Why nobody on Vaurse is searchable by name

Many apps let you type a person's name and see what comes up. Vaurse doesn't, and it never will. Nobody can look you up by name. Not a stranger, not a business, not an app, and not us. Nobody at Vaurse can search for a person.

A check on Vaurse always starts with something you gave: your card number, a tap or a link. Here is why we built it that way, and what that means in practice.

Why we chose this

Vaurse holds facts that matter: where you've worked, what you studied, the passes and memberships you hold. Those facts are useful because they are true. That is also why they need care.

If anyone could search for you by name, your record would stop being yours. You'd have no say in who looked, or why. So we put you at the start of every check. You decide who sees your record and what they see. Every request shows in your app, and you can say no.

What a check shows

When someone checks your Voscard, they see whether it's real and active. On a green answer, they also see your name as the issuer has it. That's all.

• A check never shows a photo, a phone number or an address.
• A door or till shows a first name and a yes.
• Door staff see a name and a pass type, never what anyone paid.

Anything more, like a job or a degree, you share yourself from your app.

Being found for work, on your terms

Finding people for work is different from searching for a person. On Vaurse Hire, only people who switched on Open to work for that kind of work can be found. A search is about the work, say, a plumber in Osu tomorrow, not about a name.

A result shows only what the worker chose to share, and the signed facts that matched. When Vaurix builds a shortlist, everyone on it is matched only on what's been signed. Nobody is ranked or scored.

• A full name shows only after the person accepts a request.
• Phone, email and home address stay hidden until they choose to share them.
• Age, religion, ethnicity, health and family are never shown, and you can't search by them.
• Your employer is never told you're open to work, and you can hide from any named company, including the one you work for.

What businesses and employers see

A shop that gives a member or staff discount learns only a first name and whether someone qualifies. It never sees a list of who qualifies. Businesses see who came back, never a list of who you are.

Your employer or school sees what it needs to run its cards, doors and records for you, and nothing from your other organisations. Apps you connect never get your attendance, door taps or where your card has been.

When an organiser looks at an event report, any number under 20 shows as "fewer than 20", so nobody can be picked out.

What we never do

We never sell your data, and we never rent it out. Not to advertisers, not to anyone. We never use it to score you, to profile you, or to show you ads from other companies.

These rules hold for every app built on Vaurse too. No tool can search for a person, and no product can score people, rank them or sell what it learns. Every fact shared about a person is approved by them, for a purpose and a set time, and they can take it back.

You can read the full detail in Trust & security and our privacy policy.