Privacy Policy

Who we are

TomFiction is an essay coach for students. An AI coach, Maple, interviews you one question at a time, and your essay is built only from your own answers. TomFiction is run by TomFiction · support@tomfiction.com.

What stays on your device

These live in this browser's storage and are not sent to our servers:

• Your essays, worksheets, drafts and every answer you give
• Your recordings, while the Keep recordings setting is on (otherwise they are dropped after transcription)
• Your settings, the name and class heading you enter for school essays, and your answer-sharing choice
• The result of the age check (never your birth date)

Because they are stored only here, they don't follow you to another browser or device, and clearing this site's data removes them.

Where your words go

To ask good questions, build your essay and take payments, TomFiction relies on these services. Each one gets only what is listed, under contract, to run TomFiction for you.

• DeepSeek

  What it does

  The AI that reads your prompt, chooses your coach's questions and puts your answers in order. For worksheets on Balanced or Best, it can also find the questions and check that an answer covers each part of a question.

  Where

  China

  What it gets

  Your prompt and the details you add (school, limit, rubric, sources, topics you've used), the text of your answers, and your draft. With the Chrome extension, also the text and title of a Google Doc you agreed to share. For worksheets on Balanced or Best: the worksheet's text when its questions can't be found in your browser, and, for a question with more than one part, that question and your answer. Never your recordings.

  When

  Every essay

• Groq

  What it does

  Speech-to-text

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  Each recording, to turn it into words.

  When

  When you answer by talking

• Brave Search

  What it does

  Looks up facts about your school or topic so your coach can ask better questions

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  Search phrases built from your prompt and school name. Never your answers.

  When

  When your prompt calls for research

• Vercel

  What it does

  Hosts the app and our private storage, and counts page views (Vercel Web Analytics, which sets no cookies)

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  Every request to the app passes through it, including your IP address. Our own records, listed below, are stored with it too.

  When

  Every essay

• Stripe

  What it does

  Payments, through Stripe Checkout (cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay and Link)

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  Your payment details, email address and billing country, entered on Stripe's own checkout page. We never see your full card number.

  When

  Only when you or a parent buys a plan

• Resend

  What it does

  Sends our emails, such as the sign-in link that restores a purchase on another device

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  Your email address and the message we send you.

  When

  Only when you ask us to email you

• Google Ads

  What it does

  Tells us whether a visit that came from one of our Google ads led to a purchase

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  On our home and pricing pages only: the page you visited, that a purchase happened (not what you wrote), your IP address and browser details, and a Google cookie. It never runs on the interview, essay or panel screens.

  When

  Only on our home and pricing pages

• Cloudflare

  What it does

  Runs our domain's DNS and forwards email sent to support@tomfiction.com to our inbox

  Where

  United States

  What it gets

  The emails you send us, on their way to our inbox.

  When

  When you email us

• Your browser's speech service (for example Google in Chrome, Microsoft in Edge)

  What it does

  Live captions while you talk

  Where

  Set by your browser

  What it gets

  Your voice while you record.

  When

  Only if you turn on Live captions (off by default)

The AI runs on DeepSeek's API, which processes requests in China. We are moving the AI to US-hosted infrastructure, and this page will say so when the change is made.

We may also disclose information if the law requires it, to protect someone's safety, or as part of a sale or merger of the business, in which case this policy keeps applying to your information.

What we keep

• A random visitor ID. A random code in a cookie on this browser, so we can tell visits apart, apply fair-use limits and keep the service secure. It isn't linked to your name.
• Usage events. Which pages you open, how far an essay gets, counts and timings (for example how many words an answer had), and errors, with your browser type. No answer text unless you turn on answer sharing.
• Cost log. One line per AI, speech or search call: the time, the kind of call, the model and its cost, with a scrambled essay ID. No text.
• Feedback you send. Your note, the page you were on, the question on screen and your last few usage events.
• Purchases. Stripe keeps the record of what was bought, when, for how much and the purchase email. We look it up there to turn on your plan, restore it on another device or refund it, and your browser keeps a signed note of your plan in a cookie. Card details stay with Stripe.
• Your email, if you give it. With the essay type, your coach's overall score for the draft, and whether you asked for occasional updates (off by default).

If you were invited to the beta and signed in with your code, these records are linked to the name on your code so we can follow up on problems. These records are stored privately with our host.

How long we keep it

• Usage events, the cost log and visitor IDs: Until you ask us to delete them.
• Feedback: Until you ask us to delete it.
• Purchase records (with Stripe): For as long as the plan lasts, plus what tax and accounting law requires.
• Your email without a purchase: Until you unsubscribe or ask us to delete it.
• Data on your device: Until you delete it (Settings, then Delete all data) or clear your browser's data.

What we don't do

• We don't sell or rent your personal information.
• We don't show ads in the app. Our Google Ads measurement runs only on our home and pricing pages, never with your answers or essays.
• We don't create voiceprints or identify you by your voice.
• We don't use your answers or essays to train AI models.

Sharing your answers

Answer sharing helps us improve Maple's questions. It is off unless you turn it on. Adds the text of your answers (up to 600 characters each), your coach's questions and your prompt to the usage events above. Never your recordings.

Chrome extension

The TomFiction extension puts Maple beside your Google Doc. Before it reads a doc, it asks:

TomFiction will read this doc's text and send it to TomFiction and our AI provider to understand your assignment and what you've already written, and to plan or find your questions. It isn't sold or used for ads. Nothing in your doc changes until you choose to put your words in, either by clicking where they go when the coach asks or with a button in the panel.

• When it reads your doc. Only after you agree, for each doc, on the card that asks first. It reads the doc's text and title through Google's own plain-text download, and nothing else on the page.
• Where the doc's text goes. To TomFiction and our AI provider, DeepSeek, to understand your assignment and what you've already written, and to plan or find your questions. It isn't sold or used for ads.
• What is kept, and where. The doc's text is saved with that essay or worksheet in your browser's storage, like your answers, and goes along with the requests that work out your assignment and plan your questions, or that find a worksheet's questions when they can't be found in your browser. Our servers pass it to DeepSeek and don't keep it. At most the first 60,000 characters are sent.
• What the extension remembers. Which docs you agreed to (their IDs, never titles or text) and where you put the coach, in Chrome's storage for the extension. Forget all in the extension's options, or removing the extension, clears it.
• Your doc. Nothing in it changes until you choose to put your words in. When an essay or a worksheet answer is ready, the coach asks you to click where it goes and pastes it there once. Put it at my cursor pastes at your cursor instead, and Replace pastes your improved part over what you highlighted. With Fill in my doc as I go on, each finished answer, and a finished essay once, goes straight to that click-where-it-goes step without a button. Docs' version history shows each as a paste.
• Microphone. Inside a doc, Chrome asks whether docs.google.com can use your microphone, and the answer applies to docs.google.com. You can change it in Chrome's site settings for docs.google.com.
• Your choices in the panel. Inside Google Docs, Chrome keeps the coach panel's storage separate from this site. Your essays from the panel, the age check and the answer-sharing choice live there, and sharing is off unless you turn it on in the panel's settings. The panel also notes which Google Doc each essay or worksheet was started from (doc IDs only, never titles or text), so reopening the coach on that doc offers Continue.

TomFiction's use of information received from the TomFiction Chrome extension, including the text of Google Docs you choose to share, adheres to the Chrome Web Store User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. We use it only to provide and improve the coach, never sell it or use it for advertising, transfer it only to the providers named on this page as needed to run the coach (or to comply with law), and don't let people read it except with your permission, for security, or to comply with law. Chrome Web Store User Data Policy

Worksheets

On a worksheet, Maple asks its questions one at a time. You say or type each answer, and Maple types up what you said. Here is where a worksheet's words go:

• Finding the questions. Your browser looks for the questions in the worksheet you paste, or in the Google Doc you let the extension read. On Quick nothing else is used. On Balanced or Best, if your browser can't find them, the worksheet's text goes to TomFiction and our AI provider, DeepSeek, to find them.
• Your answers. Each answer goes to TomFiction's server to be cleaned up (fillers out, punctuation and capitals in) and isn't kept there. Recordings go to Groq to turn them into words, as with essays. On Balanced or Best, for a question with more than one part, the question and your answer also go to DeepSeek to check that every part is answered. It never judges whether an answer is right.
• What is kept. Your worksheets and answers are saved in your browser's storage, like your essays. We don't keep their text.

Age

TomFiction is for students 13 and older in the United States. Before you start your first essay on a device, we ask for your birth month and year. Only the result (old enough or not) is kept, in this browser. Your birth date isn't saved or sent anywhere. If you are under 18, check with a parent or guardian before using TomFiction. We don't knowingly collect information from children under 13; if you believe a child under 13 has used TomFiction, email support@tomfiction.com and we will delete what we hold.

Deleting your data

Open Settings (the gear at the top of this page or the home page) and choose Delete all data. That erases every essay, answer, recording and draft in this browser. Your settings and choices stay until you clear this site's data in your browser's settings.

Deleting on your device doesn't reach the records we keep. To have those deleted, or to see what we hold, email support@tomfiction.com from any address and tell us roughly when you used TomFiction. Parents and guardians can ask on a student's behalf. We answer within 45 days. Payment records are kept as tax law requires.

Your privacy rights

Depending on where you live (for example California, New York and other states with student or consumer privacy laws), you may have the right to know what we collect, to get a copy, to correct or delete it, and to opt out of its sale or sharing. We don't sell personal information. To use any of these rights, email support@tomfiction.com. We won't treat you differently for asking.

Security

Everything travels encrypted (HTTPS). Our records sit in private storage that only the people who run TomFiction can open, and our keys are rotated. No system is perfectly secure; if a breach affects your information, we will tell you as the law requires.

Changes to this policy

When this policy changes, the date at the top changes too. For significant changes, we will say so in the app before they take effect.

Contact

Email support@tomfiction.com. It goes straight to Orion, the founder, who reads every message. You can also use Send feedback in Settings. TomFiction · support@tomfiction.com.