Privacy Notice

Privacy Notice for Site Visitors

This Privacy Notice explains how I, and how WordPress, process information about the visitors of this site in connection with the services provided through WordPress.com, Jetpack (including WooCommerce Services), IntenseDebate, Crowdsignal.com, and Akismet. Read on!

Who’s Who and What This Privacy Notice Covers

To keep things simple, in this Privacy Notice we’ll refer to the visitors of the site as “Visitors,” and we’ll refer to the website as “Site”. Visitors to the Site can read published content and interact with the Site through features such as comments, “likes,” poll/survey responses, and follows. Visitors without a WordPress account can also choose to subscribe for email notification of new blog posts.

This Privacy Notice is available to help Visitors understand what information is collected when they visit the Site, and how that happens.

Information WordPress Collect About Visitors to the Site

WordPress collect information about visitors to the Site in a few different ways–they collect certain information that the visitors provide to the Site, they collect some information automatically, and they collect any information that I provide to them about my visitors. As my site is a personal blog, I do not pass on any information to WordPress, that is not collected by them automatically.

Information a Visitor Provides to the Site

We’ll start with information that visitors provide directly to the Site, which primarily happens when visitors type into a text field on a Site, like a comment field or a sign-up form.

Here are the most common ways in which a visitor directly provides information to the Site:

Follower and Subscriber Information: When a visitor signs up to follow or subscribe to my Site using Jetpack or WordPress.com, WordPress collect the sign-up information requested by the Site, which includes an email address.
Site Comments: When a visitor leaves a comment on my Site, WordPress collect that comment, and other information that the visitor provides along with the comment, such as the visitor’s name and email address.
Crowdsignal Survey Responses: When a visitor completes a poll, quiz, or other type of survey prepared by me via Crowdsignal.com, WordPress collect the visitor’s responses to those surveys, and other information that the survey owner requires for a poll/quiz/survey response, like an e-mail address.
Other Information Entered on the Site: WordPress may also collect other information that a visitor enters on the Site–such as a contact form submission, a search query, or Site registration.

Information WordPress Automatically Collect from the Site

WordPress also automatically collect some information about visitors to the Site. This may include:

Technical Data from a Visitor’s Computer and Etcetera: WordPress collect the information that web browsers, mobile devices, and servers typically make available about visitors to a Site, such as the IP address, browser type, unique device identifiers, language preference, referring site, the date and time of access, operating system, and mobile network information.
Visitor Interactions: WordPress collect information about a visitor’s interactions with the Site, including the “likes” and “ratings” left by visitors to a Site using WordPress.com or Jetpack.
Location Information: WordPress may determine the approximate location of a visitor’s device from the IP address. They collect and use this information to, for example, tally for the site owner (me) how many people visit their Site from certain geographic regions. If you’d like, you can read more about the Site Stats feature for WordPress.com sites and Jetpack sites.
Akismet Commenter Information: WordPress collect information about visitors who comment on Sites that use their Akismet anti-spam service. The information WordPress collect typically includes the commenter’s IP address, user agent, referrer, and Site URL (along with other information directly provided by the commenter such as their name, username, email address…oh, and the comment itself, of course).
Crowdsignal Response Information: WordPress collect information about visitors who respond to a Crowdsignal survey. The information that they collect typically includes IP address, browser type, operating system, user agent, and the web page last visited.
Intense Debate Commenter Information: WordPress collect information about visitors who comment on Sites that use their Intense Debate service. The information that they collect typically includes the IP address and account information on the Site, along with the comment.
Jetpack Site Activity: WordPress collect visitor activities related to the management of the Site, such as login attempts/actions and comment submission and management actions. For more information, please see the Jetpack Privacy Center.
Information from Cookies and Other Technologies: A cookie is a string of information that a Site stores on a visitor’s computer, and that the visitor’s browser provides to the Site each time the visitor returns. Pixel tags (also called web beacons) are small blocks of code placed on Sites. Automattic (who own WordPress) uses cookies and other technologies like pixel tags to help identify and track visitors and Site usage, and to deliver targeted ads when ads are enabled for free WordPress.com sites or when ads are enabled on a Site through WordAds or Jetpack Ads. For more information about their use of cookies and other technologies for tracking, including how visitors can control the use of cookies, please see their Cookie Policy.

Other Information Provided by Me

WordPress also collect any other information that I provide to them about visitors to my Site. For example, a I may upload a directory or other information about Site visitors and customers to the “backend” administrative platform for managing the Site.

How WordPress Use Visitor Information

WordPress use information about Site visitors in order to provide their Services to me and my Site. I may use their Services to, for example, create and manage my Site, flag and fight comments from spammers, and collect information through polls, quizzes and other surveys.

In addition to the above, WordPress use some information about Site visitors who are also their Users as described in their Privacy Policy.

WordPress may also use and share information that has been aggregated or reasonably de-identified, so that the information could not reasonably be used to identify any individual. For instance, they may publish aggregate statistics about the use of our services.

How WordPress Share Visitor Information

WordPress may share information collected about Site visitors in the limited circumstances spelled out below:

Subsidiaries, Employees, and Independent Contractors: WordPress may disclose Site visitor information to their subsidiaries, their employees, and individuals who are their independent contractors that need to know the information in order to help them provide their services to their Users and their Sites, or to process the information on their behalf. WordPress require their subsidiaries, employees, and independent contractors to follow this Privacy Notice for information about visitors that they share with them.
Third Party Vendors: WordPress may share Site visitor information with third party vendors who need to know this information in order to provide their services to them. This group includes vendors that help WordPress provide their services to their Users and their Sites. WordPress require vendors to agree to privacy commitments in order to share information with them.
Legal Requests: WordPress may disclose Site visitor information in response to a subpoena, court order, or other governmental request. For more information on how WordPress respond to requests for information, please see their Legal Guidelines.
To Protect Rights, Property, and Others: WordPress may disclose Site visitor information when they believe in good faith that disclosure is reasonably necessary to protect the property or rights of Automattic, their Users, third parties, or the public at large. For example, if WordPress have a good faith belief that there is an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury, they may disclose information related to the emergency without delay.
Business Transfers: In connection with any merger, sale of company assets, or acquisition of all or a portion of their business by another company, or in the unlikely event that Automattic goes out of business or enters bankruptcy, Site visitor information would likely be one of the assets that is transferred or acquired by a third party. If any of these events were to happen, this Privacy Notice would continue to apply to Site visitor information and the party receiving this information may continue to use this information, but only consistent with this Privacy Notice.
Information Shared Publicly: Information that visitors choose to make public is–you guessed it–disclosed publicly. That means, of course, that information like visitor comments and “likes” are all available to others, including information about the visitor that is displayed in connection with a comment or “like” (such as a visitor’s WordPress.com username and Gravatar). WordPress provide a “firehose” stream of public data (including comments) from Sites to provide that data to firehose subscribers, who may view and analyze the content, but do not have rights to re-publish it publicly. Public information may also be indexed by search engines or used by third parties.

How Long WordPress Keep Visitor Information

If WordPress are not legally required to keep it, they generally discard information about Site visitors when no longer needed for the purposes for which they collect and use it on behalf of their users — those purposes which are described in the “How WordPress Use Visitor Information” section above.

For example, WordPress keep the web server logs that record information about a visitor to one of their user’s Sites — such as the visitor’s IP address, browser type, and operating system — for approximately 30 days. They retain the logs for this period of time in order to, among other things, investigate issues if something goes wrong on a user’s Site.

As another example, when a Site visitor views my Site WordPress use their IP address in order to update my Site Stats with information about their visit, like what country they are in. WordPress keep that IP address for approximately 30 days to give them time to calculate my monthly Site Stats and address any issues with those counts.

Other Tools

My Site may contain ads from third party ad networks and advertisers.

Ad networks and analytics providers may set tracking technologies (like cookies) to collect information about visitors’ use of the Site and across other websites and online services, such as a visitor’s IP address, web browser, mobile network information, pages viewed, time spent on pages, links clicked, and conversion information. This information may be used by those companies to, among other things, analyze and track usage, determine the popularity of certain content, and deliver advertisements that may be more targeted to visitor interests. For more information about how to manage and delete cookies, visit aboutcookies.org, and for more information on interest-based ads, including information about how visitors may be able to opt out of having their web browsing information used for behavioral advertising purposes, please visit aboutads.info/choices (US based) and youronlinechoices.eu (EU based).

Information I collect about Visitors to my Site

The only information that I ask visitors to my site to provide is an email address if they wish to subscribe to my blog. Subscribers can choose to unsubscribe at any time by clicking on the “Unsubscribe” button, or by notifying me, so I can remove them from my followers list.

Visitors to my site who choose to visit, like, comment or in any other way interact with the site can refer to the Privacy Policy above for information on how WordPress uses this information.

Cookies

You can view Automattic’s Cookie Policy here.