Privacy, terms, and credits for DocuPeer.

This Privacy Policy explains what information DocuPeer may collect, how it may be used, how it may be shared, and what choices you have when you use the website, review interface, submission flow, matching system, and any associated communications.

DocuPeer is designed so that as much of a review as possible stays on your device until you choose to submit it. That means drafts, saved preferences, and in-progress annotations can remain on your device instead of being transmitted to a DocuPeer-operated backend.

DocuPeer may collect or process the following categories of information:

• Information you provide directly, such as your name, email address, self-declared education level, self-declared specialty, and any message you send us.
• Content you submit to the platform, such as papers you post for review, and reviews or annotations you write on other people's papers.
• Device, browser, network, and usage information, such as IP address, user agent, page views, navigation events, performance diagnostics, crash information, and security logs.
• Data stored locally on your device, including local storage, cached assets, in-progress review drafts, and similar browser-side settings.
• Information generated through your use of the product, such as review counts, submission history, and feature usage, used to compute your reciprocal credit balance and to match you with appropriate papers.

DocuPeer is built around a mutual-anonymity model. Reviewers do not see the identity, email, or affiliation of an author. Authors do not see the identity of a reviewer; reviewers are shown only as pseudonymous handles such as "Anonymous reviewer #1".

DocuPeer may still process identifying information internally, such as to prevent abuse, enforce the review ratio, and administer accounts. It is not surfaced to the other side of the review.

By using DocuPeer, you authorize DocuPeer and its service providers to use cookies, local storage, cache storage, server logs, diagnostics, analytics, and similar technologies for product operation, session management, security, abuse prevention, performance monitoring, debugging, and product improvement.

Some features depend on local browser storage to function correctly, including the review draft autosave and the session cookie. Disabling these technologies may limit functionality.

DocuPeer may use information to:

• operate, maintain, secure, and improve the website and review interface;
• match a paper to appropriate reviewers by specialty and level;
• compute the reciprocal review-to-submission credit balance;
• surface received feedback to the original author;
• respond to support requests, feedback, or legal notices;
• measure reliability, detect abuse, prevent fraud, and investigate incidents;
• understand how the product is used and what should be improved next.

DocuPeer may share information in the following circumstances:

• with hosting, infrastructure, analytics, security, or delivery providers that help operate the service;
• with other users, in the pseudonymised, anonymised form described in Section 3;
• when required by law, legal process, court order, or a good-faith belief that disclosure is necessary to protect rights, safety, or property;
• in connection with a reorganization, asset sale, financing, or transfer of the business, subject to applicable law.

DocuPeer does not sell personal information in the ordinary consumer sense. However, service providers and infrastructure partners may process technical data as part of delivering the service.

Information may be retained for as long as reasonably necessary to operate the service, comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, or maintain security and business records.

Data stored locally in your browser may remain there until you clear it or your browser removes it.

DocuPeer uses reasonable administrative, technical, and organizational measures to protect information, including bcrypt-hashed passwords and signed session cookies. No website, storage method, or network transmission is perfectly secure, so absolute security cannot be guaranteed.

DocuPeer is not intended for children under 13 and is not knowingly designed to collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe such information has been provided, contact DocuPeer so it can be reviewed.

You may be able to:

• clear local storage, cookies, or cached assets through browser settings;
• request deletion of your account and associated data;
• stop using the service at any time;
• contact DocuPeer regarding privacy questions or requests.

DocuPeer may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes become effective when posted here, unless a later date is stated. Continued use of the service after updates means you accept the revised policy.

By accessing or using DocuPeer, you agree to these Terms of Use. If you do not agree, do not use the site.

DocuPeer is provided by Rahul Awasthi and Aryan Patel as co-founders. References to "DocuPeer," "we," "our," or "us" on this page refer to that operation unless the context requires otherwise.

Subject to these terms, DocuPeer grants you a limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and use the site for lawful personal, educational, research, editorial, or internal business purposes.

You may not use DocuPeer to:

• break the law or violate another person's rights;
• submit content you do not have the right to submit;
• submit content that is primarily machine-generated, or that has been generated by an AI system in a way that is intended to bypass authorship expectations;
• attempt to deanonymise a reviewer or an author;
• use reviews as an opportunity to harass, insult, or personally attack another user;
• interfere with the service, infrastructure, or matching system;
• scrape, mirror, bulk-download, or automate access in a way that is abusive, excessive, or inconsistent with these terms;
• attempt to bypass security controls, rate limits, or the reciprocal review requirement.

You retain ownership of the papers you submit and the reviews you write. By submitting content, you grant DocuPeer a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to store, host, display, and process that content solely as needed to operate the service, including matching your paper with reviewers and showing reviews to the original author.

DocuPeer's software, interface design, visual assets, branding, page content, and product presentation are owned by Rahul Awasthi and Aryan Patel or licensed to DocuPeer and are protected by applicable intellectual property laws.

DocuPeer's core rule is that reviewers earn submission credit only by producing genuine, substantive reviews. Submitting empty, joke, or bad-faith reviews to game the ratio is a breach of these terms and may result in suspension.

DocuPeer is offered for informational, educational, editorial, research, and exploratory purposes. It is not a substitute for professional editing, formal academic peer review, or legal review of a document.

DocuPeer may change, suspend, restrict, or discontinue any feature, dataset, interface, or integration at any time, with or without notice. We do not guarantee uninterrupted availability or error-free operation.

You agree that DocuPeer may use reasonable monitoring, logging, analytics, diagnostics, abuse-detection, and security tools to protect the service and enforce these terms.

DocuPeer may suspend or block access if use appears unlawful, abusive, disruptive, or harmful to the product, infrastructure, or other users.

If you send feedback, ideas, bug reports, suggestions, or similar submissions (distinct from paper submissions), you grant DocuPeer a worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free license to use, adapt, publish, and incorporate that feedback without compensation or obligation.

DocuPeer may rely on third-party APIs, datasets, content, hosting, or media services. We are not responsible for third-party services, and your use of them may also be subject to their separate terms or privacy policies.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, DocuPeer is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis, without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory, including implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, accuracy, availability, or reliability.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Rahul Awasthi, Aryan Patel, and DocuPeer will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for any loss of data, profits, goodwill, business opportunity, or use, arising out of or related to the service, even if advised of the possibility.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the total liability of DocuPeer, Rahul Awasthi, and Aryan Patel for claims arising out of or related to the service will not exceed the greater of one hundred U.S. dollars (US $100) or the amount you paid directly to DocuPeer for the specific service giving rise to the claim in the prior twelve months. DocuPeer is currently offered free of charge.

You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Rahul Awasthi, Aryan Patel, and DocuPeer from claims, liabilities, damages, losses, and expenses arising out of your misuse of the service, your violation of these terms, or your violation of another person's rights, including any claim that content you submitted infringes another person's intellectual property.

DocuPeer may revise these terms by posting an updated version on this page. Continued use after changes are posted means you accept the revised terms.

Questions about these terms or the privacy policy can be sent to hello@docupeer.org.

If you want to continue exploring the product, you can review a paper or read more about DocuPeer.

DocuPeer is built by a small founding team. The current contributors are:

• Rahul Awasthi — Co-founder & CEO. Product, engineering, and the vision for a peer-review community that stays free by design.
• Aryan Patel — Co-founder & COO. Operations, community, and the day-to-day work of making DocuPeer trustworthy and useful.
• Akshaj Reddy Sanikommu — Interim CTO.
• Pritam Avuthu — CMO.

Nothing on this page constitutes an endorsement of any individual by any third party, and any views expressed through the DocuPeer product are those of DocuPeer's operators, not of any employer, university, or affiliated organisation.

DocuPeer uses Poiret One (Google Fonts, OFL) and Space Grotesk (Google Fonts, OFL) for its interface, and Versailles as an accent display face. Body prose for papers uses Cormorant Garamond (Google Fonts, OFL). Code and monospaced numerals use JetBrains Mono (JetBrains, OFL).

DocuPeer is built on Next.js, React, Prisma, Tailwind CSS, and other open-source libraries. Each of those projects is licensed by its own authors under its own terms, and DocuPeer's use of them does not imply endorsement of DocuPeer by their maintainers.