Officers

How Coaching privacy works (and its limits)

Only you and your coach can see that a session or conversation happened.

Nobody else sees it. Employers and agencies never see Coaching. It doesn't appear in:

• applications
• officer search
• employer analytics
• your Highly active badge or activity counts
• your job-search status
• recruiter feedback
• anything sent to employers

Our admins can't see it either. They see only totals, such as "sessions this month", and each coach's own earnings. They can't see who booked or read any message.

How it's protected:

• Each conversation has its own random key. Your messages, the name you chose for your coach and your alert address are encrypted with it.
• That key is locked twice: once with a key made from your password, and once with your coach's key, which is made from their password.
• Your password-made key is never stored. That's why Coaching asks for your password to unlock.
• Nothing in our database links your account to Coaching in readable form.
• Audit logs for Coaching actions record no names, accounts or IP addresses.
• Bookings and payments keep only the coach, the time, the amount and a random reference. That's what's needed for availability, refunds and coach pay.

Honest limits:

• The server decrypts while you're unlocked. Your messages are decrypted on our server while you or your coach are using them; the browser doesn't do the encryption. That protects against someone reading the database or backups, but not against someone who takes over the running server. Doing the encryption in the browser instead would still mean trusting the code our server sends you.
• Payments: the card company and Stripe know you paid "SecondWatch service". Stripe sees your card details and the email you type at checkout. For a same-day request, your bank briefly shows a pending authorization; it becomes a charge only if the coach accepts, and otherwise drops off. Your statement shows a neutral description such as SECONDWATCH* SVC.
• Teams: Microsoft sees that someone joined a meeting called "SecondWatch session", and whatever account you join with. Join as a guest if you prefer.
• Email: alerts just say "You have a new message on SecondWatch". Your email provider sees that subject. You can turn alerts off in each conversation.
• Your coach: coaches keep things confidential, but there are legal and safety limits. See the policy.
• Forgotten password: changing your password keeps your history. Resetting a forgotten one can't open old messages, because only your old password could.

Delete any time: in Coaching settings you can delete your history (upcoming sessions are refunded in full). The Hide the Coaching tab option removes it from the menu on that device.