Privacy policy.
Effective date: September 20, 2026. Company-wide privacy and email commitments updated October 14, 2026.
1.Introduction and scope
This Privacy Policy (the "Policy") describes how BinderCo, the business name of 2787168 Alberta Ltd., an Alberta corporation ("BinderCo", "we", "us", or "our"), collects, uses, discloses, and safeguards personal information in connection with its products and services, including Binder (Record, Advocate and Counsel), Binder University, Binder Intelligence (including HR, Insurance, Law, Governance, Controlled and Humanities), and its contributor and editorial services. Product-specific provisions describe particular functions and may be supplemented by additional notices.
Our company-wide privacy and email commitment
Across BinderCo, we do not sell, rent, trade or provide customer or contributor information, including email addresses, to third parties for their independent marketing, lead generation, advertising or mailing lists. We do not initiate unsolicited email outreach. Necessary processing by service providers acting for BinderCo, disclosures you specifically authorize, and disclosures required or permitted by law are described below. These company-wide commitments apply to all BinderCo products and services, even where a product has a separate privacy notice.
BinderCo is responsible for personal information under its control. BinderCo's processing is subject to applicable Canadian privacy law, including PIPEDA and, where applicable, Alberta PIPA.
By creating an Account or using Binder, you acknowledge this Policy. Where Binder requires express consent for a specific use of personal information, that consent will be requested separately.
2.Information we collect
Account data
We collect information required to create and administer an Account, including name, email address, authentication information, organization information where provided, role, phone number or mailing address where provided, Membership or University Access information, and internal account identifiers.
Matter, Record, and Advocate content
A Matter is an issue, event, incident, question, risk, claim, dispute, or other subject a User chooses to manage in Binder.
Record may contain documents, correspondence, photographs, notes, dates, contracts, insurance materials, operational records, and other information relating to a Matter. Advocate analyzes Matter and Record content to identify gaps, inconsistencies, unanswered questions, and issues requiring further attention.
Matter content may include personal information about the User and third parties. Users are responsible for ensuring that they have a lawful basis or authority to submit third-party information.
Counsel communications
When a Matter is referred to Counsel, BinderCo collects information submitted with the referral, communications with the supervising lawyer, and research memoranda or other Counsel work product.
Binder University data
Where you use Binder University, we collect enrolment, access, progress, completion, purchase, course-request, and community-participation information as required to provide the educational service.
Payment data
Payments are processed by Stripe or another payment processor identified at checkout. BinderCo does not store full payment-card numbers where payment credentials are collected directly by the payment processor. BinderCo receives transaction status, tokenized references, and limited payment-method and billing information necessary to administer purchases.
Usage and device data
We collect operational information such as pages accessed, features used, timestamps, session identifiers, IP address, browser and device information, operating system, referring URL, errors, and security events.
Cookies
Binder uses cookies and similar technologies required to operate, secure, and improve the Service. Binder's current cookie practices are described in Section 11.
Communications with BinderCo
When you contact BinderCo, we collect the contents of the communication and information you provide.
Contributor and author verification
When a professional or contributor contacts us about a proposed publication, we may collect their name, professional details, correspondence, manuscript and publication permissions for reviewing the submission and keeping an audit record. Information supplied by a public relations representative or another intermediary does not, by itself, establish the named professional's consent to be contacted or to publish under their name.
3.How we use information
Delivering Binder
We use Account, Matter, Record, Advocate, University, usage, and related data to provide the Service, authenticate Users, enforce access entitlements, maintain Matters and educational progress, and operate the application.
Service communications
We use contact information to send messages the recipient has requested or authorized, and operational, security, billing, legal and account notices reasonably necessary for an existing service or otherwise permitted or required by law.
No unsolicited email or third-party marketing
BinderCo does not send unsolicited email outreach, including unsolicited commercial or promotional messages. We send newsletters, offers or marketing emails only where we have recorded legally sufficient consent or another independently documented lawful basis under Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL), and we honour applicable unsubscribe requests. Providing an email address, being named by a third party, or submitting an article does not automatically enrol anyone in marketing. Consent to an operational or verification email is not consent to marketing.
We will not email a prospective author for verification solely because an intermediary supplied their address. The professional can contact BinderCo directly and initiate the requested correspondence. BinderCo does not ask recipients to follow email links to verify identity or approve a transaction. For verification, recipients should independently enter binderco.ca in their browser; any requested email authentication uses a code rather than an email link. These precautions do not replace appropriate identity and publication-rights checks.
Counsel delivery
For an accepted Counsel referral, we use the referral information and relevant Matter content to deliver Counsel. Counsel communications are handled under restricted access appropriate to the supervising lawyer's professional obligations.
Billing
We use Account, purchase, Membership, and payment information to process transactions, renewals, receipts, refunds where applicable, tax records, and account administration.
Security and integrity
We use operational and usage data to secure Binder, detect abuse, investigate incidents, enforce the Terms and Acceptable Use Policy, and protect Users and BinderCo.
Binder University educational derivatives
Binder University may use de-identified educational derivatives created from eligible Binder Matters.
For new educational processing after the effective date of this Policy, BinderCo will process Matter content for this purpose only where the applicable Matter has been affirmatively enabled for educational use through the Matter setting.
Before an educational derivative is used, BinderCo removes, generalizes, or alters information that could reasonably identify the User, a third party, or the originating Matter. This includes direct identifiers and, where appropriate, combinations of dates, locations, monetary amounts, job titles, employee counts, organizational characteristics, medical or personal details, and other contextual information.
The educational lesson or issue may be preserved while unnecessary identifying detail is changed.
Counsel communications, Counsel memoranda, lawyer work product, and content stored solely within Counsel are excluded from the educational processing. Once a Matter is referred to Counsel, the entire Matter is excluded from new educational processing.
BinderCo does not publish the identity of the originating User or Matter for an educational scenario.
A User may turn off future educational use for a Matter in the Matter management panel, or request assistance at privacy@binderco.ca.
Legal compliance
We use and disclose information as reasonably necessary to comply with law, valid legal process, professional obligations, tax and accounting duties, and to establish, exercise, or defend legal rights.
4.Consent and other lawful processing
BinderCo identifies the purposes for which personal information is collected, used, or disclosed and obtains consent where required.
Core processing necessary to provide Binder is undertaken as part of the User's requested service and contractual relationship with BinderCo, subject to applicable privacy law.
Optional features or uses that materially extend beyond core service delivery may require separate consent. In particular, future educational processing of a Matter for University educational derivatives uses an affirmative Matter-level permission model.
Users may withdraw consent subject to applicable legal or contractual restrictions. Disabling educational use takes effect for new processing when the Matter setting is saved; it does not disable ordinary Binder services. Work already sent to a processing provider cannot be recalled, but unfinished work is prevented from becoming a new published derivative after withdrawal.
5.Counsel, confidentiality, and legal process
Counsel
Counsel is the only Binder component through which a solicitor-client relationship may arise. Access to Counsel communications is restricted to personnel with a need to know for delivery, security, legal, or professional-obligation purposes.
Record and Advocate content
Record and Advocate content can include sensitive business, insurance, employment, health, litigation, and third-party information. BinderCo does not treat all Record or Advocate content as solicitor-client privileged merely because it is stored in Binder.
Where BinderCo receives compulsory legal process for User information, BinderCo will review the request for facial validity, disclose only what is legally required, and provide notice where legally permitted and reasonably practicable so the affected User may respond.
Post-referral educational exclusion
Once a Matter is referred to Counsel, the entire Matter is excluded from new educational processing. This is a product and privacy safeguard and is not a representation that all pre-referral content is non-privileged or that all post-referral content is privileged.
6.Sharing of information
BinderCo never sells, rents, trades or licenses personal information, customer lists or email addresses to data brokers, advertisers, sponsors or other third parties for their own marketing or solicitation. We do not share customer or contributor email addresses with other contributors, firms or advertisers for their own contact lists.
We share limited personal information with contracted service providers only as needed to deliver, secure and administer BinderCo services on our behalf. These providers must not use the information for their own independent marketing. We also disclose information only as specifically authorized by the individual or as otherwise required or permitted by applicable law. This distinction between operational service providers and independent third-party marketing applies to all BinderCo services.
Binder uses the following providers for the functions described below. Only information needed for the applicable function is sent to a provider.
- Supabase: database, authentication and application state. Binder's primary Supabase project is hosted in Canada (ca-central-1).
- Amazon Web Services: object storage for uploaded documents, attachments and media.
- Vercel: application hosting and request delivery.
- Stripe: payment processing and subscription administration.
- Resend: transactional email.
- Anthropic: AI processing for selected analysis, research and educational-content workflows. Relevant content is sent when a feature uses that processing.
Provider practices, processing locations and retention vary by service and configuration. Contact privacy@binderco.ca for current provider information.
BinderCo may also disclose information:
- where legally required;
- in connection with a corporate transaction, subject to applicable privacy law and contractual safeguards; or
- with the User's consent.
7.International processing and data residency
Binder's primary Supabase database is hosted in Canada. This does not mean every copy of information or every processing operation remains in Canada. Hosting, payment, email and AI providers may process information in other countries.
Information processed outside Canada may be subject to foreign law, including lawful access by authorities. The information involved depends on the feature used. Contact privacy@binderco.ca for current processing-location information.
8.Retention
Personal information is retained only as long as reasonably necessary for the identified purpose, contractual commitments, legal requirements, security, dispute resolution, and professional obligations.
Following termination, ordinary Binder content is retained for the post-termination access/export period stated in the Terms or product-specific notice and then deleted in the ordinary course, subject to legal holds, backups, and any separate Counsel file-retention obligations.
Educational derivatives
A de-identified educational derivative may be retained on an ongoing basis where BinderCo has reasonably determined that it no longer identifies the User, a third party, or the originating Matter.
Turning off educational use stops future educational processing of the Matter. If a User has a concern about an existing educational derivative, the User may request review at privacy@binderco.ca. BinderCo will assess whether the derivative remains sufficiently de-identified and whether further modification or withdrawal is appropriate or legally required.
Backups
Deletion from the active application may not immediately remove backup copies. Backup retention and removal follow the applicable provider configuration and any legal preservation requirements.
9.Security
BinderCo maintains administrative, technical, and physical safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the information under its control.
Binder uses authenticated access and authorization checks to restrict access to private account content. Internal educational-source records and privacy assessments are restricted to administrative processing. Matter-derived educational content requires a recorded privacy assessment before publication. Changes to that content require a new assessment.
BinderCo assesses security incidents and provides notices required by applicable law.
No system is perfectly secure. Users are responsible for protecting Account credentials and promptly reporting suspected unauthorized access.
10.Your rights and choices
Subject to applicable law, Users may request access to or correction of personal information, withdraw consent where available, and raise privacy complaints.
Privacy requests should be submitted to privacy@binderco.ca. BinderCo may verify identity before responding and will respond within applicable legal timelines.
Educational-use choice
Where a Matter is eligible for educational processing, the User may enable or disable future educational use through the Matter setting. Requests may also be made to privacy@binderco.ca.
11.Cookies and tracking
Binder uses first-party cookies and similar technologies necessary for authentication, security, preferences, and operational analytics.
Binder University uses a first-party random identifier to administer the rolling article allowance. The browser stores only that identifier. The server stores a one-way keyed representation with the identifiers and access times of articles counted in the current window. The article meter does not use an IP address, device fingerprint, or cross-site identifier. Article records expire after 30 days and are deleted in the ordinary course; the browser cookie may remain for up to one year so later rolling windows can be administered. Clearing the cookie or changing devices starts a new anonymous meter.
Public-page analytics use first-party collection. The collector stores public route categories and referring hostnames, rather than Matter URLs or search-query text. For distinct-IP counts and repeat-visit statistics, public-page analytics may create stable cryptographic identifiers derived from the visitor's IP address and browser user-agent. The underlying IP address is not stored in the analytics database. These pseudonymous identifiers may allow visits on different dates to be associated and are not proof of an individual person, particularly on shared networks. Tracking is used for BinderCo operational statistics and is not sold or disclosed to advertisers. The browser's Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track signal disables this cross-day identification. Where consent is required for a new tracking purpose, BinderCo will obtain it before that processing begins.
12.Children
Binder is intended for adults and is not directed to individuals under 18. BinderCo does not knowingly create Accounts for children. Where a Matter contains information about a minor, the User is responsible for having lawful authority or another lawful basis to submit that information.
13.Changes to this Policy
BinderCo may update this Policy. Material changes will be communicated as required by law and BinderCo's notice practices.
Where a change introduces a new purpose requiring consent, BinderCo will obtain the required consent rather than relying solely on continued use.
14.Contact
Privacy Officer
BinderCo / 2787168 Alberta Ltd.
privacy@binderco.ca
Legal notices: legal@binderco.ca
Security reports: security@binderco.ca