This policy explains what personal data Less Plastic collects, why we collect it, who else receives it, and what you can ask us to do with it. Less Plastic is a non-commercial site: we do not sell your data, and we do not use it for advertising or profiling.
1. Data You Give Us
You can browse the whole site without an account. If you create one, we store:
- Your username and email address.
- Your password, stored only as a cryptographic hash. We never see or store the password itself. Accounts created through a sign-in button have no password at all.
- Optional profile settings: profile picture, preferred country and language, and whether you want to be notified about comments and replies.
- Content you submit: products, blog posts, comments, ratings and favourites, together with the account that submitted them.
2. Data Collected Automatically
- Your approximate country, determined from your IP address so the site can show the right regional content and language. This lookup runs on our own server against a local database — your IP address is not sent to any third party for this purpose, and we do not store it as part of your profile.
- Standard server logs kept for security and troubleshooting.
3. Signing In With Google, Microsoft or Amazon
You may sign in using a Google, Microsoft or Amazon account instead of a password. When you do, that provider asks for your permission and then sends us a limited set of information — your name, your email address, a profile picture where one is available, and a permanent identifier for your account at that provider.
We store that information and link it to your Less Plastic account, so that the same button signs you into the same account next time. If the email address matches an account you already had here, we connect the two rather than creating a duplicate.
We do not keep the access tokens the provider issues. We use them once to complete the sign-in and then discard them, which means we cannot read your mail, contacts, files or anything else in your account at that provider — only the sign-in details listed above.
What the provider records about the sign-in is governed by that provider's own privacy policy:
To disconnect a provider from your Less Plastic account, or to remove the account entirely, write to us at the address in section 9. Set a password in your settings first if you want to keep signing in.
4. Cookies
We use a small number of cookies:
- Essential cookies that keep you signed in, remember your country and language, protect forms against cross-site request forgery, and record your cookie choices. The site cannot work without these.
- Analytics cookies, which are set only if you accept them in the cookie banner. Declining costs you nothing on this site.
You can change your choice at any time on the cookie settings page — withdrawing consent is as easy as giving it.
5. Who Else Receives Your Data
We share data only with the services needed to run the site:
- Brevo — sends our account emails, such as confirmation and password reset messages. It receives your email address.
- Google, Microsoft and Amazon — only if you choose to sign in with one of them, as described in section 3.
- Google reCAPTCHA — protects the registration form from automated abuse. It receives technical data about your browser and interaction.
- Google Analytics — measures site usage, and only if you accept analytics cookies.
- Google Web Risk — checks product links submitted by users against a list of known harmful sites. It receives the submitted link, not your personal data.
- Railway — hosts the site and its database.
Some of these providers are based outside the European Economic Area, so your data may be transferred there under the safeguards those providers offer. We do not sell your data or pass it to advertisers.
6. Why We Are Allowed to Process It
- To provide an account you asked for, and the features that come with it.
- With your consent, for analytics cookies — which you may withdraw at any time.
- For our legitimate interest in keeping the site secure and free of spam and abuse.
7. How Long We Keep It
Account data is kept for as long as your account exists. If you ask us to delete your account, we remove your personal data. Content you published may remain on the site with the author removed, so that discussions stay readable; tell us if you want it taken down as well. Server logs are kept only as long as they are useful for security and troubleshooting.
8. Your Rights
If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, you have the right to ask us for a copy of your data, to correct it, to delete it, to restrict or object to how we use it, and to receive it in a portable format. Where we rely on your consent, you may withdraw it at any time. You may also complain to your national data protection authority.
Write to the address below and we will respond within one month.
9. Contact
For any question about this policy or to exercise the rights above, contact us at:
lessplasticonlywaytogo@gmail.com
10. Children
This site is not directed at children, and we do not knowingly collect data from anyone under 16. If you believe a child has given us personal data, contact us and we will delete it.
11. Changes to This Policy
We may update this policy as the site changes. Updates are posted on this page with a new date at the top. If a change materially affects how we use your data, we will make that clear rather than relying on the date alone.