Legal
Privacy policy
In short: we collect the minimum, we sell you to no one, and we delete everything on request. Below is the same at length.
Questions about your data, corrections or deletion — write to us.
Write to us →This policy concerns the personal account. Reading the site, using the reference and searching the corpus require no registration — in that case we collect nothing about you beyond anonymous statistics.
Who is responsible for your data
Knyha Rodu is part of the Chronicle of Horodkivka, a non-commercial local-history project covering the Horodkivka community, Tulchyn district, Vinnytsia region, Ukraine.
Questions, complaints and requests regarding your data: [email protected], Telegram @SERGIUSH.
What we collect
When you create an account
- Email address — to recognise you at sign-in and send confirmations
- Name — optional, only so we can address you
- Password — stored as a cryptographic hash (Argon2id); the password cannot be recovered from it
- Date the account was created
When you sign in with Google
Google passes us your identifier, email address and name. We store only the identifier and the email. We do not store your profile photo and request access to nothing else in your Google account.
When you use the account
- Surnames and villages you follow — so we can tell you when matching records appear
- Corrections you send — the text and a contact, if you leave one
- Line readings you correct — your text for the fragment, the machine reading of the same place, the outline coordinates on the scan, and how many seconds the field was open. The last is for one purpose only: to know how much work a line costs. It is never shown to you and is not a score. No signature is attached unless you turn that on in your profile
- Session technical data — IP address and browser type, so you can end a session left open on someone else's device
- Which scans you downloaded — the case reference and sheet number, without your address and without the image itself. It serves one purpose: the project has a finite monthly storage budget, and the daily allowance for downloading originals is counted from this record. Opening the same sheet again costs nothing against the allowance — which is precisely why we have to remember what you already took
What we never collect: payment data (the project is free), health data, precise location, contacts from your address book. We use no advertising trackers and pass nothing to ad networks.
Why, and on what legal basis
| Data | Purpose | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Email, password, Google identifier | Signing in and protecting the account | Performance of a contract |
| Followed surnames | A digest about new records — no more than once a month | Your consent: you added a surname where we said we would write |
| Corrections to documents | Fixing readings in the corpus | Legitimate interest: accuracy of historical data |
| Session IP and browser | Account security, abuse prevention | Legitimate interest: security |
| Sheets downloaded (case and number) | Daily download allowance: storage budget is finite | Legitimate interest: keeping the service running |
How long we keep it
- Account data — as long as the account exists. Delete the account, and the data goes with it
- Sessions — 30 days from the last sign-in, then automatically
- One-time links (email confirmation, password reset) — 1 hour
- IP addresses in server logs — no longer than 30 days
- Corrections you sent — retained, as they become part of the research; on request we anonymise them by removing your contact
- Line readings you corrected — retained for the same reason: the corrected text becomes part of the corpus and is used to train the handwriting-reading programs. Deleting your account removes the signature and the link to you; the text itself stays
- Records of downloaded sheets — as long as the account exists; deleted with it
Who we share with
No one, beyond four technical providers without which the site cannot run:
- Google (sign-in) — only if you choose to sign in with Google; the fact of signing in is passed
- Google Analytics — anonymised visit statistics (how many people come, from where, to which pages); it never sees your email or other account data and is not linked to your account
- An email service — to deliver your confirmation message and the digest about the surnames you follow
- Cloudflare — protects the site from attacks; sees technical connection data
We do not sell your data or pass it on for advertising. Visit statistics are seen only by Google Analytics — without your name, email or any other account data.
Inside the project, one person has access to this data — the author of the Book of Kin. They see the list of accounts (email, sign-up date, how many bookmarks and surnames were added) and the messages sent through the site. This is needed to answer letters and to raise the daily scan allowance for those who ask.
Your rights
You may exercise them at any time — in your account or by writing to [email protected]. We reply within one month.
- See what data we hold about you
- Take it with you — the export button hands you everything as a JSON file
- Correct inaccuracies
- Delete the account — a button in the account, together with all followed surnames and sessions. This is final and cannot be undone
- Withdraw consent to the digest — a button in every letter or in the “My surnames” section. Sign-in and password-reset messages keep coming: without them you cannot get into your account
- Lodge a complaint with a data protection authority if you believe we have breached your rights
Cookies
There are three cookies on this site:
- Session cookie — appears only after you sign in and keeps you signed in. Protected with the
HttpOnlyandSecureflags: JavaScript cannot read it, and it travels only over an encrypted connection - Theme choice (light or dark) — kept in your browser and never sent to the server at all
- Google Analytics (
_ga,_ga_*) — counts visits: how many people come, from where, to which pages. Set even without registering, not linked to your account, and does not show us who you are. You can opt out with the Google Analytics Opt-out browser extension or by blocking third-party tracking in your browser
There are no advertising cookies on this site — we use Google Analytics only for our own visit statistics, not for advertising.
Children
The account is not intended for anyone under 16. We do not knowingly collect their data.
Changes
If this policy changes substantially, we will notify account holders by email. The date of the last update is at the foot of the page.