Privacy

Who we are

Pharos is an essay competition run by student volunteers. If you have a question about your data, email pharosprize@gmail.com.

What this website collects

The site has no accounts, no analytics, no advertising and no tracking cookies. Our fonts are served from our own site, not from another company. The one exception is the waitlist form on the Home and Competition pages, which is run by Tally (see "The waitlist" below). The entry form, when entries are open, is also run by Tally (see "The entry form" below).

Our host, Firebase Hosting (run by Google), processes basic technical information such as your IP address so it can deliver the pages and keep the site secure. We don't use that information ourselves.

If you email us

We receive your email address and whatever you write. We use it only to reply to you, and we don't share it. We delete it 12 months after our last reply.

Instagram

If you follow or message us on Instagram, Instagram's own privacy policy applies to what you share there.

The waitlist

If you join the waitlist, we collect your email address and your tick to say you agree to us emailing you. Nothing else.

The form is run by Tally (tally.so), which stores what you submit for us. See Tally's privacy policy. On the pages that show the form, your browser loads Tally's form and script from tally.so, so Tally can see technical details such as your IP address, as its policy explains. If the form doesn't load, we show a plain link to it at https://tally.so/r/kbdkBR.

We use your email only to email you once, when entries open. We delete it when entries close. To come off the list sooner, email pharosprize@gmail.com.

If you are under 18 and join the waitlist

Many entrants will be under 18. For the waitlist we collect only an email address. If you are under 18, please make sure a parent or guardian knows you are signing up. A parent or guardian can ask us at any time to delete their child's email address: email pharosprize@gmail.com.

The entry form

When you enter, the entry form collects:

• your full name, email and country;
• your school (optional) and your age;
• the prompt you chose and your essay (a PDF);
• your fee choice and, if you have one, your fee support code;
• a screenshot of your payment, the transfer reference and the name on the account you paid from;
• if you are under 18, a second email address (we suggest a parent or guardian's).

The form is run by Tally (tally.so), which stores the responses for us. Tally says it stores form data on servers in the European Union. See Tally's privacy policyfor the details. On the page that shows the form, your browser loads Tally's form and script from tally.so, so Tally can see technical details such as your IP address, as its policy explains.

Payments

You pay the entry fee by bank transfer, directly to The Assembly Soup Kitchen (T.A.S.K)'s bank account. Pharos never handles the money. The Assembly Soup Kitchen (T.A.S.K) shares a list of incoming transfers (date, amount and reference) with us, so we can match each payment to an entry.

If you are shortlisted or win

If you are shortlisted or win, your name only (not your school, country or age) may be published on this website and on Instagram (@pharosprize). These names stay published after the competition ends.

If you are under 18 and enter

A parent or guardian must agree to you entering and to us handling your details. We may email the second email address on your entry to ask about this.

How long we keep entry data

By 3 August 2027 we delete the entry data we no longer need: emails, ages, essays, payment screenshots and fee support emails. We keep the published names of shortlisted entrants and winners, and the certificate records.

Certificates and publishing names

Each certificate has a code. You can check a code on our Verify page, which shows the name, award, edition and issue date on that certificate. A code you type into the box is checked in your browser and is not sent anywhere. If you open a link that already has the code in it, the code is part of the page address, so our host (Firebase Hosting) receives it like any other address. Certificate details are stored in the site in locked form, so there is no public list of names: they open only for someone who has the code.

We may publish the names of shortlisted entrants and winners on this site and on Instagram, as set out above. Entrants agree to this on the entry form.

Your rights

Under Malaysia's Personal Data Protection Act, you can ask what personal data we hold about you, ask us to correct it, and withdraw your consent to us using it. Email pharosprize@gmail.com and we'll reply.