This Privacy Policy explains what personal information My Blog (“we”, “us”) collects when you read the site, react to an article, comment or contact us, why we use it, who receives it, how long we keep it and the rights you have, wherever you live.
Who is responsible
The controller of your personal information is Orbital Wire. Contact us by e-mail at orbitalwire@proton.me or through our contact page (choose “Privacy / data request”).
The short version
- Nothing that tracks you runs until you say yes. Analytics, advertising and social media tools stay off for every visitor, in every country, until you allow them in the consent banner, and you can change your mind at any time with “Your Privacy Choices” at the bottom of every page.
- We honour Global Privacy Control and Do Not Track signals: if your browser sends one, those tools stay off.
- We do not sell personal information for money, and we do not store the IP address of people who comment.
- Your name, e-mail address and IP address are never given to AI tools, and nothing you send us is used to train AI models.
What we collect, why, and on what legal basis
Reading the site. Our web server receives your IP address, browser type, the page requested, the referring page and the time. We use this to deliver pages, keep the site secure and fix problems (legitimate interests: running a safe, working website). Access logs store a shortened IP address (the last part is removed) and are rotated automatically after a short period.
Comments. You give us your name, e-mail address, an optional website and your comment. Your name, website and comment are published once approved; your e-mail address is never published. We do not store your IP address or browser details; while you submit a comment they are used only to stop spam and repeated posting, through a scrambled (keyed hash) value that expires within an hour. Legal basis: providing the comment feature you asked to use and our legitimate interest in keeping discussions lawful and useful.
Comment moderation. New comments are checked by automated rules and may be checked by an AI model. Only the text of the comment is sent, with e-mail addresses, phone numbers, IP addresses and links removed, and only to an AI provider that does not use it to train its models; your name, e-mail address, website and IP address are never sent. A person reviews anything the checks are unsure about. Legal basis: legitimate interests (keeping comments free of spam, abuse and attempts to manipulate our systems).
Contact form. Your name, e-mail address, the subject you choose and your message are e-mailed to us through our e-mail delivery provider. They are not stored in the website’s database. We use them only to answer you and handle your request (steps you asked us to take, and our legal obligations for privacy, correction and copyright requests).
Reactions (“Was this helpful?”). The counts are anonymous. To allow one reaction per article, your browser keeps a small note in its local storage, and our server keeps a scrambled value made from your IP address, browser and the article for up to 7 days (legitimate interests: fair, honest counts).
Your privacy choices. When you make a choice in the consent banner we record a random consent ID (also kept in a cookie in your browser), the choices you made, the date, the version of our cookie list and whether your browser sent a privacy signal. We do not record your IP address with it. We keep this to be able to show that we asked for and respected your consent (legal obligation).
Audience measurement, only with your consent. If enabled on this site, Google Analytics measures which pages are read and how (pages viewed, scrolling, clicks on sources, share buttons and related articles), with device, browser and approximate location derived from your IP address. If enabled, Microsoft Clarity records how pages are scrolled and clicked. Legal basis: your consent.
Advertising and social media, only with your consent. If enabled on this site, our advertising partners (such as Google AdSense) and the Meta Pixel use cookies and similar technologies to show and measure ads and, if you allow it, to personalise them. Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on your prior visits to this and other websites; Google’s advertising cookies let it and its partners serve ads to you based on those visits. You can opt out of personalised advertising in Google’s Ads Settings and of other vendors’ personalised advertising at aboutads.info or youronlinechoices.eu, and see how Google uses information from sites that use its services. Legal basis: your consent.
Embedded content. Videos and posts from services such as YouTube or X are only loaded when you press “Load” on them. Loading one connects your browser to that service, which then handles your information under its own privacy policy.
The Cookie Policy lists every cookie and similar technology used on this site, generated from the services actually switched on.
You do not have to give us any information to read the site. We cannot publish a comment without a name and e-mail address, or reply without an e-mail address. Please do not include sensitive information (for example about health, beliefs or finances) in comments or messages.
AI tools and your information
We use AI tools to research and write our articles from public sources; our How we work page explains how. These tools work with public sources, not with information about our readers. We never give AI tools your name, e-mail address, website or IP address, we do not use anything you send us to train AI models, and we only use AI providers for comment moderation whose terms exclude training on what we send. We do not make decisions about you based solely on automated processing that have legal or similarly significant effects.
Who receives it
- Service providers that run the site for us under contract (processors): our hosting provider, our e-mail delivery provider, and the AI provider used for comment moderation when one is set up. They may use the information only to provide their service to us.
- When you consent to them: Google (Analytics, advertising), Microsoft (Clarity), Meta (Pixel) and advertising partners. Some of them use the information also for their own purposes as independent controllers, as described in their privacy policies.
- Everyone reading the site, for the public parts of approved comments.
- Professional advisers, and authorities or others when the law requires it or to protect rights, safety or property; and a buyer or successor if the site is transferred, who must respect this policy.
Selling and sharing
We do not sell personal information for money. Some US state laws treat letting advertising or social media partners collect information for targeted (cross-context behavioural) advertising as a “sale” or “sharing”. This only happens on this site if those tools are switched on and you allow marketing cookies. You can opt out at any time on our Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information page, and a Global Privacy Control signal from your browser counts as an opt-out. We do not knowingly sell or share the personal information of anyone under 16.
International transfers
Some of our providers process information outside your country, including in the United States. Where the law requires it, these transfers rely on adequacy decisions (such as the EU-US Data Privacy Framework for certified companies, and the UK and Swiss equivalents), or on standard contractual clauses (including the UK Addendum and Brazil’s standard clauses) offered by the providers.
How long we keep it
- Published comments: while they are published, or until you ask us to delete them. Comments still awaiting moderation after 90 days and comments marked as spam after 7 days are deleted automatically; removed comments are emptied from the bin after 30 days.
- Comment moderation records (decision and a shortened, redacted excerpt; no names or e-mail addresses): 90 days.
- Contact messages: only as long as needed to handle your request and any follow-up.
- Reaction safeguards: up to 7 days. Rate-limit values for comments, the contact form and logins: up to 1 hour.
- Consent records: 2 years, then deleted. The consent cookie in your browser: 180 days, after which we ask again.
- Server access logs (shortened IP addresses): rotated automatically after a short period. Security log of administrator actions: 60 days.
- Analytics, if enabled: up to 14 months in Google Analytics, then deleted or kept only in aggregated form.
We may keep information longer when the law requires it or to deal with a dispute or legal claim.
Your rights
Depending on where you live, you can ask us for access to, a copy of, correction of or deletion of your personal information, ask us to restrict or stop using it, or to send it to you in a portable format. You can withdraw consent at any time, as easily as you gave it, without affecting what happened before. You can object at any time to uses based on our legitimate interests.
European Economic Area, United Kingdom and Switzerland: you can also complain to your data protection authority (in the EU, see the list of the European Data Protection Board; in the UK, the Information Commissioner’s Office; in Switzerland, the Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner). We would appreciate the chance to resolve your concern first.
California and other US states: you have the right to know what personal information we collect, use and disclose, to access, correct and delete it, to obtain a portable copy, to opt out of its sale, sharing or use for targeted advertising, and not to be discriminated against for using these rights. We do not collect sensitive personal information as defined by these laws. If we refuse a request, you can appeal by replying to our answer with “Appeal”; if the appeal is refused, you may contact your state Attorney General.
Canada and Quebec: you can access and correct your information, withdraw consent, and complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada or, in Quebec, the Commission d’accès à l’information.
Brazil: you have the rights in Article 18 of the LGPD, including confirmation, access, correction, anonymisation, portability, deletion and information about sharing, and you can complain to the ANPD.
To make a request, write to orbitalwire@proton.me or use the contact page (“Privacy / data request”). We may ask you to confirm your identity, for example by writing from the e-mail address you used to comment, and will answer within the time the law requires (usually one month, or 45 days under US state laws). You may use an authorised agent where the law allows it.
Categories of personal information (US state law notice)
In the last 12 months we have collected: identifiers (name, e-mail address and website you give us in comments or messages; a random consent ID; and, only with your consent, online identifiers set by analytics or advertising tools); internet activity (pages viewed and how they are read, only with your consent for analytics); approximate location derived from your IP address (only with your consent for analytics or advertising); and the content of your comments and messages. Sources: you, your browser, and (with consent) our analytics and advertising partners. Purposes and retention are described above. Categories of recipients: service providers, and with your consent analytics and advertising partners. Personal information “sold” or “shared”: online identifiers and internet activity, only to advertising and social media partners, only with your consent.
Children
This site is for a general adult audience and is not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 16 (or under 13 in the United States). If you believe a child has given us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.
Security
We protect personal information with encrypted connections, restricted administrator access with two-factor authentication, data minimisation and regular updates. No website is completely secure, so we cannot promise absolute security.
Other websites
Articles link to their sources and other websites, and share buttons open other services. They have their own privacy policies; we are not responsible for how they handle your information.
Changes to this policy
We update this policy when our practices change. The date at the top shows the latest version. If a change affects choices you made, we ask you again.