Your privacy matters to us, and this policy explains it in plain English. The Canary Guide (canaryguide.info) is a free, advertising-supported travel guide. This page sets out what data is collected when you visit, the cookies we use, how you stay in control, and how to get in touch with any questions. We've tried to keep it clear and jargon-free.

In short: we don't ask you to create an account or hand over personal details to read the site, we don't sell your data, and no analytics or advertising cookies are set until you agree to them via our cookie banner.

Consent comes first (Consent Mode v2)

When you first visit, you'll see a cookie banner. Until you make a choice, everything non-essential is switched off by default — this is Google's Consent Mode v2 with all storage denied until you consent. We only set analytics and advertising cookies after you select "Accept all". If you don't consent, the guide still works normally; you simply won't be tracked.

You can change your mind at any time. There's a "Cookie settings" link in the footer of every page — click it to reopen the banner and update or withdraw your choice whenever you like.

Analytics (Google Analytics 4)

If you consent, we use Google Analytics 4 to understand, in aggregate, how the site is used — which pages are popular, roughly where visitors come from, and whether things are working — so we can improve the guide. We run it in anonymised form (IP addresses are truncated/anonymised), and we look at trends across many visitors, not individuals. Analytics cookies remember basic, non-identifying information such as a randomised visitor ID and which pages you viewed. We do not use this data to identify you personally.

Advertising (Google AdSense)

The guide is free because it carries advertising through Google AdSense. If you consent, advertising cookies may be used to show ads and, where enabled, to make them more relevant and to measure their performance and limit how often you see the same ad. If you don't consent to advertising cookies, you may still see ads, but they will be non-personalised. Advertising is what keeps The Canary Guide open and free for everyone to read.

Third parties (Google)

Both Analytics and AdSense are provided by Google, which acts as a third party and processes data under its own privacy terms. When these services are active, some information (such as your device type, browser and truncated IP) is handled by Google. You can read how Google uses data on its own "How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services" and privacy pages, and you can manage your Google ad preferences in your Google account. Aside from these standard Google services, we don't share your browsing data with other advertisers.

What we don't do

Essential cookies

A small number of strictly necessary items may be stored regardless of consent — for example, a record of your cookie choice itself, so the banner doesn't reappear on every page. These don't track you and are needed for the site to function and to honour your preferences.

Your rights and legal basis (EU/GDPR)

For visitors in the EU/EEA and the UK, our legal basis for setting analytics and advertising cookies is your consent, which you give through the cookie banner and can withdraw at any time via the footer "Cookie settings" link. Depending on where you live, you may also have rights to access, correct or delete personal data, or to object to certain processing. Because we collect very little and don't hold accounts, there is usually little personal data to act on, but we'll always help where we can.

Contact us about your data

If you have any question about privacy, cookies or your data, email us at hello@canaryguide.info and we'll do our best to help. For anything else, see our contact page.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time as our tools or the law change. Any updates will appear on this page, so it's worth a quick look if you want the current position. This is a plain-English summary written to be genuinely useful; it isn't legal advice.