Legal
Privacy Policy
In short: this website sets no cookies, runs no analytics and has no accounts. The only personal information we receive through it is what you choose to email us. Our hosting provider records standard server logs. Recordings we make inside partner laboratories are governed by a written agreement with that laboratory and by the consent of the people recorded; this Policy explains how we treat them.
01Who we are and what this covers
Tera Labor (“Tera Labor”, “we”, “us”, “our”) records hand-first data for wet-lab and bench work using instrumented gloves and synchronized cameras, and makes that data available to laboratory and robotics partners under contract.
This Privacy Policy (the “Policy”) describes how we collect, use, disclose and protect personal information when you:
- visit teralabor.com and its subdomains, including the sample-recordings pages (the “Site”);
- contact us by email or otherwise, including to request a deployment; or
- are recorded, or work at an organisation that engages us, in connection with a data collection engagement (a “Deployment”).
“Personal information” means information that identifies, relates to, or could reasonably be linked to an individual. For most Deployments, Tera Labor acts as a service provider / processor on behalf of the partner organisation, which is the controller of its staff’s personal information; where that is the case, the partner’s own privacy notice and our agreement with it govern, and this Policy applies only to the extent it is consistent with them.
02Information we collect
Information you give us
The Site has no account system and no forms. When you email us — for example to request a deployment, ask a question or exercise a privacy right — we receive whatever you choose to include: typically your name, email address, organisation, role, and the content of your message. Please do not send us special-category or sensitive information unless we ask for it.
Information collected automatically
The Site is a static website served by GitHub Pages. Like any web server, the hosting provider automatically records technical information when you load a page or stream a video, such as your IP address, browser type and version, operating system, referring URL, the pages and files requested, and the date and time of each request. Tera Labor does not add analytics scripts, tracking pixels, advertising tags or fingerprinting to the Site, and we do not have access to GitHub’s server logs beyond aggregate traffic figures. GitHub’s handling of this information is described in the GitHub General Privacy Statement.
The Site stores a small amount of state in your browser’s address bar (for example, which recording and timestamp you are viewing) so that links can be shared. This is not sent to us.
Information from other sources
If a partner organisation introduces you to us, or you are listed as a contact in a Deployment agreement, we may receive your business contact details from that organisation.
03Recordings made during Deployments
During a Deployment we capture data that can relate to identifiable people, principally the operators who wear our gloves:
- Video from a wearable egocentric camera and a fixed third-person camera. These may capture hands, arms, clothing, faces of the operator and of bystanders, and the surrounding workspace.
- Audio, where enabled for the engagement, which may include the operator narrating protocol steps.
- Glove telemetry: per-finger pressure, grip force, thumb force, wrist orientation and angular velocity, sampled continuously and time-aligned with the video.
- Annotations: protocol step boundaries and labels, session metadata, and identifiers we assign to sessions and operators.
Glove telemetry describes motion and force, not physiology; it is not designed or used to identify a person, verify identity, or infer health, and we do not process it as biometric information. Video, however, may show faces and other identifying features.
Our commitments
- Consent and notice. We record only where the partner organisation has confirmed it has authority to permit recording in the space, and each operator we equip has been informed about what is recorded and how it will be used and has agreed to participate. Operators may pause or stop a recording at any time.
- Minimisation. Cameras are framed on the bench. Where faces or bystanders are captured incidentally and are not needed for the engagement, we blur or crop them before delivery where the agreement calls for it.
- Pseudonymisation. Operators are referred to by session or operator identifiers in datasets and annotations. The key linking identifiers to names is held separately and shared only with the partner organisation.
- Purpose limitation. Deployment data is used for the purposes set out in the Deployment agreement — typically to deliver datasets to the partner and, where the agreement permits, to improve our capture and annotation tooling. We do not sell Deployment data, and we do not use it for advertising.
- Sample publication. We publish a recording on the Site only with the written permission of the partner organisation and the recorded operator(s), after review.
If you have been recorded during a Deployment and have a question or concern, you may contact us directly at team@teralabor.com; we will coordinate with the partner organisation and respond as described in Section 11.
04How we use information
We use personal information to:
- respond to your enquiries and correspond with you about a potential or ongoing Deployment;
- plan, perform and deliver Deployments, including scheduling, on-site logistics, participant notice and consent, and delivering datasets;
- operate, secure and troubleshoot the Site, including detecting abuse and enforcing our Terms of Service;
- maintain business records, perform accounting and comply with legal obligations;
- protect the rights, property and safety of Tera Labor, our partners, recorded participants and others; and
- with permission, publish sample recordings on the Site to illustrate our work.
We do not use personal information for automated decision-making that produces legal or similarly significant effects about you, and we do not use personal information for targeted advertising.
05Legal bases (EEA, UK and Switzerland)
If you are in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom or Switzerland, we rely on the following legal bases:
| Activity | Legal basis |
|---|---|
| Responding to your emails and enquiries | Our legitimate interest in communicating with people who contact us; where an enquiry leads to a contract, steps taken at your request prior to entering into it. |
| Performing a Deployment for a partner organisation | Performance of our contract with the partner; the partner’s legitimate interests and, for the recorded operators, the basis identified in the partner’s notice — typically consent, which may be withdrawn at any time. |
| Server logs and Site security | Our legitimate interest, and that of our hosting provider, in keeping the Site available and secure. |
| Publishing a sample recording | Explicit consent of the recorded individual(s), which may be withdrawn. |
| Record-keeping, tax and legal compliance | Compliance with legal obligations to which we are subject. |
Where we rely on legitimate interests we have balanced those interests against your rights and freedoms, and you may object as described in Section 11.
08Retention
We keep personal information only as long as needed for the purposes described in this Policy, and then delete or de-identify it. In general:
- Email correspondence is retained for as long as reasonably necessary to respond to you and to maintain a record of our dealings, and in any event no longer than three (3) years after our last contact, unless a Deployment agreement or legal obligation requires longer.
- Deployment data is retained for the period specified in the Deployment agreement. Where the agreement is silent, we retain our working copies for up to twenty-four (24) months after delivery to support corrections and re-delivery, then delete them.
- Published sample recordings remain available until the partner or the recorded individual asks us to remove them, or we choose to retire them.
- Server logs are retained by our hosting provider according to its own policy.
We may retain information longer where required to comply with law, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, or where it has been aggregated or de-identified so it no longer relates to an individual.
09Security
We use administrative, technical and physical safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the information we hold, including encryption in transit, access controls and least-privilege access to Deployment data, encrypted storage of raw recordings, and separation of identifying keys from datasets. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure; if we become aware of a breach affecting your personal information we will notify you and any relevant authority as required by law.
10International transfers
Tera Labor operates from the United States, and our hosting and email providers may store information in the United States and other countries whose data-protection laws differ from those where you live. Where we transfer personal information from the EEA, the UK or Switzerland, we rely on appropriate safeguards such as the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses (and the UK Addendum) or a recognised adequacy decision, and we take supplementary measures where needed. You may request a copy of the relevant safeguards by contacting us.
11Your rights and choices
Depending on where you live, you may have the right to:
- access the personal information we hold about you and receive a copy;
- correct inaccurate or incomplete information;
- delete your personal information;
- restrict or object to certain processing, including processing based on legitimate interests;
- withdraw consent at any time where processing is based on consent, without affecting processing that occurred before withdrawal;
- port information you provided to us in a structured, machine-readable format; and
- lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, for example the data-protection authority in your EU member state, the UK Information Commissioner’s Office, or the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner.
To exercise any of these rights, email team@teralabor.com with the subject line “Privacy request”. We will need to verify your identity, which we will usually do by replying to the email address we have on record for you or, for recorded participants, by confirming with the partner organisation. We respond within thirty (30) days, or within forty-five (45) days for California requests, and will tell you if we need more time. We will not discriminate against you for exercising your rights.
Where we act as a processor for a partner organisation, we may need to refer your request to that organisation, and we will tell you if we do. You may also authorise an agent to make a request on your behalf; we may ask for proof of that authority.
12Notice to California residents
This section supplements the Policy for residents of California under the California Consumer Privacy Act as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act (“CCPA”).
In the preceding twelve months we have collected the following categories of personal information, as those categories are defined in the CCPA: identifiers (name, email address, IP address); professional or employment-related information (organisation, role); internet or network activity (server logs held by our hosting provider); audio, electronic, visual or similar information (recordings made during Deployments); and inferences only to the extent that step annotations describe activity shown in a recording. Sources, purposes and recipients are described in Sections 2 through 6.
We do not sell personal information and do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising, and we have not done so in the preceding twelve months. We do not use or disclose sensitive personal information for purposes other than those permitted by the CCPA. We do not knowingly collect personal information of consumers under 16.
California residents have the rights to know, delete, correct, and to opt out of sale or sharing (which does not apply because we do not sell or share), and the right not to be discriminated against for exercising those rights. Exercise them as described in Section 11. Our contact for privacy requests is team@teralabor.com.
13Children
The Site and our services are intended for professionals and are not directed to children under 16. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, contact us and we will delete it.
14Changes to this Policy
We may update this Policy from time to time. The “Effective” date at the top shows when the current version took effect. If we make material changes we will signpost them on the Site and, where we have your email address and the law requires it, notify you directly. Prior versions are available on request.
15Contact
Tera Labor is the controller of personal information collected through the Site and in our direct correspondence with you. For any question about this Policy or to exercise your rights:
team@teralabor.com