A safer space starts with honest status.
What is working in Ponder today, and what still has to happen before launch.
Identity and permission
Adults sign in with Google or email. Ponder verifies each school before school features open. Family and school spaces are separate: database row-level security limits family records to that family’s guardians and school records to that school’s staff, and teachers see only their own classes. Parents link to a school only through an invitation they accept. Admin access is checked by the database, not just hidden in the interface, and these rules are tested with multi-user checks.
Guardian consent flow, account recovery, and sign-in testing on real phones, tablets and school networks.
AI and learning
Ask Ponder and the hints in the Learn space are answered by Claude (from Anthropic) through Ponder’s own server. The server blocks requests from other websites, turns away messages about passwords, card numbers, government IDs or report cards, asks people not to share names or personal details, and limits how often it can be used; the AI key never reaches the browser. Ponder is set up to give hints and questions rather than hand over answers. Spoken questions are turned into text by NVIDIA speech recognition on the server. Report-card reading is in accuracy testing and is not available to families or schools until it reads test report cards at 95% or better, and a person must confirm every result before anything is saved.
A published safety evaluation of Ponder’s answers, clear limits on what the AI can and can’t judge, and a way for teachers and guardians to raise concerns about an answer.
Privacy and retention
Read the current privacy policy. Ponder collects as little as it can about children, and a child’s records are visible only to their own family and, once a parent accepts a link, their school. Account data is stored in Sydney. Download and delete controls are built into My account, and retention periods are drafted in the policy. Still to do before launch: a lawyer’s review of the policy, and a formal review of how the Australian Privacy Principles and children’s privacy requirements apply.
Security and release
Database row-level security and scoped grants protect every family and school record, and automated checks that one family or school can’t see another’s records pass. Ask Ponder is rate-limited. Still to do before launch: an independent security assessment, verified backups, incident handling and an accessibility review. No compliance certification is claimed.
iOS distribution
The native iOS source has not been compiled or submitted. The consumer login flow, age rating, privacy nutrition label, account deletion and child safety controls must be reviewed against current Apple App Review Guidelines before submission.