Data security and your IP

Your designs are yours. Nothing is public, nothing is browsable by other buyers, and no workshop sees a file until you send them a request. This page explains exactly what happens to a design at each step, including what is kept and for how long.

Pricing happens on your computer

When you drop a file into Instant Quote, or create a Part, the geometry is measured in your own browser. The file is not sent anywhere.

It is uploaded the first time you ask a workshop for a price — and not before. So you can price a sensitive design, compare materials and change your mind with nothing ever having left your machine.

Uploads are encrypted

When a file does go up, it travels over an encrypted connection and is stored encrypted.

Only the workshops you chose can see it

• Nothing is browsable. Other buyers cannot see your Parts or your Projects, and there is no public catalogue of designs.
• Only shops you sent a request to. Choosing four workshops means four workshops, not the marketplace.
• Inside a workshop, only its team. What each person there can see depends on their role — see team roles and permissions.

What is kept, and for how long

This is worth being precise about, because the intuitive answer is wrong in both directions.

• You can delete a file yourself, at any time. Open the Part, remove the file. That is the fastest and most complete option available to you.
• Drafts nobody comes back to are cleaned up. A part that was never quoted and has sat untouched for a couple of weeks is archived — reversible, and nothing is destroyed. If it stays archived for about a month after that, the stored file is removed. The part itself stays in your library, so you keep the record of what you had.
• Parts that went into production are kept. A design that was actually made is a record of what was made, for you and for the workshop, and is not swept up automatically. Delete it yourself if you want it gone.
• A part with a live request is never touched, however old it is, because a workshop may still be looking at it.

Practical advice for sensitive work

• Use Instant Quote to explore. It answers the “can we afford this?” question without your design going anywhere.
• Send only the part, not the assembly. A workshop needs the component it is making, not your whole product.
• Choose fewer shops for sensitive designs. Every shop you add is another organisation holding your file.
• Host it yourself if you prefer. A Part can point at a link you control instead of an upload; shops fetch it from there once they hold a request, and you can withdraw the link.
• Delete the file when the order is delivered. The part, its history and its prices all remain.

Words used on this page

Encryption

Scrambling data so that it is unreadable to anyone without the key.

IP

Intellectual property — your designs and the ideas in them.

RFQ

Request For Quotation — asking workshops what they would charge to make your part.

Local processing

Doing the calculation on your own computer instead of sending your file to a server.

In short

Nothing is uploaded until you ask for a price. Only the workshops you chose can see it. Unused drafts are cleaned up on their own; anything that was actually made is kept, and you can delete it yourself whenever you like. The full legal detail is in the privacy policy.