Privacy Policy — Ancestor Assist

Scope

This policy covers the Ancestor Assist website at ancestorassist.com. Any other products or services offered by Ancestor Assist carry their own privacy policy.

Overview

The Ancestor Assist website provides genealogy calculators and printable research forms. It has no accounts and no login, and nothing on it has to be filled in before it can be used. The one thing it would ever ask for is an email address, and only if you choose to join the update list. This policy explains what is collected when you visit, and what is not.

What the tools do with what you enter

The calculators run entirely in the browser. Dates, ages, and names entered into them are processed on the device and are never transmitted to Ancestor Assist or to anyone else.

The fillable forms work the same way. A form is filled in on the device, and printed or saved from there. Nothing typed into a form is sent anywhere.

The site itself keeps some settings in the browser. They are stored on the device, are never sent anywhere, and can be cleared at any time with the browser's usual controls for site data.

Information collected

Automatically — Standard technical data is collected by the site's hosting and security provider (Cloudflare) for performance, security, and abuse prevention. The same provider also measures how quickly each page loads and how steadily it draws, and reports those timings with the page's address, the referring site, and the browser type. Ancestor Assist has access to the provider's reports — mostly totals, such as visits by page, referring site, browser, operating system, and country, and load times — and builds no profile from them. None of this includes a name, an email address, or anything typed into the site. The measurement stores nothing on the device and sets no cookie.

By email — Correspondence sent to the contact address is retained in order to reply to it.

If you join the update list — The email address you give, and nothing else. See below.

That is the whole of it.

The update list

Joining the Ancestor Assist update list is entirely optional — the site works the same either way — and the only thing collected is the email address itself.

An address on the list is used for updates about the site and about new software, and for nothing else. It is never sold, never rented, and never shared with advertisers or anyone else. No one is told whether a message was opened.

Addresses are held by Ancestor Assist and by the service used to store and send the mail, which may change over time. An address stays on the list until you ask to be taken off, and is removed from it after that.

Links to other sites

Some pages link to other websites. Those sites are outside Ancestor Assist's control, and what they collect is governed by their own privacy policies. Ancestor Assist sends nothing to the sites it links to.

Cookies and advertising

Advertising is served by Google AdSense on some pages. Ancestor Assist provides the space; the ads themselves, and any cookies or identifiers used to select them, are Google's, and Google's use of them is described in its own policies. Personalized advertising can be turned off at Google Ads Settings or the Digital Advertising Alliance opt-out page.

Ancestor Assist sets no cookies of its own. Google's advertising code can also keep information in the browser's storage for this site, as it does with cookies; that information is Google's, and is covered by Google's policies.

Those opt-out pages, like any other site linked from here, are outside Ancestor Assist's control, and their own privacy practices are their own.

Children's privacy

This site is not directed at children under 13, and does not knowingly collect personal information from children. The update list would be the only place the site asks for anything at all, and it is not intended for them.

Data security

The site is served over HTTPS, and plain HTTP requests are redirected to it. The strongest protection it offers, though, is that there is very little to protect: no accounts and nothing entered into a calculator or a form leaving the device. An address on the update list would be the only personal information held at all, and that is one line per person.

Changes to this policy

This policy may be updated. The "Last updated" date above reflects the most recent revision.

Contact

Questions about this policy can be sent to contact@ancestorassist.com.

What this website collects, what it does not, and how advertising works