Privacy & security

How we protect students and families

Harbor handles some of the most sensitive information a family has. Here is exactly how we keep it safe, in plain language.

Only the right people see student information

Every record carries its school and is protected by database-level row security, which is enforced even if the app has a bug.
Staff see a student only if they are on that student’s team. General education teachers and paras see accommodations, not evaluations or medical information.
Families see only their own child. A custody restriction blocks a guardian from everything about that student.
Automated tests sign in as every role and prove these rules on every change.

IEP and medical messages are stored separately from regular messages.
They never appear in notification previews and cannot be forwarded.
Each time someone opens one, the view is written to an append-only record of access.

Photos are kept in private storage and shown through links that expire after an hour. They are never public URLs.
Location data and other hidden metadata are removed from photos before upload.
The server refuses to share a class-wide photo of a student without photo consent.

AI is used only for translation and for drafting help a teacher requests.
Names, emails, phone numbers, ID numbers and addresses are replaced with placeholders before any text leaves our servers. If a name slips through, the request is blocked.
We use Google’s enterprise Vertex AI service in the United States, which does not use customer data to train models. We store only usage counts, never the text.
IEP drafts are private to the teacher and delete themselves automatically (after 90 days by default).

All traffic is encrypted with TLS, and data is encrypted at rest. Data is hosted in the United States.
School staff must use two-step verification. Passwords must be at least 12 characters.
On phones, sign-in sessions are encrypted with a key kept in the device’s secure keychain.
The web app uses a strict Content Security Policy and modern security headers.

No advertising, no data selling, and no third-party tracking.
Families and staff can request a copy of their data or deletion of their account in the app.
Schools control how long messages are kept. Communication that is part of a student’s education record is kept as the school requires.
Harbor is designed to help schools meet FERPA, IDEA, COPPA and state student-privacy laws, and to support WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility.

Found a security issue? Please email us. We take every report seriously and respond quickly. See also ourprivacy policy.