What personal data we collect and why we collect it
Comments
When visitors leave comments on the site we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.
An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.
Contact forms
When visitors submit a contact form on the site we collect the data shown in the “Contact Us” form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection. This data may be stored in a secure database for no longer than one year.
A service provided by Google, called reCAPTCHA, is used to prevent spam form submissions. You may view Google’s privacy policy here: https://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/.
Cookies
If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name and email address in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.
If you have an account and you log in to this site, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.
When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.
If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day.
Analytics
We collect analytics on this site to be able to view how users interact with the site; this allows us to improve the experience for visitors of the site. We may store IP addresses as a unique hash in a database to view which pages a single visitor views. The IP address hash cannot be used by others to find a visitors real IP address. Location data may be gathered from the visitors IP address.
Logs
All actions regarding signing in, and user accounts will be recorded into a log. Actions that are logged are the following – failed/successful login attempts, creating/updating posts and pages, changes in any WordPress and WordPress plugin configuration files, and activating/installing/updating/removing WordPress plugins and themes. The previously mentioned logs will be kept for 120 days at most. Repeat failed login attempts may result in the source IP address being stored in firewall configuration indefinitely.
How long we retain your data
If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.
For users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.
Data submitted through a contact form will be stored in a data base either for a year, or when it is no longer relevant to the site administrators (whichever comes first).
Analytics data on any user that visits this site will be deleted after one year.
What rights you have over your data
If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal or analytics data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.
Where you can contact us
If you have any questions or concerns regarding our privacy policy please submit a contact form or email us here: privacy@chriswhitfield.com. All requests regarding the privacy policy are handled by chriswhitfield.com, the designer and host of this site.