Our policies

1. Privacy Policy

What we collect

When you create an account we collect your display name, your email address, and a password, which is stored only in securely hashed form. When you play challenges we record your attempts: which challenge, your score, and how many errors you caught, missed or wrongly struck. That is the whole list. The Lab has no payments, collects no financial information, and uses no advertising trackers. The only data kept in your browser is what is needed to keep you signed in.

Who is responsible for your data

The Venix NextGen Initiative is the data controller for all learner data, in line with the Nigeria Data Protection Act, 2023. The platform is maintained under a written agreement with Venix Partners Limited, which may process data only on the Initiative's instructions and may not use it for any purpose of its own. Data is hosted on Supabase (in the United Kingdom) and served through Vercel.

How your data is used

Your email address is used to operate your account. Your display name and best scores appear on the public leaderboard; your email address never does. The Initiative uses aggregated, anonymised results, such as average Gap Test baselines and improvement across a cohort, to measure and report the impact of its programmes to its board and to funders. No personal data is ever sold, and it is not shared with third parties except the hosting providers named above or where the law requires it.

Your rights

You can ask to see the data we hold about you, correct it, change your display name, or delete your account and its records entirely. Write to programme@venixnextgen.org and we will act on your request. We keep account data only for as long as your account exists.

2. Terms of Use

The Lab is free to use for learning. By creating an account you agree to the following, which exist to keep the platform fair and useful for everyone.

Be yourself. Use a display name you are happy for other learners to see, and nothing offensive, misleading or impersonating someone else. One account per person; do not share your password.

Play fairly. Scores exist to measure judgement, not to be gamed. Do not attempt to bypass the platform's security, extract challenge answers by technical means, use automated tools to submit attempts, or interfere with other learners' use of the Lab.

Respect the content. Challenges, explanations and other materials belong to the Venix NextGen Initiative, and the platform software is used under agreement with Venix Partners Limited. You may use everything here for your own learning, and facilitators may use it in Initiative programmes. Republishing or commercial use requires written permission.

An important warning about challenge content. The documents inside challenges deliberately contain false statements. That is the whole method: you learn by finding them. Never rely on a challenge passage as a source of facts, and never quote one outside the Lab as if it were true. The accurate information lives in the explanations at the back of the book.

We may suspend or remove accounts that break these terms, and remove leaderboard entries produced by unfair play. The Lab is provided as is; we work to keep it available and correct, but as a free educational service we cannot promise uninterrupted operation. These terms are governed by the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

3. Safeguarding Statement

The Initiative works with young people, including minors, and their protection comes before every other consideration. That commitment, set out in our governing documents, applies fully to the Lab.

If you are under 18, you should use the Lab with the knowledge and consent of a parent or guardian, ideally as part of a school or cohort programme with a facilitator. The platform collects the minimum information needed to run, displays only chosen display names publicly, and contains no messaging or chat between users, which removes the most common channel of online risk.

Facilitators and volunteers are expected to follow the Initiative's safeguarding and code of conduct requirements at all times, in live sessions and online. We never feature a participant's name, image or work in our communications without consent, and for minors, without guardian consent.

If anything connected with the Lab or an Initiative programme makes you or a young person feel unsafe, or you believe these standards have been breached, report it to programme@venixnextgen.org. Reports are treated seriously, confidentially, and without retaliation against anyone who raises a concern in good faith.

4. Responsible AI Statement

The Lab exists to teach responsible AI use, so it must practise what it teaches. Drawing on the Initiative's Risk and Ethics Policy, we commit to the following.

Honesty about AI. We teach that AI output can be confidently wrong, that it can reflect bias in the material it learned from, and that responsibility for its use always rests with people. Every challenge in the Lab is built on that truth.

Fairness and inclusion. Challenge content is written to be relevant to Nigerian and African learners, reviewed for stereotypes and bias, and made available free of charge. We welcome corrections: if you believe any challenge contains an unintended error or unfair framing, tell us at programme@venixnextgen.org and we will review it.

Transparency. Passages presented in challenges are AI-generated or AI-styled by design and are labelled as such. Planted errors are always revealed, with explanations, after every attempt. Nothing in the Lab pretends to be something it is not.

Privacy by restraint. The most reliable way to protect data is to collect little of it. The Lab follows that principle, as described in the Privacy Policy above.