Peerford is a public record of research — institutions, researchers and what they publish — with sites and workspaces for universities, and Commons, where researchers talk about their work. This page says what Peerford holds about people, where it comes from, what it is used for and what you can ask of us.
Updated October 13, 2026
A researcher’s page is assembled from the public scholarly record: the author names on published works and the institutions those works name, public ORCID records, and the public profiles researchers keep themselves. How, and from which sources, is set out on How Peerford counts. A page may show the photo a researcher shows on their own public profile, of which Peerford keeps a copy.
Research is published to be read, cited and compared, and a reliable record of who wrote what serves researchers, their institutions and everyone who relies on their work. That is why Peerford holds these records.
Researchers can sign in, connect their account to their page and say what they want shown about themselves: a biography, research interests, a website and a photo. What they write is shown as theirs. If something about you is wrong, or you want your page taken down, write to privacy@peerford.com.
An account holds your name, your email address and your password, which is stored only as a one-way hash. If you sign in with ORCID, Google, Microsoft or GitHub, that service tells us your name, your email address where it has verified it and, for ORCID, your iD. We see nothing else of your account there.
Each session records the device, its IP address and its browser, so you can see where you are signed in and sign out elsewhere. A change made in a university’s workspace is recorded with who made it, when, and from which IP address and browser, so that what changed can always be traced; the address and browser are removed after 90 days, and the change is kept.
A university on Peerford keeps its own staff directory: its people’s names, departments, positions, work email addresses and ORCID iDs. The university decides what is held there, who may see it and what its public site shows. Peerford holds it on the university’s behalf and uses it for nothing else. A question about a university’s directory is best put to the university, and we pass on any that reach us.
What you post on Commons — posts, replies, reposts and the papers you attach — is public: anyone can read it, signed in or not, beside your name and photo. Who you follow, who follows you and which posts you like can be seen by others. Your bookmarks are yours alone. A post you delete keeps its place in its thread and nothing it said.
A member is shown as a verified researcher when their account is connected to their researcher page, or when Crossref’s records of published work carry the ORCID iD they sign in with; checking asks Crossref about that iD and nothing else. A post you report is seen by Peerford’s moderators, with your report.
Peerford emails you to confirm your address, to reset your password, with a code that proves a profile is yours, and with the notifications and reports you ask for. It is sent through Brevo.
When someone in a university’s workspace asks for a report, the question and the figures Peerford computed for it — which can name departments and researchers — are sent to an AI model provider, currently DeepSeek, which writes the prose. No account details are sent, and every figure in a report comes from Peerford’s own calculations, never from the model.
Peerford sets a cookie that keeps you signed in for 14 days, renewed while you use it; short-lived cookies that carry a sign-in with ORCID, Google, Microsoft or GitHub through to the end; and one that remembers whether the workspace’s side menu is open. Your browser keeps your theme, language, table layouts and the institutions you last compared. The language a page is in is part of its address. There is no advertising, no analytics and no tracking, and nothing follows you to other sites.
Some of them are outside your country, and each handles your data only for what is described here. We do not sell personal data, and we do not use it for advertising.
You can see and correct your account and what you say about yourself at any time, in your profile settings, and delete your account in your account settings. It is signed out and hidden on Commons at once, and 30 days later deleted with its roles, what you wrote about yourself, your photo and everything of yours on Commons, while what you did in a workspace stays in its record; signing in before then restores it. You can also ask us for a copy of what Peerford holds about you, to correct or delete it, or to take down your researcher page; write to privacy@peerford.com, and we answer within 30 days. You may also complain to the data-protection authority where you live.
Peerford is not meant for anyone under 16, and we do not knowingly hold an account for anyone under 16.
When this page changes, the date at its top changes. A change to how your data is used is emailed to account holders before it takes effect. The terms of use cover the rest of using Peerford.