Who we are

The Daily Automaton is published by Captivated Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales under company number 15936109, with its registered office at Electric Works, 3 Concourse Way, Sheffield, S1 2BJ, United Kingdom. We are the data controller for this site, which means we decide how and why your data is used, and we handle personal data in line with the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018. For anything in this policy, email [email protected].

The short version

  • You can read the whole paper without giving us any personal information.
  • There are no accounts, no sign-up, and no forms.
  • We run no analytics at all. We do not measure you, and we could not identify you if we wanted to.
  • The site itself stores nothing in your browser — no cookies, no local storage.
  • We do not sell your data, and we use no affiliate links.
  • We show advertising through Google AdSense, which does use cookies. In the UK, the European Economic Area and Switzerland we ask your consent first, and you can refuse.

What we collect

Nothing directly. There are no accounts and no forms, so there is no point at which you hand us anything. The pages are static files; light and dark are chosen by your own system setting, which your browser never sends to us.

Analytics

We do not use any. There is no analytics script on this site — not Google Analytics, not a privacy-friendly alternative, none. We have no dashboard of your behaviour because we collect nothing to put in one.

Hosting

The site is hosted on Cloudflare Pages and served through Cloudflare's global network. To deliver pages and protect the site from attack, Cloudflare processes limited technical information such as your IP address and browser type. SeeCloudflare's privacy policy.

Advertising and cookies

We use Google AdSense to show advertising, which helps cover hosting and the domain. To do that, Google may set cookies — small files stored in your browser — and use similar identifiers to serve adverts, measure whether they worked and, with your consent, personalise them. Those cookies are set by Google, not by us.

If you are in the UK, the EEA or Switzerland you will see a consent message the first time you visit, run through Google's certified consent management platform. You may consent, refuse, or choose exactly which purposes you allow. Refusing is as easy as accepting, and you can change your mind at any time.

You can also manage advertising directly with Google:

You can also block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The paper will read exactly the same, though you may still see adverts — just non-personalised ones.

Advertising is kept visibly separate from the reporting. It is labelled, ruled off, and never placed between an article and the sources that support it.

Our lawful bases

Under UK GDPR we need a lawful basis to process personal data. We rely on our legitimate interests to operate and secure the site and to serve it reliably through our hosting provider. For advertising cookies, and any personalised advertising shown to visitors in the UK, the EEA and Switzerland, we rely on your consent — given or refused through the consent message, and withdrawable at any time.

How long we keep your data

We hold no personal data about you, so there is nothing for us to keep. Our providers retain the limited technical data they process — Cloudflare's security logs, Google's advertising data — under their own retention practices, set out in the policies linked here.

Where your data goes

Google and Cloudflare are global companies, so processing may involve transfers outside the UK. Both operate under safeguards intended to protect data transferred internationally, described in their own policies above.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law you have the right to access personal data held about you, to have it corrected or erased, to restrict or object to its use, and to data portability. Because we hold none directly, most requests will concern our providers, and we will help you direct them appropriately.

If you have a concern, please contact us first so we can try to put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office atico.org.uk.

A note on the pictures and the bylines

Not a data matter, but it belongs somewhere findable. Our illustrations are generated with an AI image model and labelled as illustrations; our correspondents are personas rather than people. The reporting beneath them is real and cited. The About page explains all of this properly.

Changes

We may update this policy as the site grows. When we do, the date at the top of this page changes.

Contact

Questions about this policy or your data? Email[email protected].

This policy is governed by the laws of England and Wales.