We have not appointed a data protection officer.
This policy covers the StudyDerm website (studyderm.app), the StudyDerm app (my.studyderm.app) and the StudyDerm service behind them (api.studyderm.app). It is published at https://studyderm.app/privacy and linked from the sign-in screen and from checkout, where you agree to our Terms of Service and this Privacy Policy before you pay.
StudyDerm is sold only to customers based in the UK, and is for people aged 18 or over.
3. The personal data we collect
3.1 Data you give us
| What | Details |
|---|---|
| Email address | You enter it to sign in. It is the only direct identifier we hold in our own database. |
| Your answers | Every answer you give to a question: the option you chose, or the text you typed (up to 500 characters) in a "type your answer" question, whether it was correct, and when. |
| Settings | Your time zone, daily goal, sound on or off, and your exam date if you choose to give it. |
| Messages to us | Anything you send to us by email, for example a support, accessibility or privacy request. |
| Disability or health detail you choose to tell us | For example, if you ask for help or an adjustment because of a disability. See section 3.6. |
The optional display name you can set for challenge links stays on your device. Our servers strip it out and never store it.
3.2 Data created when you use StudyDerm
| What | Details |
|---|---|
| Account record | A random account number (not based on your email), when the account was created and when you last signed in. |
| Study progress | XP, streaks, badges, daily quests, which stages you have passed, practice sessions (including whether each one gave you questions from paid content, which our refund rules use), and a review schedule for each question (attempts, correct answers, when it is next due). |
| Sign-in security | Your one-time sign-in codes and the tokens that keep you signed in. We store these only in scrambled (hashed) form, never as the code or token itself. |
| Sign-in abuse prevention | Counters that limit how often sign-in codes can be requested or guessed. These use a scrambled (keyed hash) form of your email address and network (IP) address, not the address itself. |
| Content download counters | Counters of how much content your account downloads per hour, to stop copying of paid content. These are linked to your account number. |
| Network address in memory | Our servers hold your IP address in memory (never on disk or in our database) to limit the number of requests. |
| Our application logs | For each request: a random request number, the type of request, the result and how long it took. Our application logs do not contain your IP address, email address or account number, or what you sent. |
| Our providers' request logs | Railway, which hosts our servers, and Cloudflare, which delivers our website and app files, keep their own records of requests, and Railway keeps database server logs. Request records can include your IP address, browser type, the address requested and the time. |
| Emails we send you | Our email provider, Resend, keeps delivery logs of the emails it sends for us (recipient and content, including sign-in codes). |
| Free access records | If we give you free access (for example as a tester), we record when, until when, who granted it and a short reason. |
| Order confirmation records | For each new subscription, a record that we sent your order confirmation: your account number, the time, and a fingerprint of the exact Terms of Service, Privacy Policy and Cancellation and Refunds Policy we sent. It contains no email address and cannot be edited or deleted. |
| Cancellation records | If you cancel within your 14-day cancellation period: your account number, when and how you cancelled, when we emailed you to choose between a refund and keeping access, and your choice. It contains no email address. |
| Refund records | For each payment we refund: your account number, the Stripe payment, subscription and refund numbers, the amount, the reason and the time. It contains no email address or card details, and it is write-protected. |
| Renewal reminder records | For each renewal reminder we send: your account number, the Stripe subscription number, the renewal date, when we sent it and our email provider's message number. It contains no email address, and it is write-protected. |
| Terms acceptance records | Which version of our Terms of Service, this Privacy Policy and our Cancellation and Refunds Policy you accepted, when, whether at checkout or in the app, and a fingerprint of that exact text. It contains no email address, IP address or device details and cannot be edited or deleted. |
3.3 Data we receive from Stripe
Stripe runs our checkout and billing pages. Stripe's notices to us can contain your email, name, billing address and card type and last four digits. From Stripe's notices we read ids, status, dates and your billing country (to check you are in the UK). We do not store or log your address or the rest. What we keep is: a Stripe customer number, a subscription number, whether your subscription is active, paid, failed, cancelled or set to end at the end of your paid period, when your paid period ends, and notice of any payment dispute (chargeback).
We never receive your full card number. Stripe collects your billing address at checkout because we sell only to customers based in the UK.
3.4 Do you have to give us your data?
You must give an email address to create an account. Without it we cannot let you sign in or provide the service. Everything else in section 3.1 is created by using the app or is optional (for example your exam date). To subscribe, you must give Stripe the payment and billing details it asks for.
3.5 Patient information: do not enter it
StudyDerm has no feature for patient data, and we do not want it. Do not type anything that could identify a patient (names, initials, dates of birth, hospital or NHS numbers, case details, or photos) into any part of StudyDerm, including "type your answer" questions, or in emails to us. If you do, we will delete it when we find it.
3.6 Disability or health detail
We do not ask for health data, and the app has no place to enter it. If you choose to tell us about a disability or health condition, for example in an accessibility or support email, we process it on the basis of your explicit consent (UK GDPR Article 9(2)(a)) and only to help with your request. Please tell us only as much as we need to help you. You can withdraw your consent at any time by emailing privacy@studyderm.app; we will then delete it. We keep it for 12 months after the matter is resolved, then delete it.
4. Why we use your data and our lawful basis
Data protection law requires a "lawful basis" for each use. Ours are below.
| Purpose | Data used | Lawful basis |
|---|---|---|
| Create your account and sign you in by email code | Email address, account record, sign-in codes and tokens | Contract: needed to provide the service you signed up for. |
| Run the study service: questions, marking, progress, streaks, XP, review schedule, the roadmap, syncing across devices | Answers, study progress, settings | Contract. |
| Take payment, check that you are based in the UK, give paid access, and open the Stripe billing page so you can manage or cancel | Account number, Stripe customer and subscription numbers, subscription status and end date, billing country | Contract. |
| Send you service emails: sign-in codes, order confirmations, renewal reminders and notice of price changes and of significant changes to our terms before they apply | Email address, plan, renewal date | Contract. |
| Keep a tamper-resistant record of answers as given, so scores and progress cannot be altered after the event | Answers | Legitimate interests: keeping scores and records honest. |
| Protect the service: limit sign-in attempts, stop content copying, prevent fraud and abuse | Hashed email and IP addresses, IP address in memory, content download counters, logs | Legitimate interests: security and fraud prevention. |
| Find and fix faults and improve the service | Application logs (no IP addresses, emails or account numbers) | Legitimate interests: service improvement. |
| Respond to a payment dispute (chargeback), including giving your bank or card issuer, through Stripe, the records of your purchase and the dates of your use of the service | Subscription and payment records, dates you used the service | Legitimate interests: defending legal claims and preventing fraud; contract: showing the service you paid for was provided. |
| Handle free access grants and other legal claims | Answer and access records | Legitimate interests: keeping records honest and defending legal claims. |
| Apply our Cancellation and Refunds Policy: handle cancellations within 14 days, refunds and duplicate payments, and check whether paid content was used | Cancellation and refund records, whether each practice session included paid content, subscription records | Contract; legal obligation (consumer law refund duties). |
| Keep tax, VAT and accounting records | Payment and refund records (most are held by Stripe as an independent controller) | Legal obligation (tax and company law). |
| Keep proof of the contract information we gave you | Order confirmation records | Legal obligation and legitimate interests: proving what we sent you when you subscribed. |
| Know which version of our terms applies to you, and ask you to accept a significant change | Terms acceptance records, subscription status | Contract; legitimate interests: proving what you agreed to. |
| Answer your requests, including rights requests and complaints | Your messages and email address | Legal obligation for rights requests and data protection complaints; legitimate interests for other support. |
| Use disability or health detail you choose to send us | That detail | Explicit consent (UK GDPR Article 9(2)(a); section 3.6). |
| Marketing emails (none today) | Email address | Consent, asked for before any is sent. |
Balancing our legitimate interests. Where we rely on legitimate interests, the data is limited to what is needed, is scrambled or kept only briefly where possible, is never used to profile you or for marketing, and protects your account as well as our service; we have concluded that this does not override your rights. You can object (section 9.6).
5. Who we share your data with
We do not sell your personal data. We do not share it for advertising.
A processor acts only on our instructions. An independent controller decides for itself how to use the data for its own purposes, under its own privacy notice.
| Provider | What they do | What they receive | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Railway | Hosts our servers and database in its EU West region (Amsterdam, the Netherlands). | The data in sections 3.1 to 3.3 that we store, and request details (including IP addresses) as traffic reaches our servers. | Processor. |
| Resend | Delivers the emails we send: sign-in codes, order confirmations, renewal reminders, price-change notices and notices of changes to our terms. | Your email address and the content of each email. | Processor. |
| Cloudflare | Runs our domain names and delivers the website and app files. | Normal web request data when you load studyderm.app or my.studyderm.app (IP address, browser type, page address). | Processor. |
| Google (Google Workspace) | Runs our company email. | Anything you email to us. | Processor. |
| Stripe | Runs checkout, payments, subscriptions, the billing page and payment receipts. | From us: your random account number and the plan you chose; if you dispute a payment, the records of your purchase and the dates of your use of the service, which Stripe passes to your bank or card issuer. From you, directly on Stripe's pages: your email, name, card and billing details. We do not otherwise send Stripe your email. | Independent controller, for payment processing and fraud prevention. |
We may also share personal data:
- with your bank or card issuer, through Stripe, if you dispute a payment: the records of your purchase and the dates of your use of the service, so we can respond to the dispute;
- with our professional advisers (for example our accountant or lawyers), under a duty of confidentiality, where they need it to advise us;
- with HMRC, courts, the police or regulators where the law requires it;
- with a buyer or successor if our business or the StudyDerm service is sold or transferred, who must use it in line with this policy.
If you share a challenge link, the display name and scores in it are visible to whoever you send it to. That link is created on your device and is not sent to us.
6. International transfers
Our servers and database are in the European Union (Amsterdam, the Netherlands). UK law recognises the EEA as giving adequate protection.
Some of our providers process data outside the UK, including in the United States. We only use providers that apply a lawful transfer safeguard recognised by UK data protection law, for example the UK extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, or standard contractual clauses with the UK addendum, or the international data transfer agreement issued under UK law. You can ask us for details of the safeguard that applies at privacy@studyderm.app.
7. How long we keep your data
| Data | How long |
|---|---|
| Sign-in codes | Valid for 10 minutes. Deleted automatically after 1 day. |
| Sign-in tokens | Valid for up to 30 days at a time (90 days at most before you must sign in again). Deleted automatically 30 days after they expire or are cancelled. |
| Sign-in rate limit counters | Deleted automatically after 2 hours, 2 days or 8 days, depending on the counter. |
| IP address in server memory | Only until that memory is cleared. Never written to disk. |
| Content download counters | Older counters are replaced each time you load content. The latest content-access counter, which lists the unit ids you fetched, is kept with your account data. |
| Email address, account, settings, study progress, answers, state import records (a write-protected record, linked to your account, of progress imported from your browser), subscription status, renewal reminder records and free access records | While your account is in use. Deleted or anonymised (section 9.3) 24 months after the last time you used it, or sooner if you ask. The last time you used it is the latest of: when you last signed in, when the app last renewed your sign-in, and when your progress was last saved. We do not delete an account under this rule while its subscription has not yet ended or a payment dispute is open. |
| Payment, refund and VAT records | 6 years, as tax law requires. Most are held by Stripe as an independent controller. |
| Refund records | 6 years after the refund. |
| Cancellation records (within the 14-day period) | 6 years after the cancellation. |
| Renewal reminder records | 6 years after the reminder was sent, or until your account is deleted, if sooner. |
| Order confirmation records | 6 years after the subscription ends. |
| Terms acceptance records | 6 years after your account closes or your subscription ends, whichever is later. |
| Erasure records | When we delete an account, we keep a record of the deletion: when it happened, a one-way fingerprint of the old account number (so that a late notice from Stripe cannot recreate the account), the Stripe customer and subscription numbers whose records still carry our old account number (so we can remove it, section 9.3), and when each subscription ended. It contains no email address and no account number. We keep it for as long as we run StudyDerm, so a deleted account stays deleted. |
| Support emails and complaints | 24 months after the matter is resolved. |
| Disability or health detail you send us | 12 months after the matter is resolved. |
| Our application logs | Up to 90 days. They contain no IP addresses, email addresses or account numbers. |
| Delivery logs kept by our email provider, and request logs kept by our hosting providers | For the short period each provider sets. |
Cancelling your subscription does not delete your account or your progress. To have your data deleted sooner, ask us (section 9.3).
8. Data stored on your device
We set no cookies. The app uses your browser's local storage to keep you signed in, to keep a copy of your progress, and to save answers made offline until they can be sent. We do not use it for tracking, analytics or advertising.
Signing out leaves your progress stored on the device. It removes your sign-in token, but the local copy of your progress and settings stays in that browser. To remove it, clear the site data for my.studyderm.app in your browser settings. Do this on any shared computer.
Stripe's checkout and billing pages are run by Stripe and may set Stripe's own cookies.
Full details are in our Cookies and Storage Notice.
9. Your rights
You have the rights below. They are free to use in most cases. To use any of them, email privacy@studyderm.app from the email address you sign in with. Requests to close your account or delete your data are also accepted at support@studyderm.app. If you write from another address, we will need to confirm the account is yours, for example by sending a sign-in code to the account address.
How long we take. We reply without undue delay and within one month. The month starts when we receive your request, or when we have confirmed your identity if we need to. If a request is complex, or you send several, we may extend this by up to two further months; we will tell you within the first month and explain why. If we reasonably need more information from you to find the data you have asked for, we will ask, and the time until you reply does not count.
There are no buttons in the app to download or delete your data. We handle these requests by email. You can change your settings in the app, and you can save a copy of the progress stored in your browser using "Export progress" in settings (this file goes only to your device).
9.1 Right of access
You can ask for a copy of the personal data we hold about you and information about how we use it. We will send it in a common electronic format (for example a JSON or CSV file).
9.2 Right to rectification
You can ask us to correct inaccurate data. You can change your settings in the app. To change your sign-in email address, ask us and we will move your account to the new address once we have confirmed both addresses are yours.
9.3 Right to erasure
You can ask us to delete your personal data. We act within one month of a verified request (extendable as the law allows). We will:
- delete your email address and account record, so the account can no longer be signed in to or linked to you;
- delete your settings, study progress, subscription status, renewal reminder records and sign-in tokens;
- for answer and audit records that must stay intact so scores and records cannot be altered, clear the response recorded for every answer (the option you chose or the text you typed), keeping only whether it was correct and when, and replace your account number with a random one, so what remains is anonymous;
- remove our account number from your customer and subscription records at Stripe once the 6 years for which payment records must be kept have passed. Until then Stripe keeps those records, and the payment records (invoices and receipts) that go with them, as an independent controller.
We remove the link to you from tamper-resistant records only where the law allows. We keep payment, refund and VAT records for as long as tax law requires, refund records and cancellation records for 6 years, order confirmation records for 6 years after the subscription ends, terms acceptance records for 6 years after your account closes or your subscription ends, and records needed for a live payment dispute or legal claim until it ends. We cannot delete an account while its subscription has not yet ended or a payment dispute is open: we will ask you to cancel first (or cancel for you if you ask), and we delete it once any dispute has ended. We will tell you what we keep and why.
If you only want to stop paying, cancel your subscription in the billing page. That does not delete your data.
9.4 Right to restrict processing
You can ask us to limit how we use your data, for example while we check whether it is accurate or while we consider an objection.
9.5 Right to data portability
You can ask for the data you gave us and that we hold to provide the service (for example your answers, progress and settings) in a structured, machine-readable format, or ask us to send it to another organisation where that is technically possible.
9.6 Right to object
You have the right to object at any time to our use of your data where we rely on legitimate interests (see section 4). We will stop unless we have compelling legitimate grounds that override your interests, or we need the data to establish, exercise or defend legal claims. Some security processing (for example limiting sign-in attempts) is needed to run the service safely for everyone, so we may not be able to stop it while you have an account.
You can always object to direct marketing, and we will stop. We do not send any today.
9.7 Automated decisions
We do not make decisions about you based solely on automated processing that have legal or similarly significant effects. The app calculates scores, XP, streaks, which questions to review next and which stages you have unlocked. These are part of the study service and do not have legal or similarly significant effects. Paid access depends on whether your subscription is active (including the 7-day grace period after a failed renewal payment) or we have given you free access. It is suspended while a payment dispute is open, and you may be asked to accept updated terms before you continue (Terms of Service section 19).
9.8 Withdrawing consent
Where we rely on your consent (section 3.6, and any future marketing), you can withdraw it at any time, as easily as you gave it, by emailing privacy@studyderm.app. This does not affect what we did before you withdrew it.
10. How we protect your data
No system is perfectly secure, and we do not claim otherwise. Our measures include:
- All connections to the website, the app and the study service use HTTPS.
- The database is on our hosting provider's private network with no public access, and connections to it are encrypted.
- Each account can read only its own records. The database enforces this, and separate, restricted database roles handle sign-in, billing and data clean-up.
- Sign-in uses one-time codes, not passwords. Codes expire after 10 minutes, work once and allow 5 attempts. Codes and tokens are stored only in hashed form.
- Our application logs never contain email addresses, IP addresses, account numbers or what you send.
- Our website and app load no third-party scripts, and a strict browser security policy blocks them.
- Messages from Stripe are checked for a valid signature before we act on them.
- Paid content and images are kept in memory in your browser and cleared when you sign out.
If we have a personal data breach, we will notify the Information Commission within 72 hours where the law requires it, and tell the people affected without undue delay where the law requires it.
11. Children
StudyDerm is for adult doctors and health professionals preparing for a specialty exam. You must be 18 or over to use it; this is a condition of our Terms of Service. We do not carry out age checks and we do not knowingly collect children's data. If you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we will delete it.
12. Changes to this policy
We will update this policy when the way we use personal data changes, before the change takes effect. The date at the top shows when it last changed. Every version, with the date it took effect and a summary of what changed, is listed at https://studyderm.app/privacy/history. If a change is significant, for example a new purpose, a new kind of provider or a new way we use your data, we will email you at least 7 days before it applies (unless the law requires it sooner) and show a notice in the app. From the date it applies, the app will ask you to confirm that you have read the new version before you continue to use StudyDerm.
13. Questions and complaints
Data protection complaints. Please contact us first at privacy@studyderm.app if you have a concern about how we use your personal data. We will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days, look into it, keep you updated, and reply within one month.
Other complaints (for example about our content or service) follow the process in our Content Accuracy and Complaints page.
You also have the right to complain to the Information Commission, the UK data protection regulator, at https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/.