Candidate data in an AI recruiting platform is secured only as well as the controls you can verify: encryption in transit (ask them to show TLS), who can open a phone number, an unlock or access ledger, a clear answer on India versus overseas processing, and a deletion path that is not “email support and hope.” In SafalHires, profiles stay masked until a recruiter unlocks them, and that unlock is auditable. Treat every other claim the same way you would treat a lock on a filing cabinet — ask the vendor to show it working, not to describe it in a brochure. This article does not invent ISO, SOC, or other certifications we are not putting on the page.
Security questions support DPDP and client due diligence. They are not a substitute for a legal review of your role as data fiduciary. See also What Data Privacy Rules Apply to AI Hiring Tools in India?.
If a salesperson cannot open the access log in a demo, you do not have logging. You have a slide.
Five asks that beat a padlock icon
Staffing agencies hold the richest personal files in the building: phones, current employers, expected CTC, notice period. An AI layer adds a new copy of that text inside prompts, embeddings, and vendor subprocessors. The buying conversation should start from the desk, not from a global ATS feature list.
| Ask | What “show me” looks like |
|---|---|
| Encryption | HTTPS on every recruiter session; how resumes sit at rest; whether backups are encrypted. Ask them to walk a test upload. |
| Access control | Role-based logins, tenant isolation (your pool is not another agency’s), SSO or strong passwords, who on the vendor side can see production files. |
| Unlock ledger | A timestamped record of who revealed name, email, or phone, on which job, and preferably why a credit was spent. |
| India / location | Where the database runs, where model inference runs, which subprocessors receive resume text. “We have an India entity” is not the same as “the disks are here.” |
| Deletion | What happens when a candidate asks to be removed, when you close an account, and when a requirement ends. Get the timeline in writing. |
Refuse to score vendors on badges you have not read. Ask for the report, the date, and the scope. If they will not share even a redacted letter, write that down as a risk, not as a maybe.
Masking is access control, not a diversity sticker
Contact fields are the highest-value target in a recruiting stack: they get copied to WhatsApp, Excel, and client email. A platform that shows every phone number to every logged-in recruiter is one shared password away from a leak. Masking until unlock shrinks that window. The recruiter can still judge skill, company, location, and match reasoning. Identity appears when someone accepts the cost of a look.
SafalHires is built that way: masked by default, unlock as a logged decision. That helps fair shortlisting (see Is Candidate Masking Legal and Does It Actually Reduce Bias?) and it helps security, because casual browsing does not dump a phone book into a laptop download folder. Ask in the demo for the ledger, not only the mask UI. A mask without a log is a courtesy blur. A mask with a log is a control.
Junior recruiters should not need every client’s historical downloads. Ask how jobs, teams, and exports are scoped.
Support access to production candidate files should be exceptional, ticketed, and logged. Ask them to show that policy, not to deny that support exists.
Once a CV is on a recruiter laptop or in a client inbox, the platform’s encryption no longer covers it. Your own device and email rules matter as much as the SaaS lock.
Subprocessors, models, and deletion you can actually run
Most AI shortlisting tools send some resume or JD text to a model host. That is normal. What is not normal is refusing to name the host. Ask: which fields go in the prompt, whether the vendor’s contract forbids the host from training on your content, and whether you can turn off enrichment that calls a third scraper. Write the names into your processor schedule. If a new subprocessor appears later, you want a notice, not a changelog buried in a blog.
Deletion is the control agencies skip. A candidate who asks to be removed from “your database” may still live in last year’s Excel, a WhatsApp backup, and a client share. The platform should still be able to purge or suppress its copy on a published timeline. Ask what “delete” means: hard delete, anonymise scores, keep financial records. Then run one test deletion in onboarding and keep the ticket. A promise with no test is a hope.
Create a dummy job. Upload one dummy resume. Confirm HTTPS. Open the masked view. Unlock. Export the unlock log. Ask where that row is stored. Ask them to delete the dummy and show it gone. If any step is “we will check with engineering,” treat it as not yet shown.
Questions to take into the vendor call
What security questions should I ask an AI recruiting vendor?
Encryption, who sees contact fields, unlock or access logs, data and inference location, deletion, and named subprocessors. Make them demonstrate, not narrate.
How does SafalHires protect candidate contact details?
Masked until unlock; unlock is auditable. Use a live walkthrough of the ledger as the proof, not this paragraph as a certificate.
Does a security badge mean the platform is DPDP-ready?
No. DPDP is your duty as fiduciary plus the processor contract. A badge is one input. It is not the programme.
See masking and unlock on a live desk
SafalHires keeps identity off the shortlist until a recruiter chooses to reveal it — and that choice leaves a trail you can inspect.
See SafalHires