Terms of service

These terms of service (the “Terms”) are an agreement between Surf Platforms Inc., a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Delaware with its principal place of business in San Jose, California (“Elsin”, “we”, “us”) and the organisation that creates or uses an Elsin workspace (the “Customer”, “you”).

If you accept these Terms for an organisation, you confirm that you have authority to bind it. By creating an account, using a workspace, connecting through the API or an AI agent, or paying for a plan, you agree to these Terms. When you create an account, we record that you accepted these Terms and the privacy policy, with their versions and the time, and that you confirmed you are 18 or older. If you have signed an order form or other written agreement with us, it takes priority where it conflicts with these Terms.

Section 21 applies to anyone who uses this website. Candidates and other people who use Elsin's apps, web flows and tools are covered by the end user licence agreement. How we handle personal data is described in the privacy policy.

Depending on your plan, Elsin (the “Service”) includes:

• Verification: fraud and duplicate signals on each application, an on-device identity check for candidates (a head-turn check, an ID read and a face match), a person-reviewed ID route for candidates who prefer it, a check at interview and on day one that the same person turned up, work-history and reference checks, and handling of applications made by AI agents.
• Hiring: careers pages, application forms, a pipeline, interview scheduling, scorecards, candidate messaging, offers with electronic signature, and reports.
• Connections: integrations with applicant tracking systems, background-check providers, HR systems, calendars, video meetings, chat tools and job boards; outgoing webhooks; a REST API, a hosted MCP server and a command-line tool.

Elsin signals risk and sends applications to a person for review. It does not make hiring decisions, and nobody is rejected automatically.

We are developing Elsin actively, so features, limits and integrations may change. Some features are marked as previews or are available only when we or you switch them on. We will not remove a core feature of a paid plan during a paid period without telling you in advance and, if it materially reduces the Service, offering a pro rata refund.

Preview features are provided as they are, may be changed or withdrawn at any time, and are excluded from any service commitment.

• Each person needs their own account. Accounts are for individuals and must not be shared.
• You choose who joins your workspace and their role. You are responsible for what people in your workspace do, and for removing access when someone leaves.
• Keep passwords, sign-in links, API keys and tokens confidential. Tell us promptly at contact@surfplatforms.com if you suspect unauthorised use.
• Information you give us about your organisation, including billing details, must be accurate and kept up to date.
• You must be at least 18 and able to form a binding contract to create an account or a workspace.
• Surf Platforms Inc. runs Elsin and Surf Studio on one sign-in system, so one account may serve both, as the privacy policy explains.

For the personal data of your candidates and employees that you put into or collect through Elsin (“Customer Data”), you are the controller and we are your processor. You are responsible for:

1. A lawful basis for collecting and using Customer Data, including for any check you ask candidates to complete.
2. Notice to candidates: telling them, in your own privacy notice, that you use Elsin and what for, and linking to Elsin's privacy policy where relevant.
3. Biometric and identity checks: Elsin shows its own notice and obtains each candidate's written consent before the face check, and offers a person-reviewed ID route instead. You must not require the face check where the law where a candidate lives or works forbids it, must keep the alternative route available, and must not penalise a candidate for choosing it.
4. Decisions: making every hiring decision through a person. A flag, a score or an unverified status is a reason to look more closely, not a reason to reject. Where the law gives candidates rights about automated tools, such as audits, notices or alternatives, you are responsible for meeting them.
5. Background checks and consumer reports: Elsin is not a consumer reporting agency, and its signals and verification results are not consumer reports. If you order a background check through a connected provider such as Checkr, that provider is the consumer reporting agency, and you are responsible for your own obligations under the US Fair Credit Reporting Act and similar laws, including the disclosure and authorisation, pre-adverse and adverse action notices, and any local fair-chance rules.
6. Equal opportunity: using any equal-opportunity survey only for lawful reporting, and never in decisions about individuals. Elsin keeps those answers apart and shows only totals.
7. Retention: setting how long you keep candidate data, using the retention settings Elsin provides, and handling candidates' requests to see or erase data you hold, for example by deleting a candidate in the app or through the API. We will help you answer them.
8. Messages you send: the content of emails and offers you send through Elsin, and having the right to send them.

We process Customer Data only to provide and support the Service, to keep it secure and to prevent fraud, as described in these Terms and the privacy policy, and as you otherwise instruct in writing. We keep it confidential, limit access to people who need it, and require our sub-processors to protect it.

Our data processing addendum (the “DPA”) forms part of these Terms and applies automatically, without a signature, to Customer Data. It includes the Standard Contractual Clauses and the UK Addendum where they apply. If you need a countersigned copy, ask us at contact@surfplatforms.com. If the DPA and these Terms conflict about personal data, the DPA wins.

Our current sub-processors are listed on our sub-processors page. We will tell you at least 30 days before we add a new one, and you may object as the DPA describes.

Elsin also uses keyed codes derived from Customer Data, such as from email addresses, phone numbers, devices and ID numbers, to detect the same identity across customers. Other customers see only counts, never your data or your name. You authorise this use, which protects every customer, including you.

If we become aware of a personal data breach affecting Customer Data, we will tell you without undue delay and give you the information you need to meet your own obligations.

You must not, and must not let anyone else:

• use Elsin for anything other than recruiting and onboarding, for example to monitor employees, track people, or check anyone who has not applied or been offered a job;
• use Elsin to discriminate unlawfully, or to make decisions about individuals from equal-opportunity answers;
• upload data you have no right to use, or content that is unlawful, misleading or infringing;
• try to identify people behind keyed codes or fraud network counts, or to rebuild data that Elsin keeps on a candidate's device;
• probe, scan or test the Service's security, or get around its limits, without our written permission;
• reverse engineer the Service, except where the law allows it despite this restriction;
• send spam, or use Elsin's email to contact people who are not candidates, referees or your own team;
• resell, sublicense or provide the Service to others, or use it to build a competing product;
• overload the Service or use it in a way that harms other customers.

You can reach Elsin through its REST API, its hosted MCP server, and the elsin command-line tool, using an API key or an OAuth connection. Anything done with a credential you issued is done by you.

Roles and scopes

Every credential has a role (viewer, interviewer, recruiter or admin) that can never be higher than the role of the person who created it. It can be narrowed further to scopes:

A credential with no scopes can reach everything its role can reach. Scopes only narrow; they never widen past the role.

Keys and connections

• API keys expire after 7, 30, 90 or 365 days (90 by default). We store only a hash of each key, so we cannot show it again.
• AI agents can connect with OAuth 2.1. Access tokens last an hour and are refreshed for up to 30 days. You can revoke a key or connection at any time.
• Requests are rate limited. We may change limits to protect the Service.
• Every API and MCP call is logged against the credential that made it.

AI agents

• An AI agent you connect acts on your behalf. You are responsible for its instructions, its actions and its output, and for checking its work.
• By default, verification decisions an agent proposes are held for a person in your team to confirm. An agent's key cannot switch this off. If an admin turns it off, you remain responsible for every decision the agent makes.
• The API and MCP tools have no way to reject a candidate. Rejection is always done by a named person.
• Do not give an agent more access than it needs, and do not use an agent to do anything these Terms forbid.

You may set a policy for applications made by AI agents (allow, hold for a person, or require verification). Elsin labels applications that appear automated; the label is an indication, not a finding.

Elsin can connect to services run by others, including Greenhouse, Ashby, Lever, Workable, Checkr, BambooHR, Google, Microsoft, Zoom, Slack, Calendly, Cal.com and job boards. When you connect one, you authorise us to exchange data with it on your behalf, as described in the privacy policy.

• Your use of each service is governed by your agreement with its provider. We do not control those services and are not responsible for them, their availability or what they do with data.
• A provider may change or end its integration, which may change or end that feature in Elsin.
• When you disconnect an applicant tracking system, we delete its keys and the link to it. Candidates, jobs and applications already imported stay in your workspace until you delete them.
• Background checks are carried out by the provider you connect, under your account with that provider.

• Free use: a free plan is available with limits on seats, jobs and verifications, shown in the product.
• Trials: a paid plan may start with a free trial, shown before you subscribe. Each organisation can use one trial. At the end of the trial the plan is charged unless you cancel.
• Prices: the Integration and Platform plans can be bought in the product, billed monthly or annually. The price and billing period are shown before you subscribe and are charged through Stripe. Enterprise plans are arranged with us in writing.
• Renewal: paid plans renew automatically each month or year until you cancel. You can cancel in the product at any time; the plan then runs to the end of the period you paid for.
• Changes: if you move to a higher plan, the difference for the current period is charged straight away. We will give you at least 30 days' notice of a price change, which takes effect at your next renewal.
• Taxes: prices exclude taxes, which are added where required.
• Late payment: if a payment fails and is not fixed, we may move the workspace to the free plan or suspend paid features.
• Refunds: fees are non-refundable except as these Terms say or the law requires.

“Confidential Information” is anything one party discloses to the other that is marked confidential or that a reasonable person would understand to be confidential, including Customer Data, non-public product information and pricing. The receiving party will use it only to perform or use the Service, protect it with at least reasonable care, and share it only with people and sub-processors who need it and are bound to protect it.

This does not apply to information that is or becomes public through no fault of the receiving party, was already known to it, is received lawfully from someone else, or is developed independently. A party may disclose Confidential Information when the law requires, after giving notice where it lawfully can.

• Your data: you keep all rights in Customer Data. You give us the rights we need to host, process and display it to provide the Service.
• The Service: we and our licensors own Elsin, including its software, models, designs and documentation. During your subscription we give you a non-exclusive, non-transferable right to use the Service for your internal recruiting, under these Terms.
• Service data: we may use information about how the Service performs, and aggregated or de-identified data that does not identify you or any person, to run, secure and improve Elsin.
• Feedback: if you send us suggestions, we may use them without any obligation to you.
• Your branding: logos and banners you upload for your careers pages are shown publicly on those pages.

• You can stop using Elsin and cancel paid plans at any time.
• We may suspend access, in whole or part, if it is needed to stop a security threat, serious harm to others, unlawful use or a breach of acceptable use. We will tell you, limit the suspension to what is needed and restore access once the problem is fixed.
• Either party may end this agreement if the other materially breaches it and does not fix the breach within 30 days of notice.
• We may end free use with 30 days' notice.
• Sections that by their nature should survive (including confidentiality, ownership, disclaimers, limits of liability, indemnities and governing law) survive the end of this agreement.

A workspace owner can download an export of the whole workspace, including its files, and can delete the workspace, in the product at any time. Deletion takes effect after a 30-day grace period, during which any owner can cancel it. We then delete the workspace and its Customer Data, including stored files, and cancel any subscription. You can also download individual hire packets. When this agreement ends:

1. for 30 days you may also ask us at contact@surfplatforms.com for an export of your Customer Data in a common machine-readable format, and we will provide it;
2. after that, or sooner if you ask, we will delete your workspace and its Customer Data, including stored files, except copies we must keep by law, which we will keep protected and delete when that duty ends;
3. candidates' own Elsin accounts and verification results, which they control, are not part of your workspace and are not deleted with it. Nor are the sign-in accounts of your team members, which may belong to other workspaces.

We will provide the Service with reasonable skill and care. You understand that:

• verification signals, face matches, document reads and automation labels are probabilistic. They can miss a fraudulent applicant and can flag a genuine one;
• a face match is a comparison score against thresholds, not proof of identity. An inconclusive or failed check can have innocent causes, such as poor light, an old ID photo or a damaged document;
• the person-reviewed route depends on the judgement of your reviewer;
• Elsin is not a background check, a right-to-work check or a consumer report, and does not replace any check the law requires you to do.

Except as these Terms expressly say, the Service is provided “as is” and “as available”. To the fullest extent the law allows, we disclaim all other warranties, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement and that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free or detect all fraud.

To the fullest extent the law allows: (a) neither party is liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, goodwill or data, however caused; and (b) each party's total liability arising out of or relating to these Terms is limited to the fees you paid us for the Service in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, or 100 US dollars if you paid nothing.

These limits do not apply to your payment obligations, to either party's indemnity obligations, to a breach of acceptable use, or to liability that the law does not allow to be limited, such as for fraud, or for death or personal injury caused by negligence.

By us: we will defend you against any third-party claim that the Service, as we provide it, infringes that party's intellectual property rights, and pay the resulting damages and costs finally awarded or agreed in settlement. If such a claim arises, we may modify the Service, get you a right to keep using it, or end the affected part and refund prepaid fees for it. This does not cover claims caused by Customer Data, your modifications, or combination with things we did not provide.

By you: you will defend us against any third-party claim arising from Customer Data, your hiring or employment decisions, your failure to meet your obligations in section 5, or your breach of acceptable use, and pay the resulting damages and costs finally awarded or agreed in settlement.

The party asking for defence must tell the other promptly, let it control the defence and settlement (no settlement may admit fault for the other party without its consent), and give reasonable help.

Please read this section carefully. It affects your rights, including the right to sue in court and to a jury trial.

1. Governing law. These Terms and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or the Service are governed by the laws of the State of California, without regard to its conflict of laws rules. The Federal Arbitration Act governs the interpretation and enforcement of this section.
2. Talk first. Before starting an arbitration or a court case, each party will try to resolve the dispute informally for at least 30 days after written notice describing it and the relief sought. Notice to us goes to contact@surfplatforms.com; we send notice to your workspace owners.
3. Arbitration. Any dispute not resolved informally will be resolved by binding individual arbitration administered by JAMS under its Comprehensive Arbitration Rules and Procedures (or its Streamlined Rules where they apply), before a single arbitrator, in English, seated in Santa Clara County, California. Hearings may take place by video or on written submissions if the arbitrator agrees. Each party bears its own costs and an equal share of JAMS fees, unless the arbitrator decides otherwise under applicable law. The award is final and may be entered in any court with jurisdiction.
4. Exceptions for both parties. Either party may bring an individual claim in small-claims court if it qualifies, and may seek an injunction or other equitable relief in court to stop actual or threatened infringement or misuse of its intellectual property, confidential information or the Service.
5. Who decides. The arbitrator decides all questions about whether this section applies and whether it is valid, enforceable or has been waived, except that a court decides the validity and scope of the class action waiver below.
6. If JAMS is unavailable. If JAMS declines or is unable to administer the arbitration, the parties will use the American Arbitration Association under its Commercial Arbitration Rules, and if neither is available, either party may ask a court to appoint an arbitrator under 9 U.S.C. § 5.
7. Coordinated filings. If 25 or more substantially similar demands are filed against either party within 90 days by or with the help of the same or coordinated counsel, the parties will ask JAMS to administer them under its mass-arbitration procedures in effect at the time. Any batching or bellwether process applies equally to both parties and does not take away the right to have each claim decided individually. Limitation periods are paused for any demand waiting its turn.
8. No class actions and no jury. Each party may bring claims against the other only individually, and not as a plaintiff or class member in any class, collective, consolidated or representative proceeding. The arbitrator may not consolidate more than one party's claims. Where a dispute is heard in court, each party waives a jury trial to the extent the law allows. If the class action waiver is found unenforceable for a claim, that claim goes to court and the rest stay in arbitration.
9. Courts. Where a dispute may be heard in court, the state and federal courts in Santa Clara County, California have exclusive jurisdiction, and each party submits to them. Either party may enforce a judgment or award in any court with jurisdiction.
10. Survival. This section survives the end of these Terms. If any part of it, other than the class action waiver, is unenforceable, that part is removed and the rest applies.

We may update these Terms. We will update the date at the top and, for a significant change, tell workspace admins by email or in the product at least 30 days before it takes effect. If you do not agree, you can cancel before then and we will refund any prepaid fees for the period after the change. Continuing to use Elsin after the change takes effect means you accept it.

• Notices: we send notices to the email address of your workspace's owners or admins. You send notices to contact@surfplatforms.com.
• Assignment: neither party may transfer this agreement without the other's consent, except to a successor in a merger, acquisition or sale of most of its assets.
• Events outside our control: neither party is liable for delay or failure caused by events beyond its reasonable control, except for payment obligations.
• Export and sanctions: you must not use the Service in breach of export control or sanctions laws, or let anyone on a sanctions list use it.
• Publicity: we will not name you as a customer without your permission.
• Relationship: the parties are independent contractors.
• Whole agreement: these Terms, any order form and any signed data processing addendum are the whole agreement about the Service. If any part is unenforceable, the rest still applies. Not enforcing a right is not a waiver of it.

Anyone may use this website to learn about Elsin. The content, including statistics we cite from other sources, is general information and not legal, hiring or security advice. We try to keep it accurate but do not promise that it is complete or current. Do not attack, scrape at a rate that harms the site, or misuse the website or its forms.

The website's text, design and code belong to Surf Platforms Inc. or its licensors. Links to other sites are for convenience; we are not responsible for them. Sections 15 and 16 apply to your use of the website as well. If you use the website as an individual rather than for a customer, a dispute about it is resolved under the dispute section of the end user licence agreement.

Surf Platforms Inc., San Jose, California, United States. Email: contact@surfplatforms.com. Our data processing addendum, sub-processors and biometric data policy also apply to employers.