Privacy

Very little is collected, and this page lists all of it: what this site keeps, and what Google Analytics and Google AdSense, which run on every page, see.

If you never sign in

This site keeps nothing about you: no account, and no record on its own servers of the pages you read. Google Analytics does count your visit unless you turn it off, and Google AdSense loads the first time you touch the page, click, type or move the mouse; both are described below.

Your browser keeps three small things of its own, and none of them leaves your device: whether you last used the flat map or the globe, your answer to the privacy choices, and, until you close the tab, where you were on the atlas, so the way back from a life returns you there. Those live in your browser's own storage and are readable only by this site, on your machine.

If you do sign in

An account exists so that saved items and corrections have an owner. What is kept is the whole of it:

• Your email address, and a display name if the provider gave one. Google also gives the address of your profile picture, and it is kept with the name.
• How you signed in — Google, an emailed link or a password — as the provider's own identifier for you. Readers are not offered passwords; an account that has one keeps it only as a one-way hash, from which the password cannot be read back. Signing in with Google also keeps the sign-in tokens Google issues; nothing here uses them.
• A sign-in or password-reset link you asked for, until it is used or expires 15 minutes later.
• Your session: the token your session cookie carries, when it was made and when it runs out, and the IP address and browser it was made from.
• What you saved — the addresses of the lives and moments you starred, and when.
• Corrections you sent, with what you wrote and what became of them.
• Full access, if you bought it: Stripe's reference for the payment, the amount, when it was paid, and when it was refunded or disputed if it was. Your card never reaches this site; Stripe takes it on its own page.
• Your connected apps, such as Claude: which app, what you approved and when, and the tokens it was given. Removing an app on your Account page ends its access at once.
• What your apps ask: each call an app you connected makes to the atlas's tools — when, which app, which tool, what it asked, and how many results came back, or why it was refused. It is kept with your account for a year, and after that only as daily totals that name nobody.

This site's own servers keep no referrers, no page views and no profile of the pages you looked at, and keep your IP address and browser only on your session. Counting visits is Google Analytics' job, described next.

Analytics and advertising

Google Analytics counts visits to every page: which pages are read, roughly where from, and on what kind of device. To do that it sets cookies (below), and Google receives your IP address and browser details. It runs unless you turn it off: the banner on your first visit asks, and Privacy settings at the foot of every page changes your answer at any time. Turning it off stops it and removes its cookies.

Calls from your apps are counted in Google Analytics too, sent from this site's server rather than your browser, so Google sees neither your IP address nor your browser for them. Each says which tool was used, what kind of answer it asked for, free or full access, whether it was refused, how many people came back, how long it took, and the place and role it asked about. You appear there only as a code made from your account that Google cannot turn back into it. The words an app searched for, a point on the map, dates, the app and your email address are never sent. Privacy settings covers your browser, not these.

Google AdSense, Google's advertising service, is loaded on every page the first time you touch it, click, type or move the mouse there. Google and its partners may use cookies to show ads, including ads based on your earlier visits to this and other sites. You can turn off personalised ads at Google's Ad Settings, and read how Google uses information from sites like this one at policies.google.com.

Cookies

Your session is one cookie, atlas.session_token (on this site's secure address the browser shows it as __Secure-atlas.session_token). It is set when you sign in, lasts a week and is renewed while you keep using the site, and is cleared when you sign out. Signing in through Google sets atlas.state to carry the request safely out and back; it lasts five minutes. atlas_last_login remembers whether you last used Google or an emailed link, so the sign-in page can suggest it, and holds only that. Google Analytics sets _ga and _ga_PKK3HTRQTV, which last up to two years and tell one visit from the next; turning analytics off in Privacy settings removes them. Google AdSense may set cookies of its own, such as __gads and __gpi.

Who else sees anything

Sign-in goes to Google if you choose it, and an emailed link goes through a mail provider; each sees what it needs to do that job and no more. Buying full access goes to Stripe, which is given your email address and an account number of ours to tie the payment to you. An app you connect is given the answers to what it asks, and the name and email address on your account if it asks for them. Google sees what Analytics and AdSense collect, as described above. Nothing about you is sold or rented, and your email address and account are never given to Google Analytics or AdSense.

Deleting it

Ask, through the correction link on any card, and the account and everything attached to it goes. Signing out ends the session immediately.

Changes

If what is collected changes, this page changes with it. It is written from the actual shape of the database rather than from a template, so it can be checked against what the software does. Last changed on 29 October 2026, when analytics, advertising, passwords and the counting of app calls were added.