Privacy

Exterminator Guild is a set of static pages. There is nothing to sign up for as a reader, no advertising and no tracking pixels; we write nothing to your device and we do not run analytics that identify you. We do count how pages are used, with a script of our own described below. There are two other exceptions and both are described in full below: the claim form, which a business owner fills in deliberately, and the sign-in a business owner is given once a claim is approved — which does set one cookie, because a sign-in cannot work without one.

Measurement

So we can tell which pages are worth keeping and improving, this site records how pages are used. The script is ours and is served from this domain: it is not Google Analytics or any other third-party product, and no advertising network, data broker or analytics company receives anything.

A record contains the page you are on and the page you came from; the hostname of any site that linked to you, never the full address and never its query string; your country, region and city as your network reports them to our hosting provider; your device type, browser and operating system as broad categories; how long the page was actually visible; how far you scrolled; and whether you clicked through to an exterminator’s website, phone number or email address.

If a link to this site carried campaign tags on the end of the address — utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign, utm_term, utm_content, gclid, fbclid, msclkid or ref — those values are kept with the record so we can tell where a link was shared. Nothing else from the address is kept, and this site buys no advertising, so in practice these are empty unless somebody else added them to a link.

Your IP address is not stored. It is used once, on our server, to compute a short one-way code so that forty page views can be told apart from one person reading forty pages. That code mixes in a secret that changes every midnight, so the same person is a different code tomorrow and no history can be assembled about anyone across days. It is never sent back to your browser and nothing on the page can read it.

If you would rather not be measured, you already are not. The script checks for Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control before it does anything, and our server discards the request as well if either signal arrives. Content blockers stop it outright, and the site works identically either way.

Server logs

Our hosting provider records standard web-server request logs — IP address, time, the page requested and the browser’s user-agent string — as part of serving and protecting the site. We do not use them to build a profile of you. The single exception is the abuse hash described under claims, which is derived from an IP address and cannot be reversed.

If you claim a listing

The claim form is the only place this site collects anything about a person. When you submit one we store what you typed — your name, your role at the business, your email address, your phone number if you gave one, and your message — together with the proof file you attached and the listing you claimed.

We also keep a one-way hash of your IP address and your browser’s user-agent string, to stop the form being abused. The hash cannot be turned back into your address, and your raw IP is never written to the claim record.

Where it goes: the record and the proof are stored privately with our hosting provider (Vercel), and two emails are sent through our email provider (Postmark) — a confirmation to you, and a notification to us. The proof file itself is never attached to an email. Nothing is sold, and nothing is shared with the business you claimed or with anyone else.

How long: the proof file is deleted 90 days after we decide your claim. We keep the decision record itself, because it is the reason a listing shows as claimed. Ask us at any time and we will delete your claim outright — including an approved one, which simply removes the claimed note from the listing.

If you sign in to manage a listing

When we approve a claim we create a sign-in for the email address on it and email you a password. We store that address, a one-way hash of the password — never the password itself, so nobody here can read it or tell you what it is — the date you last signed in, and a count of failed attempts so the sign-in can lock itself after too many. Alongside it we store which listings that sign-in may edit.

Signing in sets one cookie. It is strictly necessary — it is the thing that keeps you signed in from one page to the next — and it holds nothing but a signed reference to your account. It is not used for advertising, it is not shared, and it is not read by the measurement described above. It expires after seven days, and signing out removes it.

What you write in there — your phone number, your website, your description, the services and places you list — is published on your own listing, attributed to you and marked as self-reported. That is the point of it. If you ask us to remove your listing or you tell us to close the sign-in, both go, and what you wrote comes off the page at the next publish.

Photographs work the same way, with one thing worth saying plainly. A photograph you upload is published on your listing and is public: anyone can see it, and search engines can index it. Before we store it we strip the file down to its picture — the camera data that travels inside an image file, which can include the exact place and time it was taken, is discarded on our server and never written anywhere. We keep the picture itself, its size, the caption you give it and the order you put it in. Remove a photograph and the file is deleted from storage at once, and it comes off the page at the next publish. Please only upload photographs you took or own, and none with a customer’s face, name or address in them.

If you ask for a password reset, we store a one-way hash of the link’s token for one hour and then it is gone. The link works once.

If you email us

We keep your message and address for as long as it takes to deal with what you wrote about, and for a reasonable period after in case you follow up. We do not add you to a mailing list and we do not pass your details to anyone.

Links out

Listings link to businesses’ own websites and to Google Maps for directions. Those are other people’s sites with their own privacy practices, and this policy does not cover them.

Business information

Listings describe businesses, not private individuals, and are built from publicly available business information. If you are named on a listing in a personal capacity and would rather not be, email help@exterminatorguild.com and it will be removed.

Contact

Questions about any of this go to help@exterminatorguild.com.