Privacy Policy

Last updated: 21 June 2026

This privacy policy explains what personal data garyjjspate.com (“this site,” “I,” “me,” or “my”) collects from visitors, why it’s collected, and how it’s used. This site is operated by Gary Spate, based in Kent, United Kingdom.

If you have any questions about this policy, you can contact me using the contact form on this site.

1. What Personal Data I Collect

Comments

When you leave a comment on this site, the data shown in the comment form is collected, along with your IP address and browser user agent string, to help with spam detection.

An anonymised string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to check whether you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available at: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Comments and their metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so I can recognise and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.

Contact Form

If you use the contact form on this site, I collect the information you provide — typically your name, email address, and message content. This information is used solely to respond to your enquiry and is not used for marketing purposes or shared with third parties, except as necessary to operate the form itself (see Third-Party Services, below).

Analytics

This site uses Google Analytics to understand how visitors use the site — for example, which pages are viewed, how long visitors stay, and what device or browser they’re using. Google Analytics collects data such as your IP address (which may be anonymised), approximate location, browser type, and pages visited.

This data is used in aggregate to help me improve the site’s content and performance. It is not used to identify you personally.

Cookies

This site may set cookies for the following purposes:

  • Comment cookies — if you leave a comment, you may opt in to saving your name, email address, and website in cookies, for your convenience so you don’t have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies last for one year.
  • Analytics cookies — Google Analytics sets cookies to distinguish unique visitors and track usage patterns, as described above.

You can control or delete cookies through your browser settings. Disabling cookies may affect how parts of the site function.

Embedded Content

Pages on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if you visited that other website directly. These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

2. Legal Basis for Processing (UK GDPR)

Where UK GDPR applies, the legal bases I rely on for processing personal data are:

  • Consent — for example, when you choose to leave a comment or submit the contact form.
  • Legitimate interests — for example, using analytics to understand and improve the site, and using spam-prevention tools to keep comments functional and free of abuse.

3. Third-Party Services

This site is built on WordPress and may use the following third-party services, each of which has its own privacy policy:

  • Google Analytics — for website usage analytics. Privacy policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy
  • Gravatar (Automattic) — for displaying commenter profile pictures. Privacy policy: https://automattic.com/privacy/
  • Akismet (Automattic), or a similar spam-filtering service, may be used to check comments against a global database to prevent spam. Privacy policy: https://automattic.com/privacy/
  • Hosting/WordPress infrastructure providers — depending on how the site is hosted, your data (such as IP address) may be processed by the hosting provider as part of normal website operation.

I don’t sell, rent, or trade your personal data to third parties for marketing purposes.

4. How Long I Keep Your Data

  • Contact form submissions are kept only as long as necessary to respond to and resolve your enquiry, after which they may be deleted periodically.
  • Comments and associated metadata are retained indefinitely, as described above.
  • Analytics data is retained according to Google Analytics’ default retention settings.

5. Your Rights

If you are in the UK or EU, under data protection law you have the right to:

  • Access the personal data I hold about you.
  • Request correction of inaccurate personal data.
  • Request erasure of your personal data (for example, you can ask for a comment to be deleted).
  • Object to or restrict certain processing, including analytics tracking.
  • Data portability, where applicable.

To exercise any of these rights, please get in touch via the contact form on this site.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the UK’s data protection regulator, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), at https://ico.org.uk/.

6. Data Security

I take reasonable steps to protect personal data collected through this site, including relying on WordPress’s built-in security practices and those of any third-party services used. However, no method of transmission over the internet or electronic storage is 100% secure, and I can’t guarantee absolute security.

7. Children’s Privacy

This site is not directed at children, and I do not knowingly collect personal data from children.

8. Changes to This Policy

I may update this privacy policy from time to time, for example to reflect changes in the tools or services this site uses. Any changes will be posted on this page with an updated “Last updated” date.

9. Contact

If you have questions about this privacy policy or how your data is handled, please get in touch via the contact form at garyjjspate.com.