The question isn't which AI detector is best.
It's whether detection is the right approach at all.
AI detection tools produce probability scores. Probability scores produce disputes. Disputes produce lawsuits. Signet /Draft gives your students a way to prove their own authorship — before any question is raised, with evidence they own, verified by a third party.
Three approaches.
Only one changes the liability equation.
Detection.
* Probabilistic AI analyzing finished work. *
Scan a finished document. Produce a probability score. That score is wrong often enough to flag non-native English speakers, neurodivergent students, and formally trained writers at disproportionate rates. Institutions are disabling these tools. Others are being sued. The arms race between detectors and humanizers has no finish line.
Forced compliance.
* Detection disguised as process recording. *
These tools require invasive permissions that open up students' private files, allowing professors to observe how a document was written. They surface limited analytics. But they read document content, transmit it to vendor servers, and in some cases apply the same probabilistic classification they claim to replace — just earlier in the process. The relationship is top-down by design. The student has no artifact, no agency, and may not know they're being observed.
The institution inherits a new data relationship: student work flowing through a third-party vendor, stored on vendor infrastructure, governed by vendor terms. The FERPA exposure, the content licensing questions, the privacy obligations — they follow from the architecture.
Student empowerment.
* The student creates the record. The institution holds it. *
The student documents their own writing process and submits a verified record alongside their work. The institution receives evidence the student created — not a score a vendor produced. No student content touches Signet's servers. No perpetual license to student work is granted. No probabilistic judgment is made about AI use, or anything else.
This shifts the dynamic from opposition to support. Writing in the age of AI assistance involves choices — what to use, where to be transparent, how to demonstrate the work is your own. /Draft gives students a way to make those choices visible without surrendering their content. They see their own progress as they work. They generate the final certificate themselves, at completion.
The institution becomes the trusted holder of records its students generated — an archive of authorship rather than a vendor of accusations. Years later, a student needing to prove their authorship of an early paper has a verifiable record to point to. The institution that maintained that record is the one they thank.
And because Signet has no commercial stake in detection or monitoring, the conversation about how your institution handles AI use can be honest. Your policies. Your standards. Your faculty's judgment. /Draft surfaces the record. You decide what it means.
/Draft is the only product in the third category.
Reduced exposure. Stronger evidence. Zero new risk.
Zero false positive liability.
Signet /Draft makes no AI classification. No probability score. No judgment. There is nothing to be wrong about — and nothing to be sued over.
FERPA-clean by architecture.
Student work never touches Signet's infrastructure. No student papers stored. No perpetual content license. No third-party vendor holding educational records.
Narrower compliance scope.
Signet does not process student data on behalf of the institution. The student's relationship with Signet is direct. When a Data Processing Agreement applies, the scope is meaningfully reduced — student content never reaches Signet's infrastructure, so the data flows that typically drive vendor compliance obligations are absent by design.
The evidentiary position shifts.
When a student submits a Signet /Draft certificate alongside their paper, the institution is reviewing evidence the student proactively created — not acting on a tool's accusation. That is a different legal footing in any proceeding that follows.
Complements what you already have.
/Draft fills the process gap that content analysis doesn't cover. It doesn't replace your existing tools. It gives your students a way to bring their own evidence to the table — which strengthens your position, not just theirs.
Your Google Workspace.
Their identity. No IT lift.
Students sign in with the .edu Google account your institution already manages. Their name is drawn from your directory — controlled by your IT department, not by the student, not by Signet. The certificate carries the same identity trust as your LMS, your library system, and your student email.
No new credentials. No enrollment. No IT changes. Any professor verifies from any browser — scan the QR code or drop the file. No account required.
The standard is shifting from "detect AI" to "prove human."
Institutions are facing litigation over AI misconduct accusations — expulsions overturned, discrimination claims filed, due process violations alleged. The legal question is whether a probability score constitutes sufficient evidence. Courts are answering.
The U.S. Copyright Office concluded in January 2025 that human creative process is the standard for copyright protection — and explicitly recommended that creators keep records of their human contributions. A Signet certificate is that record. Cryptographically signed. Independently timestamped. Verifiable by anyone.
Institutions that encourage students to document their own authorship are building a compliance posture aligned with where the law is heading — not where it was.
What Signet /Draft is — and is not.
Signet surfaces the data. We don't score it, flag it, or interpret it. Your institution's academic integrity standards — your policies, your faculty's judgment, your established processes — remain exactly where they belong. With you.
Bring it to your students.
We're working with writing programs, writing centers, and academic integrity offices who want to see what this looks like in practice. If you're interested in piloting Signet /Draft with your students — at no cost — we'd like to understand your context and get you set up.
Or reach us directly: hello@getsignet.app