Legal & privacy
The whole arrangement in plain English: what this service is, where the line sits, what happens to your data, and what a report can and cannot be.
The service.
StudyDiscovery is a human-reviewed research service. You submit a research brief; a human operator reviews it before it is accepted, charged, or run; agent-assisted research is then compiled, verified by a human, and delivered to your portal as a research packet. You never operate the underlying research system directly — and nothing runs, and nothing is charged, before a person has approved the scope with you.
Every request is reviewed first.
We triage every brief for feasibility, scope, and risk. We may accept it, recommend a different tier, ask you to reframe it, or decline it — before payment, after payment, or mid-run if new risk appears. If we decline after you have paid, you get a full refund where the work has not materially started, or a proportionate one where it has.
Out of scope.
We refuse requests that seek operational instructions for causing harm — weapons, explosives, dangerous chemical or biological work, malware or intrusion, or evading safety and security systems — along with anything unlawful, deceptive, or aimed at another person's private information. We also refuse requests for the professional judgment a report cannot be: diagnosis, treatment or dosage decisions, legal positions, or financial recommendations. Framing a prohibited request as fiction, curiosity, or "purely theoretical" does not change the answer, and refusal decisions are recorded.
What a report is — and is not.
Every packet is a speculative, evidence-backed starting point: claims tied to sources, confidence signals, contradictions preserved, and limits stated. It is not proof, certification, professional advice, or an instruction to act. Confidence scores are research signals, not guarantees. Sources can be wrong, outdated, or in dispute — verify anything important before relying on it, and bring a qualified professional into any decision that deserves one.
On high-stakes topics — health, legal, financial, safety — reports are research support for you and your professional advisers, and they say so on their face.
Payment and refunds.
Payment is requested only after operator approval, through a single-use Stripe payment link — we never see or store your card details. Prices are in New Zealand dollars; your card provider sets any currency conversion. Delivery timeframes shown per tier are good-faith estimates unless agreed otherwise in writing.
Privacy and your data.
What we hold: your contact details, the brief you submit, any files you provide, correspondence, review and delivery records, and billing records. Why: to assess, run, deliver, and support your research; to bill; to keep the service safe; and to meet New Zealand legal obligations. We do not sell client data or use it for advertising, and client work is never published as an example without written approval.
Processing: research uses trusted external providers (hosting, payment, email, model and search providers), some located outside New Zealand. We minimise what any provider sees and prefer providers that do not train on client material. Client uploads and sensitive briefs run through our most restrictive provider mode. If you are outside New Zealand, your information is handled here in New Zealand — one of the few countries holding a European Union data-protection adequacy decision, with the equivalent United Kingdom recognition — alongside the providers described above.
Retention, in short: invoices and delivery records are kept up to seven years (New Zealand tax law); raw working material is deleted within about 90 days of delivery; records of refused requests are kept as short summaries of the decision — not the material itself.
Your rights: ask what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it — hello@studydiscovery.com. We will do so unless the law requires us to keep it. If a privacy breach ever creates a risk of serious harm, we will notify the Privacy Commissioner and affected people as the Privacy Act 2020 requires.
Wherever you are.
StudyDiscovery operates from New Zealand and serves clients worldwide. These terms are governed by New Zealand law, and the New Zealand courts have non-exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute. If the consumer law where you live — including the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 in New Zealand, Australian Consumer Law, or the United Kingdom's Consumer Rights Act 2015 — gives you protections that cannot lawfully be excluded, nothing in these terms takes them away.
No guarantees, limited liability.
Research packets are provided as-is. We do not guarantee completeness, accuracy, or fitness for a particular purpose — the packet itself tells you where its own evidence is weak. To the maximum extent the law allows, our total liability for any claim arising from a research packet is limited to the amount you paid for that request, and we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, or for the outcomes of acting on unverified research.
Acceptance.
Submitting a request confirms you have read and accepted this notice. If anything here does not work for you, ask first: hello@studydiscovery.com. Effective 4 July 2026 — StudyDiscovery, New Zealand.