Global Standards for Information Gathering & Sharing

BlackKey Intelligence collects, analyzes, and distributes information under a strict set of operating standards. These standards apply to every analyst, contractor, and automated system operating on our behalf.

1. Lawful, ethical sources only

• Publicly available material (web, filings, scholarly publications, licensed databases).
• Information provided voluntarily by clients or counterparties.
• No unauthorized access to systems, no scraping in violation of terms of service, no social-engineering, no purchased breach data, no surveillance of individuals.

2. Methodology transparency

Briefs cite the analytical frames applied (industry leaders inform our frames). The synthesis itself is proprietary to BlackKey. Where a finding is reproduced word-for-word from a public source, it is flagged as Verbatim with a direct citation, and attribution to the original publisher.

3. Source attribution

Every public-source bullet that survives the source-finder is paired with a clickable URL and a snippet from the cited material. Analysts may not present uncited copy as proprietary synthesis.

4. Plain-English duty

On request, every finding must be available in plain English with acronyms expanded and a "So what?" implication line. Intelligence that cannot be explained should not be delivered.

5. Information sharing

• Engagement content is private to the owner and platform admins by default.
• Team-shared engagements are visible only to that team's members, and only to the extent permitted by the member's team role (Owner, Admin, Editor, Analyst, Viewer).
• We do not share, sell, or commingle one client's data with another's.
• Aggregated, fully de-identified statistics may be used for internal benchmarking.

6. AI usage

AI is used as a research assistant. We do not submit client confidential content to consumer AI systems. We do not allow our providers to use client content to train their general models. All AI outputs are reviewed against source material and the analyst is accountable for what we publish.

7. Conflicts of interest

Analysts must disclose material conflicts before working on an engagement. We will decline or wall off engagements where a conflict cannot be managed.

8. Accuracy and corrections

We correct material factual errors as soon as we become aware of them, and re-issue the affected deliverable with a change note.

9. Compliance frame

Operations are aligned with widely recognized standards including GDPR, CCPA/CPRA, SOC 2 principles, and the ICC International Code of Direct Marketing & Digital Marketing Communications (for any outbound communications). We are not certified to any individual scheme unless explicitly stated.