This page says what CocoaCivic records when you use it. It was written from the site's code. You do not need an account to use the site, and there are no accounts.
When you open pages and search
When you open many of the site's pages, and when you search, the site adds a line to a log on the project's computer. The line holds:
- the date and time;
- the page address and, for a search, the words you searched for;
- a shortened form of your internet (IP) address: the last of its four numbers is replaced by zero, so 203.0.113.45 is kept as 203.0.113.0 (for the longer IPv6 addresses, only the first three groups are kept);
- the description your browser sends of itself (its "user agent"), which usually names the browser and system;
- for some pages, how long the page took to prepare.
The server also keeps a technical log of errors and events. It can include the address of a page involved, and, when the site sends you an email or fails to, your email address.
When you ask the answer box a question, an AI model that runs on the project's own computer chooses which City records answer it; code, not the model, writes every sentence of the answer. Your question is not sent to any outside AI service. The site writes no separate log line for the question: the line above, made when the search page opens, is the record of the words you typed. The answer is kept in the computer's memory with the question's words, so that the same question can be answered again quickly; this holds for every way of asking in the answer box, including "Show all years". Saved answers are never written to disk. They are dropped when the records they were built from change, when a correction is approved or reversed, when the date changes and when the site restarts, and a saved answer does not record who asked. To keep the AI available to everyone, the site also counts, in memory only and for about ten minutes after an AI answer, how many AI answers each connection has asked for; the count is never written to disk. A sweep that runs about once a minute, whether or not anyone is asking, forgets the counts that have aged out and drops saved answers made before the records, the corrections or the date changed.
When you send something
- Feedback form. The site keeps what you send: the page it is about, the kind of note, your message, and your name and contact details if you give them. It also keeps the time and the same shortened form of your IP address as the log above. The full address is used only in the server's memory, to limit how many notes one connection can send, and is not written down.
- "Report a problem" on a transcript passage. The site keeps the recording, the passage, your description and the time. The report is stored without your IP address.
- Email alerts. You can ask for alerts about boards. If you sign up, the site keeps your email address, what you chose to follow and when you signed up. The link in an alert email stops alerts for that board only. The link in the confirmation email, and on the page shown after you confirm, removes your address and all your choices from the sign-up list. Neither erases the logs: the project also keeps a log of the alerts it sends or tries to send, with one line for each alert holding your address, the time and the outcome, and a note, kept under a code made from the address, of an address that was refused or switched off. The page-view log (above) also gets a line when you sign up, recording what you chose to follow and whether the confirmation email was sent, with the shortened IP address and browser description. Those lines stay until the project removes them. To have everything about you removed, the sign-up and these logs, write to hello@cocoacivic.org from the address concerned and ask for it. While email delivery is switched off, every message the site would send, confirmations and alerts alike, including your address, is saved as a file on the project's computer instead of being sent. Your email program's own unsubscribe button, where it shows one, does the same as the link in that same email. A reply to an unsubscribe request carries a link that removes your address and all your choices; an email that only asks to be unsubscribed changes nothing until that link is opened.
- Email. If you write to the project, your message and address are kept in its mailbox. The site also keeps a copy of the text on the project's computer: the sender and recipient addresses, the subject, the date and the message text, and only the names and sizes of any attachments. A language model that runs on the project's own computer reads each copy to sort it and to help prepare a reply; nothing is sent to an outside model service. Drafts of replies are kept there too. A reply is sent only after the project has approved it, and only once email delivery is switched on.
None of this is shown to other visitors.
Cookies and browser storage
The site sets no cookies. Some pages keep a short note in your browser's session storage, for example so that a page that could not load tries again only once. The browser clears session storage when you close the tab, and the note is not sent to the site.
No advertising, no outside analytics
The site shows no advertising. Its pages load no outside analytics or tracking scripts. The one outside program a page can run is YouTube's video player, described below.
Other companies involved
- Cloudflare carries the site's traffic between your browser and the project's computer. To do that it handles your full IP address and your requests, and it may set its own cookies. Cloudflare's privacy policy ↗ applies.
- YouTube. Pages that show a meeting's video have YouTube's player built in, loaded from youtube-nocookie.com. It is not click-to-load: when such a page opens, your browser connects to YouTube and runs YouTube's own scripts, whether or not you play the video. YouTube's own terms apply to that, and Google's privacy policy ↗ applies.
- Stripe processes contributions, on Stripe's own pages. This site never sees your card number. Stripe shares the details of your contribution needed to record it. Stripe's privacy policy ↗ applies.
How long records are kept
The logs, feedback notes, passage reports and the alert delivery log are kept until the project removes them. An alert sign-up is removed from the sign-up list as described under email alerts above; the logs stay. Copies of email sent to the project and the drafts of replies are kept the same way.
Contact
Questions about privacy, or a request about something you sent: hello@cocoacivic.org. See also the terms of use.