Privacy

What this project collects — and what it doesn't

There's no legal team behind this — it's built and run by one person. So instead of boilerplate, here's a direct explanation of what data this project touches, and what it deliberately never does.

If you follow this on Telegram

Joining the Telegram channel is a normal Telegram subscription — the same relationship you'd have with any public channel. As the channel's admin, I can see who's subscribed; that's standard Telegram functionality, not something built for this project, and not something I can turn off. Other subscribers can't see each other, and the subscriber list is never exported, stored elsewhere, sold, or shared beyond what Telegram itself already provides to any channel owner. To stop, just leave or mute the channel in Telegram — there's nothing stored outside Telegram to separately delete.

If you follow this on Mastodon

Following the Mastodon account is a normal Mastodon follow — the same relationship you'd have with any public account. As the account owner, I can see who's following; that's standard Mastodon functionality, not something built for this project, and not something I can turn off. The follower list is never exported, stored elsewhere, sold, or shared beyond what Mastodon itself already provides to any account owner. Which server hosts your Mastodon account is your own choice, not this project's, and is covered by that server's own privacy policy. To stop, just unfollow — there's nothing stored outside Mastodon to separately delete.

If you use browser push alerts

Clicking "Enable Browser Alerts" creates an anonymous subscription: a randomly-issued web address and an encryption key, generated by your own browser (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, etc.) — not by this project. It carries no name, email, or account of any kind attached; there is no way for this project to identify who's behind any given subscription.

That subscription is stored in a small database (Upstash Redis, reached through Vercel) for exactly one reason: knowing where to deliver a notification. It's deleted automatically — whichever happens first: a delivery to it fails permanently (browser uninstalled, permission revoked, device gone), or it simply turns a year old, whether or not it's still working. Nothing is kept indefinitely. To stop receiving alerts sooner, disable notifications for the site in your browser's own settings; the subscription becomes invalid on our end and gets cleaned up automatically the same way.

The project's operator can also see how many subscriptions are currently stored, and clear them, through a password-protected admin page — no additional identifying detail is exposed there beyond what's already described on this page.

One more thing happens at the moment you subscribe, and it is worth naming: the server counts how many subscribe attempts have come from your IP address in the past hour, so nobody can flood the list. That counter is the only thing stored against the address, it is never attached to your subscription, and it is deleted automatically after an hour.

The website itself

Visiting balticsignalmonitor.com sets no cookies, runs no analytics, and doesn't track visitors in any way. The live numbers on the page come from your browser fetching a small public status file (status.json) — a plain file request, no different from loading an image.

Third parties this depends on

• GitHub Pages — hosts this website.
• Telegram — runs the channel described above.
• Mastodon — runs the optional account described above, hosted on whichever server you use to follow it, not by this project.
• Vercel + Upstash — host and store browser push subscriptions, exactly as described above.
• Ko-fi — the optional "Support this project" button. Ko-fi only sees anything if you choose to click through and use it; that transaction is covered by Ko-fi's own privacy policy, not this project's.

None of these get more data than what's described on this page, and this project doesn't layer any additional tracking on top of what each of them already does on its own.

Your rights, and who is responsible

This project is run by one private individual, not a company, and that person is the data controller for everything described above. There is no other operator and no third party acting on their behalf beyond the services named in the previous section. Reach them at [email protected].

Two things are processed and each has its own basis. Browser push runs on your consent, given by clicking "Enable Browser Alerts" and withdrawn at any time by turning notifications off in your browser — no reason needed, and nothing is kept once the subscription stops working. The hourly IP counter runs on legitimate interest: keeping the list usable for everyone else.

Under the GDPR you can ask what is held about you, ask for it to be deleted, object to it, or ask for a copy. Write to the address above and you will get an answer. In practice there is very little to hand over — a push subscription carries no name, email or account, so it usually cannot be tied to a person at all without the exact subscription your browser holds.

If you are not satisfied with the response, you can complain to your national data protection authority: Estonia aki.ee, Latvia dvi.gov.lv, Lithuania vdai.lrv.lt.

Questions

This is a one-person, non-commercial project — if you have a question about anything on this page, or want something looked into, write to [email protected].