What this site collects, which is very little

The short version

There is not one box on this site you can type into. No account, no sign-up, no newsletter, no comment thread, no quote request. A name, an email address, a phone number or a card number cannot be collected here for a simple mechanical reason: nothing on this domain would have anywhere to put one if you offered it.

What the server sees

This site is served as plain files. The web server that delivers them keeps ordinary access logs — the requesting IP address, the page requested, the time, and the browser's user-agent string — because a server that keeps no logs cannot be defended against abuse. Those logs are not joined to anything else and are not used to build a profile of you.

Cookies

The only cookies this domain writes are Google Analytics 4's _ga and _ga_<ID>: first-party, lasting up to 2 years, and set only after analytics is allowed. There is no advertising network here and no cross-site pixel.

Analytics

Switchyard uses Google Analytics 4, provided by Google LLC and Google Ireland Ltd., to see which pages people read. It collects the pages viewed, the referring site, approximate location at city or country level, device and browser type, and session timing. Google Analytics 4 does not log or store IP addresses.

Google's advertising features, Google signals and ad personalisation are off. The data is not used for advertising, and it is not sold.

If you are in the EEA, the UK or Switzerland, a banner asks before anything is measured, and nothing is sent to Google unless you click Accept. Elsewhere analytics is on by default, and you can switch it off at any time. If your browser sends the Global Privacy Control signal, Switchyard treats you as opted out. Your choice is kept in your browser's local storage, under the key analytics-consent, and not in a cookie. Cookie settings brings the banner back so you can change it.

Google sets out what it does with this data in its privacy policy. To block Google Analytics on every site, Google offers an opt-out browser add-on.

Links that go somewhere else

Some links on this site lead to CRM vendors, and some of those are partner links that pass through a /go/ address on this domain before continuing. That redirect exists so that a tracking URL never has to be pasted into an article; it is what tells a vendor's programme that a visit came from here. Once you arrive at a vendor's site you are on their property and their privacy policy applies, not this one. How the arrangement works is written out in full.

Who to write to

Questions about this page go to [email protected]. If you are in a jurisdiction that gives you rights over data held about you, the honest answer is that this site holds almost none: there is no account record to export and no marketing list to remove you from, because neither exists.

Changes

If this page changes, the change will be dated on the page. It will not change quietly, and a mailing list will not appear on this site without this page saying so first.