ObservatoryVisibilitas

Transparency

Updated Published

In short. This page states who publishes Visibilitas, who funds it, which rules make the results verifiable by anyone, how we handle personal data and how to request a correction.

01Who is behind it and how it is funded

Visibilitas is published by Visibilitas Lab, a non-profit company limited by guarantee registered in England and Wales (incorporation in progress; the company number will be published here as soon as it is issued). A company limited by guarantee has no shareholders: its articles require all income to be applied to its objects — research and public education — and prohibit any distribution of profits to its members. Visibilitas Lab is not a registered charity.

Visibilitas was founded by Fabrizio Lo Surdo, who is its director and, today, its only source of funding. The founder also works as a consultant on visibility in AI engines, through a separate commercial business, Recognitio, whose registration in Cyprus is in progress, which may provide services to Visibilitas free of charge. We state this here, first and in writing, because the transparency we ask of data applies first of all to those who publish it.

The independence of the results does not depend on who funds the observatory: it depends on the method. That is why the method is built so that neither the funder nor anyone else can influence the results:

1. Tools and methodology anyone can verify. Prompts, engines, dates, counting rules and the scoring formula are published before collection begins, and no parameter changes while a collection is under way. Whoever wants to check does not need to trust us: they can do it again.

2. Data reported objectively, transparently and in full. Every report publishes everything that was collected — full answers, sources, counts, anomalies — not a selection. The raw dataset can be downloaded under a CC BY 4.0 license: anyone can redo the math and arrive at the same numbers.

Results are obtained solely by querying AI engines, with a public methodology that is defined and published before each data collection. Prompts, dates and raw data can be downloaded: anyone can repeat the collection and verify the results.

3. Nobody can earn a position by paying. Rankings are not for sale, in any form: no entity can pay to enter, climb or stay in a ranking, and reports carry no sponsored content. The same applies to clients of the founder's consulting business: the method has no input through which a client relationship could reach the results. Positions are determined solely by what AI engines answer, measured with the published methodology.

Who is accountable for whatChain of accountability in four steps: the funder is the founder, Fabrizio Lo Surdo, who also runs a separate consulting business on AI visibility; the method is defined by Visibilitas Lab, which publishes it and freezes it before collection begins; the publisher is again Visibilitas Lab, which releases everything collected under a CC BY 4.0 license; anyone can request a correction by writing to corrections at visibilitas dot org, with a reply within fifteen business days.WHO FUNDSFabrizio Lo Surdofounder · also runs a separate consulting businessWHO DEFINES THE METHODVisibilitas Lab (Visibilitas)published and frozen before collection beginsWHO PUBLISHESVisibilitas Lab (Visibilitas)everything collected, full dataset, CC BY 4.0 licenseWHO CAN REQUEST A CORRECTIONAnyonecorrections@visibilitas.org — reply within 15 business days

The chain of accountability stated above, as a diagram. It ends with the reader: anyone can request a correction, and the request does not go through the funder.

02Personal data (short notice)

Controller: Visibilitas Lab, registered office 128 City Road, London EC1V 2NX, United Kingdom — privacy@visibilitas.org.

What we process: reports record answers from AI engines that may contain personal data of professionals and creators (name, business, city, field of activity), already made public in the course of their work.

Legal basis: legitimate interest in research and in informing the public about a phenomenon of public relevance (Article 6(1)(f) UK GDPR and, where it applies, EU GDPR), with publication limited to professional data.

Retention: datasets stay published indefinitely as the archive of the reports, unless the rights below are exercised.

Your rights: access, rectification, objection and the other rights under Articles 15–21 of the UK GDPR, by writing to privacy@visibilitas.org. We reply within one month. You also have the right to complain to the UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) or to the data protection authority of the country where you live. If you live in the United States, you can make the same requests at the same address.

03How to request a correction

If a report states data about you inaccurately, write to corrections@visibilitas.org with: the report, the point you dispute, the correct data and a verifiable source.

  • We check and reply within 15 business days.
  • If the error is ours (transcription, disambiguation, counting), we correct the report and the dataset and note the correction, with its date, on the report page.
  • If the error is in the AI engine's answer, we cannot change it: the dataset documents what the engine answered. On request, we note in the dataset that the content is disputed by the person concerned.

04Data license

Report datasets are published under a CC BY 4.0 license: you can use them, commercially too, by crediting "Visibilitas" and the report concerned.

05Tracking

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