The bit where we tell you what we know.

Who’s asking?

Ancient Geekery (“we”, “us”) is a personal publication operated from the United Kingdom by the author trading as Ancient Geekery. For data protection purposes we are the data controller for any personal data you give us through this site.

Questions, complaints, or requests: tech@ancientgeekery.com.

The law we’re working under

UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018, and the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR). If you’re in the EEA, the EU GDPR applies as well.

What we collect, and why

1. Newsletter sign-ups

If you subscribe to the Dispatch, we collect your email address and the date you signed up. We use it to send you the newsletter. That’s the entire deal.

• Lawful basis: consent (UK GDPR Art. 6(1)(a)) and PECR for marketing email.
• Retention: until you unsubscribe, plus a short suppression record so we don’t accidentally email you again.

2. Anything you email us

If you write to tech@ancientgeekery.comwe keep the message so we can reply and refer back to it.

• Lawful basis: legitimate interests (responding to you) and, where relevant, taking steps to enter a contract.
• Retention: 24 months after the last reply, unless it relates to an ongoing matter.

3. Server logs

Our hosting provider records standard request logs — IP address, timestamp, URL, user agent, referrer — for security, abuse prevention and debugging.

• Lawful basis: legitimate interests in keeping the site up and unattacked.
• Retention: typically 30 days.

4. Analytics

We use privacy-respecting, aggregate analytics that do not set tracking cookies and do not build a profile of you across sites. See the Cookie Policy for the current set-up.

What we do not do

• We do not sell your data. There’s no auction. There is no “data partner.”
• We do not run ad-tech, re-targeting pixels, or third-party fingerprinting.
• We do not use your email to train an AI model. Yours, ours, or anyone else’s.

Who we share it with

Only the processors that make the site work, under written contracts that meet UK GDPR Article 28:

• Hosting & backend: our cloud host (data stored in the EU/UK where possible).
• Email delivery: the transactional/newsletter provider that actually pushes the email into your inbox.
• Search Console & sitemap tooling: Google, for indexing diagnostics — no personal data is sent beyond standard request metadata.

Where a processor is outside the UK, transfers rely on the UK International Data Transfer Agreement, the UK Addendum to the EU SCCs, or an adequacy decision.

Your rights

Under UK GDPR you can ask us to:

• confirm what we hold about you and give you a copy (access);
• correct anything that’s wrong (rectification);
• delete it (erasure / “right to be forgotten”);
• restrict or object to processing;
• port your data to another service;
• withdraw consent at any time, without affecting prior processing.

Email tech@ancientgeekery.com and we’ll respond within one calendar month. It’s free unless the request is manifestly unfounded or excessive, in which case we’ll tell you before charging anything.

Complaining to the regulator

If we’ve made a hash of it, you can complain to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office: ico.org.uk or 0303 123 1113. We’d rather you came to us first, but you’re not obliged to.

Children

This site is not aimed at anyone under 16 and we do not knowingly collect their data. If you think we have, tell us and we’ll delete it.

Changes to this policy

When the policy changes materially we’ll update the date at the top and, if you’re a subscriber, mention it in the Dispatch. We don’t do silent re-writes.