Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) govern your use of Etchv, including etchv.com, the dashboard, the Etchv API, our SDKs, the MCP server, our documentation and benchmarks site, and any related services (together, the “Service”). The Service is operated by Iuchar LLC, a Delaware limited liability company (“Etchv”, “we”, “us”).

By creating an account, clicking to accept, or using the Service, you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you use the Service for an organization, you agree on its behalf and confirm you have authority to bind it; “you” then means that organization. If you don’t agree, don’t use the Service.

If you have signed an order form or other written agreement with us, such as an Enterprise agreement, that agreement controls where it conflicts with these Terms.

You must be at least 18 and able to enter a binding contract. The Service is intended for businesses, developers and professionals. You may not use it if you are barred from doing so under the laws of the United States or where you live, or if you are on a US government restricted-party list.

• Give us accurate account information and keep it up to date.
• Keep your sign-in credentials and API keys confidential. API keys are shown once; store them on your server, never in public client code.
• You are responsible for activity under your account and your organization’s API keys, including usage that consumes credits.
• Workspace owners and admins control membership, roles, keys and billing for their organization.
• Tell us promptly at hello@etchv.com if you suspect unauthorized access. Revoke affected keys straight away in the dashboard.

Etchv embeds invisible watermark IDs into supported images, PDFs and videos, verifies them in the delivered file, and detects them later. Supported formats, file sizes, page, frame and pixel limits are described in our documentation and may change as the Service develops.

We may add, change or remove features. If we remove a feature you pay for in a way that materially reduces the Service, we’ll give you reasonable notice. Features we label as beta, preview or experimental are offered as is, may change or end at any time, and are excluded from any commitments we make about the Service.

Scale and Business plans target 99.95% monthly availability of the Etchv API. The target is not a guarantee and doesn’t carry service credits. A contractual service level with service credits is available in Enterprise agreements. Apart from that, the Service has no support-response commitment unless your written agreement says otherwise. We may interrupt the Service for maintenance, security or reasons outside our control.

New users receive a seven-day trial with 200 credits. The trial is granted once per person, not per workspace, needs no payment card and never converts to a paid plan automatically. When the trial credits are used or seven days pass, processing pauses until you subscribe.

• Plans, prices, included credits and limits are listed on our pricing page. Prices are in US dollars and exclude taxes, which we add where required.
• Payments are processed by Stripe. By subscribing, you authorize us to charge your payment method for each billing period until you cancel.
• Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each monthly or annual term. Annual plans are paid upfront; their credits are still allocated monthly.
• Watermarking uses one credit per image, one credit per PDF page and one credit per started 24 frames of video. Checking a file for a watermark uses one credit per file, even when no watermark is found. Embedding and detection are separate operations. Credits used by a failed job are returned to your balance.
• GPU processing, available on Business and Enterprise plans, uses three times the standard credits.
• Unused credits expire at the end of each monthly allocation period and do not roll over. When your balance runs out, new requests stop. We never charge overage fees automatically.
• Plan and billing-frequency changes take effect at your next renewal, without proration.
• You can cancel renewal at any time in Billing. You keep access until the end of the period you have paid for.
• Fees are non-refundable, except where the law requires otherwise or we agree in writing.
• If a payment fails, we may suspend paid features until it succeeds. We may change prices for future billing periods with at least 30 days’ notice; the change applies from your next renewal.

Each plan limits how many operations can run at once and how many API requests you can make per minute. Requests over a limit receive a 429 response and use no credits. Don’t try to get around limits, for example by creating extra accounts or rotating keys, and don’t place an unreasonable load on the Service. Contact us if you need more capacity.

“Your Content” means the files, metadata, delivery references and other data you submit to the Service, and the watermarked files and detection results the Service returns to you. You own Your Content. We don’t claim ownership of it.

You grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to host, copy, process, transmit and display Your Content only as needed to provide, secure and support the Service for you, and to comply with the law. This license ends when Your Content is deleted from the Service, as described in our Privacy Policy.

We don’t use Your Content to train or improve machine learning models, and we don’t sell it.

You are responsible for Your Content. You confirm that you have all rights, permissions and consents needed to submit it and to have it processed as you instruct, including under privacy, publicity and intellectual property laws, and that processing it will not violate these Terms or the law.

Etchv is a tool for connecting copies of content to records you keep. Please understand its limits before you rely on it:

• Whether a watermark can be recovered depends on the source file and on what happens to it afterwards, such as editing, cropping, compression, transcoding, printing or screenshots. We don’t guarantee that every watermark survives every transformation.
• A detection result reports whether a watermark ID was recovered and how confident the model is. It is an investigative signal. It does not by itself prove ownership, authorship, authenticity, or who shared or leaked a file.
• Etchv only recognizes watermarks it embedded. It is not a general detector of AI-generated or manipulated content.
• You decide how to use detection results, and you are responsible for doing so lawfully and fairly, including when you connect a watermark ID to a person.

You must not use the Service, or help anyone else use it, to:

• process content that is illegal, including child sexual abuse material, or content you have no right to use;
• infringe or misappropriate anyone’s intellectual property, privacy or publicity rights;
• track, surveil, stalk or harass people, or identify individuals in ways that break the law;
• remove, forge, alter or interfere with watermarks you didn’t create, or with other people’s rights-management information;
• reverse engineer, decompile or extract our models, watermarking methods or source code, except where the law expressly allows it despite this restriction;
• access the Service by automated means other than our API, SDKs and MCP server, or scrape, crawl or copy the Service;
• probe, scan or test the security of the Service without our written permission, or interfere with its operation or other customers’ use;
• share API keys outside your organization, resell or provide the Service to third parties as a standalone product without our written agreement;
• upload malware or content designed to disrupt systems;
• violate export control or sanctions laws, or any other applicable law.

We may investigate suspected violations and remove content or suspend access where reasonably necessary.

If you connect your own cloud storage or webhook endpoints, you authorize us to deliver results and notifications there, and you remain responsible for those systems and their security. Third-party services you use with Etchv, such as your cloud provider or identity provider, are governed by their own terms.

Our SDKs, MCP server and code samples may be distributed under their own licenses, which govern your use of that software. Open-source components included in the Service are licensed under their respective open-source licenses. Those licenses don’t grant rights to the hosted Service, which these Terms govern.

The Service, including our software, models, watermarking methods, documentation, website, benchmarks and brand, belongs to Etchv and its licensors and is protected by intellectual property laws. Subject to these Terms, we grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable right to use the Service for your internal business purposes during your subscription. We reserve all rights not expressly granted.

If you send us suggestions or feedback, we may use them without restriction or obligation to you.

Each of us may receive non-public information from the other, such as your content, our non-public product plans, pricing we negotiate with you, or security details. The receiving party will use it only to perform under these Terms and protect it with reasonable care. This doesn’t cover information that is public through no fault of the receiver, already known to it, independently developed, or lawfully received from someone else. Either of us may disclose confidential information when the law requires, after giving notice where allowed.

Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle personal information. When we process personal information in Your Content, we do so on your behalf and following your instructions. If you need a data processing agreement, contact legal@etchv.com.

You can stop using the Service at any time. To delete your account or a workspace, email privacy@etchv.com or use your profile settings where they offer it. Canceling a paid plan stops renewal and doesn’t delete your account. Files in Etchv storage are deleted 30 days after the subscription ends, as our Privacy Policy describes.

We may suspend or terminate your access if you materially breach these Terms, don’t pay amounts due, create a security or legal risk to the Service or others, or if the law requires it. Where practical, we’ll give notice and a chance to fix the problem first. We may also end the Service for everyone with at least 30 days’ notice, and refund prepaid fees for the unused period.

When your access ends, your right to use the Service stops and we delete your data as our Privacy Policy describes. Download anything you want to keep first. Sections that by their nature should survive, including those on fees owed, your content license to us for any remaining processing, our intellectual property, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnification and disputes, survive termination.

THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE”. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT ALLOWED BY LAW, ETCHV DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. WE DON’T WARRANT THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE, THAT ANY WATERMARK WILL BE RECOVERED, OR THAT ANY DETECTION RESULT WILL BE ACCURATE OR COMPLETE.

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT ALLOWED BY LAW, NEITHER ETCHV NOR ITS MEMBERS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS OR SUPPLIERS WILL BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA OR GOODWILL, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THE SERVICE OR THESE TERMS, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THEIR POSSIBILITY.

OUR TOTAL LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THE SERVICE OR THESE TERMS WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF THE AMOUNTS YOU PAID US FOR THE SERVICE IN THE 12 MONTHS BEFORE THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE CLAIM, OR 100 US DOLLARS.

Some jurisdictions don’t allow certain exclusions or limits, so some of the above may not apply to you. Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.

You will defend and indemnify Etchv and its members, officers, employees and agents against third-party claims, and related losses, damages and reasonable legal fees, arising from Your Content, your use of the Service, your use of detection results, or your breach of these Terms or the law. We’ll notify you of the claim, let you control its defense, and cooperate reasonably at your expense. You may not settle a claim that imposes obligations on us without our consent.

Etchv doesn’t publish customer content. If you believe content processed through the Service infringes your copyright, send a notice to legal@etchv.com identifying the work, the material you believe infringes it, your contact details, a statement of good-faith belief, and a statement under penalty of perjury that your notice is accurate and that you are authorized to act. We may terminate accounts of repeat infringers.

You will comply with US and other applicable export control and sanctions laws. You won’t use, export or provide access to the Service in or for a sanctioned country or region, for a restricted party, or for a prohibited end use.

We may update these Terms. We’ll change the date at the top and, for material changes, notify account holders by email or in the dashboard at least 30 days before they take effect. Changes don’t apply to disputes that arose before they took effect. If you keep using the Service after changes take effect, you accept them; if you don’t, stop using the Service and cancel your plan.

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Delaware and applicable US federal law, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules. The UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods does not apply.

Informal resolution. Before starting arbitration, contact us at legal@etchv.com with a description of the dispute and the relief you want. We’ll try in good faith to resolve it within 60 days.

Arbitration. If we can’t, any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service will be resolved by binding individual arbitration administered by the American Arbitration Association under its Commercial Arbitration Rules, by a single arbitrator. The arbitration will take place in Wilmington, Delaware, or by video conference if both parties agree. Judgment on the award may be entered in any court with jurisdiction.

Class action waiver. You and Etchv may bring claims only individually, not as a plaintiff or class member in any class, collective or representative proceeding, and the arbitrator may not consolidate claims or preside over a representative proceeding.

Exceptions. Either party may bring an individual claim in small claims court, and either party may seek an injunction in court to protect its intellectual property or confidential information.

Opting out. You may opt out of arbitration and the class action waiver by emailing legal@etchv.com within 30 days after you first accept these Terms, with your name, account email and a clear statement that you opt out.

Courts. Any dispute not subject to arbitration will be heard only in the state or federal courts located in Delaware, and both parties consent to their jurisdiction.

• Notices. We send notices to your account email or in the dashboard. Send legal notices to legal@etchv.com. You agree to receive communications from us electronically.
• Assignment. You may not assign these Terms without our written consent. We may assign them in connection with a merger, acquisition or sale of assets.
• Force majeure. Neither party is liable for delays or failures caused by events beyond its reasonable control, other than your obligation to pay.
• Independent parties. The parties are independent contractors; nothing here creates a partnership, agency or employment relationship.
• No waiver. Not enforcing a provision isn’t a waiver of our right to enforce it later.
• Severability. If a provision is unenforceable, it will be limited to the minimum extent needed and the rest stays in effect.
• Entire agreement. These Terms, the Privacy Policy and any order form you sign with us are the entire agreement about the Service and replace any earlier agreements on the same subject.
• Publicity. We won’t name your organization as a customer or use its logo without your permission.

Iuchar LLC, which operates Etchv. Email legal@etchv.com about these Terms, or hello@etchv.com for anything else.