Privacy policy

Who we are

This website is run by Trekkit Studios Ltd., New Brunswick, Canada. For anything about your personal information, write to hello@phantomprowler.com.

In brief

• We collect what you give us through the forms on this site, and little else.
• We never publish your email address or the exact location of a sighting.
• There are no advertising or tracking cookies.
• We do not sell your information.
• Some of our service providers process information outside Canada.

What we collect, and why

When you report a sighting

Required: your account of what you saw; when; the county; your email address; your confirmation that you are 18 or older and accept the Terms of submission.

Optional: the nearest community or road; the time of day; the distance; how long it lasted; what the animal was doing; its colour; its tail; photographs and video; the name you would like shown, or a request to be anonymous; whether you are willing to be interviewed; whether we may show your report on the site.

Recorded with your report: your consent. We store which boxes you ticked, the date and time, and the version of the terms you accepted.

We use this to review your report, to publish it if you agreed and we approve it, to research the series, and to write to you about it.

• Your email address is required but not verified. It is never published, and it is not added to the newsletter list.
• The nearest community or road is never published. The site shows the county and the year only.

Please do not put other people’s personal information in a report.

Photographs and video

Photo and video files often carry hidden data, including where they were taken. We keep your original file privately, so that it can be examined if questions are asked about it. Before anything is published we make a new copy with the location data (EXIF GPS) removed. Only that copy is shown.

Newsletter

We collect your email address. We then send one message asking you to confirm, and you are not subscribed until you use the link in it. We keep a record of your consent: when you signed up and when you confirmed.

Every newsletter has an unsubscribe link.

Contact form

We collect your name, your email address, the type of enquiry and your message. The message is emailed to hello@phantomprowler.com and a copy is stored in our database. We use it to answer you.

Technical information

• Cookies. Essential cookies only. One protects the forms against forged requests (an anti-forgery token); it does not identify you. A sign-in cookie is used by Trekkit Studios to manage the site; visitors never receive it. There are no advertising or tracking cookies.
• Analytics. None at present.
• Server logs. Like most websites, ours keeps ordinary logs of requests: IP address, browser type, the page requested, the date and time. We use them to keep the site running and to limit abuse of the forms.
• Spam check. If spam becomes a problem we may switch on Cloudflare Turnstile, which checks that a form is being filled in by a person. While it is on, Cloudflare receives details of your browser and connection, including your IP address.
• Video. When there is a trailer, it will be embedded from YouTube. If you play it, YouTube receives information about your device and may set its own cookies.

Links to Facebook, X and YouTube are ordinary links. Those services have their own policies.

Where it is kept, and who handles it

• Microsoft Azure hosts the website, the database and the file storage in Canada East data center.
• Cloudflare Email delivers the email this site sends, including confirmation messages and contact-form messages. Cloudflare is in the United States.

Some of this processing happens outside Canada, mainly in the United States. Information held in another country is subject to that country’s laws and may be available to its courts and authorities.

We do not sell or rent personal information. We do not give your email address to anyone else unless you agree or the law requires it.

How long we keep it

• Sighting reports and their files: while the project is active, or until you ask us to delete them. Reports we decline are deleted within 90 days.
• Consent records: for as long as we use the report, and three years after.
• Newsletter: until you unsubscribe. Sign-ups that are never confirmed are deleted after 30 days. After you unsubscribe, we keep your address and consent record for three years, only so that we can show the request was honoured.
• Contact messages: two years after our last exchange.
• Server logs: 90 days.

Your choices

You can ask us to show you the information we hold about you, to correct it or to delete it. You can withdraw a consent you gave. You can unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time.

Write to hello@phantomprowler.com. We may need to check that the request is from you. We aim to answer within 30 days.

Some things cannot be undone. We cannot take a report out of an episode or trailer that is already finished or broadcast (see the Terms of submission), and we may need to keep the record of your consent.

Complaints

Please write to us first. If you are not satisfied with our answer, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (priv.gc.ca).

Children

The forms on this site are for adults aged 18 and over. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone younger. If we learn that we have, we will delete it.

Security

Connections to the site are encrypted. Reports and files are held in private storage, and only the people at Trekkit Studios who need to see them can. No system is perfectly secure. If a failure puts you at real risk of harm, we will tell you.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy. A new version will be posted here with a new number and date. If a change affects how we use information you have already given us, we will ask you first.