What we collect, and what we don't

Who is responsible

This site is published by The Buy Note, based in Pakistan. For anything on this page, write to hello@thebuynote.com.

What this site collects

From reading, nothing that identifies you. There is no comment system and no newsletter database held on this site, and reading a page here does not create a record with your name on it. Creating a contributor account is the one thing that does — see If you create an account below.

• Server logs. Our hosting provider records ordinary technical information about each request — IP address, time, page, browser — for security and for keeping the site up. These are held briefly by the host and are not combined into a profile of you.
• Analytics. If a privacy-preserving analytics tool is switched on for this site, it counts page views without cookies and without tracking anybody between sites. It never records your address, your name or anything you typed.
• Outbound clicks. When you use a product link, the click is counted against the product and the position on the page. That count records the product, not the person.

If you create an account

Contributors can create an account to suggest products and to hold a tracking tag. Doing so stores, on this site’s own database: the name you give, your email address, a one-way bcrypt hash of your password (never the password itself), the role assigned to you, and the time you last signed in. Anything you submit through the account — product suggestions, and any affiliate links generated for you — is kept alongside it so the account can be administered.

Two limitations worth stating plainly, because they affect you: there is no email verification and no self-service password reset today. If you lose access, or you want the account and everything attached to it deleted, write to hello@thebuynote.com and it will be done.

To stop the sign-in and sign-up forms being hammered, the number of recent attempts from an address is counted for a short window. That counter expires automatically within the hour and is not used for anything else.

Cookies

This site sets no advertising cookies and no tracking cookies of its own. There is therefore no consent banner, because there is nothing to consent to. If that ever changes, a banner will appear before the cookie does — not after.

The one cookie this site does set is pp_admin_session, and only once you sign in. It keeps you signed in for seven days, is readable only by the server, and is not used to track you or to build a profile. Signing out clears it.

When you email us

Your address and your message sit in an ordinary mailbox so a reply can be written. They are not added to a mailing list, not passed to anyone and not used for anything else. Ask and the thread is deleted.

If you email to subscribe to the occasional update, your address is used only to send that update. Reply “stop” and it comes off the list the same day.

Amazon and other retailers

When you follow a product link you leave this site and arrive at Amazon, where their privacy policy and cookies apply, not ours. We have no access to your Amazon account, your basket, your order or your payment details — commission reporting tells us that a sale happened, never who made it.

The one thing worth knowing is what we deliberately do not send: this site sets a referrer policy that passes only the origin, so Amazon is not told which article you were reading when you clicked. Details of the commercial arrangement are on the affiliate disclosure page.

Fonts, images and embeds

The typeface is served from this site rather than from a font network, so no third party sees your visit through it. There are no social embeds, no comment widgets and no third-party video players on any page.

Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to ask what data is held about you, to have it corrected or deleted, to object to or restrict how it is used, and to be given a copy in a portable form. If you have never created an account, that usually amounts to asking for an email thread to be deleted; if you have, it covers the account and everything attached to it. Either way, write to hello@thebuynote.com and it will be done.

If you think your data has been handled wrongly and we have not put it right, you are entitled to complain to the data protection authority for the country you live in.

Children

This site is written for adults choosing things to buy and is not directed at children. No data is knowingly collected from anybody under 16.

Changes to this policy

If the site starts using anything new — an analytics tool, a mailing platform — this page is updated first, with the date at the top changed. There is no version of this policy that quietly permits more than it says.