Cookies & privacy
Short version: no adverts, no tracking cookies, and nothing from Facebook or YouTube unless you ask for it.
Cookies this site sets
- Contact form: a temporary session cookie while you use the contact form, to protect it from spam robots. It is deleted when you close your browser.
- Your cookie choice: your answer to the cookie banner is remembered in your browser’s local storage so you aren’t asked on every page. It never leaves your device.
- Your trip, visits and light/dark choice: the trip planner, the “I’ve been here” list and your light/dark setting are also kept in your browser’s local storage. They are never sent to this website or anyone else, and clearing your browser’s data for this site removes them (use “Back up” on the My trip page first).
- Offline copies: if your browser supports it, pages and photos you view are saved on your device so they still open without a signal. This is ordinary browser storage and contains nothing about you.
There are no adverts on this site, and no Google Analytics or other third-party tracking.
Visitor numbers
So I can see which churches people look at and how they find the site, this website counts visits itself, on its own server, without cookies and without storing anything on your device. For each page it records the page, the website or search engine that sent you there, the type of device and browser, and the town and country your internet address points to (looked up on the server using IP Geolocation by DB-IP). Your IP address is not stored. Instead the server keeps a scrambled code made from it that changes every day and can’t be turned back into the address, so a visit can be counted once a day but you can’t be followed from day to day or identified. These records are only used for the site’s own visitor figures, are never shared, and are deleted after 25 months.
Third-party content
- Facebook: the home page can show the Essex Churches Facebook feed. It is provided by Facebook, which may set its own cookies, so it only loads if you choose “Allow Facebook”.
- Maps: map tiles come from OpenStreetMap (and Esri, if you switch to aerial photos). Your browser requests the tiles directly from them, so they see your IP address, as with any website. They set no cookies.
- Near me: your location is only used if you press “Near me”, and only inside your browser to sort churches by distance. It is never sent to this website.
- YouTube: where a church has a video, nothing loads from YouTube until you press play, and it then plays in YouTube’s privacy-enhanced mode.
- Directions links open Google Maps, which you can choose not to use.
- Buy Me a Coffee is an ordinary link; nothing is loaded from them unless you click it.
Messages you send
If you use the contact form, your name, email address and message are emailed to me so I can reply. They are not stored on the website, and are never shared or used for marketing.