Safety at Debatable

Last updated: 2026-08-22. This page is the plain-language version. The binding documents are the terms and the privacy policy.

Debatable puts real people in live argument with each other, on camera, often across the world. That only works if the room is safe, so the protections below are built into how rounds run rather than promised in a policy nobody reads. If you are a parent, coach, or school administrator deciding whether this is appropriate for your students, this page is written for you.

1. Who can use Debatable

• You must be at least 13 to use the service.
• If you are between 13 and 18, you may only use it with the consent and supervision of a parent, guardian, or school coach.
• School-team and classroom accounts must be administered by an adult educator.
• Cash never reaches a minor. Tournament cash prizes are restricted to entrants who confirm they are 18 or older.

2. Debating a stranger

Live human rounds require a signed-in account. Anonymous visitors can practice against the AI, but they cannot enter the live queue, take a seat in a live room, or send direct messages. The person on the other side of a live round is accountable to an identity, and so are you.

Teens are matched separately. Before your first live round, everyone answers one age question: 13 to 17, or 18 and older. The answer is recorded on the account, on our servers, and cannot be edited from a browser; changing it afterward takes an email to us. The matchmaker checks the recorded answer for both people before any round is proposed, and it only ever pairs people inside the same age band: under-18 debaters meet other under-18 debaters, adults meet adults. The answer is self-reported, which is the honest limit of what any site can check without identity documents; the moderation and reporting tools in section 4 are the backstop.

Before a live room opens, both sides confirm they are present and both sides see the motion. Either debater can end the round and leave at any time.

3. Cameras and recording

• Nothing is recorded by default. A live room captures nothing unless a seated debater asks to record and every other seated debater agrees. While capture runs, the room shows a recording indicator.
• Publishing is a second, separate consent. If any seated debater declines, the recording is deleted rather than published. Saying no does not affect the round and is never held against you.
• Under 18, recording consent requires a parent or guardian's approval.
• You can debate without showing your face at all: Avatar mode replaces your video with an animated mask rendered on your own device, and the camera frames behind it are never transmitted or stored.

4. Moderation, with a human in the loop

• An on-device watchdog monitors live video for inappropriate content. When it trips, the flagged camera is cut immediately, but the machine alone never removes anyone: the opponent is asked to confirm before any strike is applied.
• Any participant can report the person across from them. Confirmed reports remove the offender from the round, and repeat offenses escalate to temporary and then longer bans.
• Spectators in a live round can watch and comment, but they cannot speak into the room, and audience cameras publish video only, never audio.

5. What happens to your words

• We do not sell your data and we do not run ad trackers.
• Signed in, your rounds, ballots, and style profile are saved to your account so the product works across devices. Nothing you say trains GPT, Claude, or any other foundation model.
• Audio from AI voice rounds streams to the speech provider for the round and is not stored on our servers.
• Research licensing of anonymized rounds is opt-in, off by default, and restricted to adults. Content from users under 18 is excluded even when the toggle is on.

The full details, including retention and deletion, are in the privacy policy.

6. How judging works, and how to contest it

AI-judged rounds run against a published rubric that is set before the round, not written after it. Every decision comes with a written reason. Either debater can appeal to a human reviewer, and no automated system can resolve an appeal. Tournament finals are decided by a live audience vote, with the AI ballot published beside it rather than deciding it.

7. For parents, coaches, and schools

If you run a program, the expectation is simple: students between 13 and 18 use Debatable with your knowledge, school rosters are administered by an adult, and you can reach a human directly with any concern. We would rather hear a question before your students join than a complaint after.

8. Report a concern

Email aidandavidhollinger@gmail.com. Reports of suspected underage use, safety incidents, and questions from schools all go to the same inbox and are read by a person.