Independent Political Report is published by Outsider Media Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit working to increase public understanding of and participation in underrepresented political activity by the media and other organizations. This privacy policy explains what data we collect, how we use it, and your rights as a visitor, commenter, or subscriber to our journal at https://independentpoliticalreport.com.
Comments
When you leave a comment on the site, we collect the data from the form, including your alias, username, email address, and the comment itself. Additionally, we collect your IP address and browser user agent string for spam detection purposes.
If you have a Gravatar profile associated with your email address, an anonymized string (hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to check for its usage. You can learn more about Gravatar’s privacy policy at https://automattic.com/privacy/.
Moreover, we collect information about visitors who comment using our Akismet anti-spam service, which includes your IP address, user agent, referrer, and Site URL, among other details directly provided by the commenter.
Newsletter Subscribers
The site provides readers with the flexibility to engage with articles without needing a registered account. You are free to participate in conversations using only an alias and email of your choice, without the need to disclose further information or consent to the official newsletter.
If you subscribe to our weekly newsletter, we collect your name and email address using MailPoet, a tool that helps us manage voluntary email subscriptions. MailPoet may track basic engagement (such as open and click rates) to help us improve communication. Subscribers have the right to unsubscribe from our email content at any time. A link allowing you to do so will be provided at the bottom of each newsletter, and your name and email address will be removed from the newsletter list. For more information, see MailPoet’s privacy policy.
Neither the site nor Outsider Media Foundation will sell your personal information to external parties. Users can also manually subscribe to the same shared newsletter through the Outsider Media Foundation website. Please note that if you have a registered Independent Political Report member account, your information will continue to be associated with your account unless you adjust your user settings due to the site’s use of Gravatar.
Media
When uploading images to the website, please be mindful to avoid including embedded location data (EXIF GPS) in the images. Visitors to the website have the potential to download and extract any location data present in these images.
To safeguard the privacy and security of all users, we strongly recommend removing or disabling EXIF GPS data from any images before uploading them to the site. By doing so, you ensure that no sensitive location information is inadvertently disclosed to website visitors.
Cookies
When leaving a comment on our site, you have the option to save your name, email address, and website in cookies. These cookies are designed for your convenience, so you don’t need to re-enter your details when posting subsequent comments. The cookies will remain active for one year.
When you visit our login page, a temporary cookie is set to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is automatically discarded when you close your browser.
Upon logging in, several cookies are set up to save your login information and screen display preferences. Login cookies will be valid for two days, while screen options cookies will last for a year. By selecting “Remember Me,” your login will persist for two weeks. Logging out of your account will remove the login cookies.
If you are a contributor and edit or publish an article, an additional cookie with no personal data is saved in your browser. This cookie simply indicates the post ID of the article you recently edited and will expire after one day.
External embedded content
Articles on Independent Political Report may feature embedded content from other websites, such as videos, images, or articles. When you interact with embedded content, it behaves in the same way as if you visited the other website directly.
Please be aware that these external websites may collect data about you, utilize cookies, embed additional third-party tracking tools, and monitor your interactions with the embedded content. This includes tracking your activities on the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that specific external website. As these external websites operate independently from Independent Political Report, we advise you to review their respective privacy policies to understand how they handle your data and ensure your privacy preferences align with their practices. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of external websites.
Data sharing
If you request a password reset on Independent Political Report, your IP address will be included in the reset email for security purposes. This measure is implemented to verify the authenticity of the password reset request and to help ensure the protection of your account.
Data retention
When you leave a comment on Independent Political Report, both the comment and its associated metadata are stored indefinitely. This retention allows us to recognize and automatically approve any follow-up comments, streamlining the moderation process.
If you choose to register on our website, we will also store the personal information you provide in your user profile. All registered users have the ability to access, edit, or delete their personal information at any time, except for the username, which cannot be changed. Additionally, website administrators have access to view and edit user profile information to manage the site effectively. Independent Political Report will not distribute user data to individuals or organizations unless required to by law.
Your rights
If you have an account on Independent Political Report or have left comments on the site, you have the right to request an exported file containing the personal data we hold about you. This file will include any data you have provided to us during your interactions with the site. Additionally, you can request that we erase any personal data we hold about you, with the exception of data that we are obliged to retain for administrative, legal, or security purposes.
Where is your data sent
Visitor comments on Independent Political Report may be subject to automated checks through a spam detection service. This process helps maintain a clean and safe environment for all users and prevents the dissemination of unwanted or harmful content.