Privacy
Privacy policy
Hurricanes Mapped has no accounts, no ads and no tracking cookies. We count visits with our own privacy-friendly analytics, and you can opt out anytime. The site works exactly the same either way.
Last updated:
Who is responsible
This site is operated by Hurricanes Mapped, the controller of the personal data described here. Questions about privacy or your data? Email info@hurricanesmapped.com.
Analytics
We use Umami, an open-source analytics tool that we run ourselves. It records the pages you view, the page that referred you, and some interactions such as selecting a storm, playing the timeline, changing a filter, sharing or downloading, opening official forecast or source links, and how many unread updates the Activity link showed. It also records your browser, operating system, device type, screen size, language and country. We don’t record search text or what you copy.
Umami does not set cookies. It briefly uses your IP address to estimate your country and to build a session identifier, then discards the address without storing it. The result is pseudonymous: we can’t see who you are. The data is used only to understand how the site is used and what to improve. It is never sold. We keep it for 25 months.
Our legal basis is our legitimate interest in understanding how the site is used so we can improve it (GDPR Article 6(1)(f)). Because the data is minimal and pseudonymous, we believe this doesn’t override your interests, but you have the right to object (GDPR Article 21).
How to opt out
Use the button below, or “Opt out of analytics” at the bottom of any page. It takes effect immediately and is remembered in this browser; you can opt back in the same way. If your browser sends Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control, we treat that as an opt-out and never load analytics.
This control needs JavaScript. Without JavaScript, analytics doesn’t run.
What is stored in your browser
The site keeps a few small settings in your browser’s local storage:
- whether you opted out of analytics;
- your preferred units;
- when you last opened the activity log, so new events can be marked as unread.
These settings stay on your device. The only exception is that, unless you opted out, the number of unread updates shown on the Activity link is included in analytics when you click it. Clearing your browser’s site data removes them.
Hosting
The site is hosted on Cloudflare Pages. Like any web host, Cloudflare processes standard request information, such as your IP address and browser, to deliver pages and protect the site from abuse. Our legal basis is our legitimate interest in running a secure, working website (GDPR Article 6(1)(f)). Cloudflare’s own analytics and tag tools are switched off for this site. See Cloudflare’s privacy policy for how long it keeps these logs.
Maps, storm data, fonts and images are served from our own domain; the site loads no third-party advertising or social media scripts. Links to outside sites, such as NOAA, NHC, JTWC or Wikipedia, follow those sites’ own policies once you open them.
If you email us, we receive your address and message through our email provider and use them only to reply, based on our legitimate interest in answering you (GDPR Article 6(1)(f)). We keep emails only as long as needed to handle your message.
Who receives your data
- Cloudflare, which hosts the website;
- our email provider, for messages you send us.
Cloudflare is based in the United States, so data it processes may be transferred outside the EU. Those transfers are protected by the EU-US Data Privacy Framework and the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses.
Your rights
You have the usual GDPR rights: to access, correct or delete your data, to restrict or object to its use, and to get a portable copy. For emails you send us, we can act on all of these. Analytics data can’t be linked to any individual, so we can’t find, show or delete analytics records for any one person (GDPR Article 11). Guessing which records are yours could mean showing you, or deleting, someone else’s data.
You can always object to analytics by opting out as described above, and you can complain to the Finnish Data Protection Ombudsman. Just email us if you want to use any of your rights.