NYC Politics Privacy Policy
Last modified: October 22, 2026
Matics Lab INC, together with its representatives, contractors, employees, officers and directors (collectively "Matics Lab INC," "we," "us" or "our"), operates the website at www.nycpolitics.org (the "Site") and the email sent from it (together with any related features, the "Services"). NYC Politics is part of a network of city politics sites operated by Matics Lab INC that share one software platform and, for reader comments, one account system (see section 6).
NYC Politics tracks a city legislature from public records: its members, their votes, the legislation they file, committees and meetings. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect from people who use the Services ("you"), how we use it, who we share it with, how long we keep it, and the choices and rights you have. It applies to everyone who visits the Site, whether or not they create an account.
By using the Services, you agree to this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, please do not use the Services. This policy is written in English, and the English version controls if a translation of any page of the Site says something different.
Summary
The short version, in a table. We do not sell personal information for money. The rest of this policy explains each line.
| Category | Collected? | Disclosed to service providers? | Sold? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identifiers (name you give us, email address, IP address, account ID) | Yes | Yes | No |
| Information you choose to give us (messages, comments) | Yes | Yes | No |
| Internet activity (pages viewed, device and browser, log data) | Yes | Yes (analytics and advertising, section 5) | See section 5 |
| Approximate location (from your IP address; the ward or neighborhood you tell us) | Yes | Yes | No |
| Precise location | No (if you use "Use my location", it is used in your browser to find your ward and is not sent to us) | No | No |
| Sensitive information (government ID numbers, health, biometrics) | No | No | No |
| Inferences about your politics | No. We never guess anyone's politics; a position is only ever what you told us | No | No |
1. Information we collect
1.1 Information you give us
- Reader comments. To comment on an On My Block article you sign in with your email address (a link, or on this Site a 6-digit code) and pick a display name. Your comments, your display name and the article are public. Your email address is never shown. If you report a comment, we record that you reported it.
- The contact form. Your name, email address, the topic you pick, your message, the page you sent it from and the language of the page. See "How contact messages are handled" in section 3.
1.2 Information collected automatically
- Sign-in sessions (yours, if you sign in): when they were created, the IP address and the browser (user agent) they came from. Sessions last up to 30 days.
- Log data. Like most websites, our hosting provider processes your IP address, browser type, the pages you request, the referring page and the time, to deliver the Site, keep it secure and stop abuse. Where we count requests to enforce limits (sign-in emails, the contact form, comments), we keep the IP address only for as long as the limit needs it, or as a salted hash.
- Analytics. We use Google Analytics 4 (through Google Tag Manager) to measure which pages are read, how people arrive and how the Site performs. See section 5.
- Advertising. Public pages carry Google AdSense ads, which may set or read cookies and collect device and usage data. See section 5.
1.3 Public records about people
Most of what the Site publishes is public records about public officials and the people who deal with them: council members, their votes and statements in meetings, legislation, and campaign contributions as the election authorities publish them (donors' names, employers, and city or ZIP code; we do not keep or publish donors' street addresses). We do not remove accurate public records on request, but we correct errors (see About).
2. How we use information
We use the information above to:
- provide the Services: show the pages you ask for, publish your comments, and answer your messages;
- keep the Services secure and working: detect and stop spam, abuse and attacks, enforce rate limits, and fix problems;
- measure and improve the Services (which pages are useful, how people find them);
- show ads on public pages (section 5);
- comply with the law, respond to lawful requests, and protect our rights and the rights and safety of others.
We do not use your information to decide anything about you that has legal or similarly significant effects, and we do not sell it.
Legal bases (for visitors in Europe or the United Kingdom). We process personal data to perform our agreement with you (providing the Services you ask for), on the basis of our legitimate interests (security, measuring and improving the Services, and showing ads), with your consent where the law requires it (for example, for some cookies), and to comply with legal obligations. You may withdraw consent at any time; that does not affect processing that already happened.
3. Email
- The contact form. We use your message and email address only to read and answer it.
How contact messages are handled
A message sent with the contact form is stored with its site, topic and language, and emailed to our team's inbox with your email address as the reply-to address, so we can answer you directly. To stop spam we keep a salted hash of the sender's IP address and count recent messages per address; a hidden field that people never see discards automated submissions.
4. Cookies and similar technologies
| Name or kind | Set by | What it does | How long |
|---|---|---|---|
Session cookie (cp.session_token, with a __Secure- prefix) | Us | Keeps you signed in | Up to 30 days |
Google Analytics cookies (_ga, _ga_*) | Count visits and pages read | Up to 2 years | |
| Advertising cookies | Google (AdSense) and their partners | Show and measure ads; may personalize ads where allowed | Varies |
| Local storage in your browser | Us | Remembers drafts of comments and similar conveniences. It stays on your device and is not sent to us | Until you clear it |
You can block or delete cookies in your browser's settings. If you block our session cookie, you will not be able to stay signed in. Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control: see section 5.
5. Analytics and advertising
- Google Analytics 4 and Google Tag Manager. Google receives information about your visit (pages viewed, the page you came from, your browser and device, an approximate location derived from your IP address, and an identifier stored in a cookie) and reports it to us in aggregate. One Analytics property covers every site in the network, so a visit that moves between our sites can be counted as one. Learn more, or opt out with Google's browser add-on, at Google's privacy site.
- Google AdSense. Public pages carry Google AdSense ads. Google and its partners use cookies to serve ads based on your visits to this and other websites, where the law and your settings allow it, and to measure them. You can turn off personalized ads at Google's Ad Settings and learn more at aboutads.info. We do not give Google your name or email address.
- Your choices. Under some U.S. state laws, letting advertising partners use cookies for targeted advertising can count as "selling" or "sharing" personal information even though no money changes hands for the data. You can opt out by turning off personalized ads as described above, by blocking third-party cookies, or by sending a Global Privacy Control signal, which we treat as a request to opt out where the law requires it. We do not otherwise respond to "Do Not Track" signals.
6. How we share information
We do not sell your personal information for money. We share it only as follows:
- Publicly, when you choose. Your comments and display name are public on the article.
- Within your team. Not applicable on this Site.
- Across the network. Reader accounts used for comments are one account system across the sites operated by Matics Lab INC, so the same email address and display name work on each, and each site keeps its own sign-in cookie.
- Service providers that process information for us under contracts that limit their use of it: see section 7.
- For legal reasons, when we believe in good faith that the law requires it, or to investigate or prevent fraud, abuse or threats to anyone's safety, or to protect our rights.
- In a business transfer, if Matics Lab INC or the Site is part of a merger, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets. The successor must keep to this Privacy Policy for the information it receives, and we will tell you of the change on the Site or by email.
- In aggregate or de-identified form, which does not identify anyone (for example, how many readers in a ward took a position).
7. Service providers and third-party services
| Provider | What it does for us | What it receives |
|---|---|---|
| Cloudflare (Workers, D1, R2, KV, Email Service, Workers AI, AI Gateway) | Hosts and delivers the Site, stores our databases and files, sends our email, runs some AI models | Everything the Site processes, including IP addresses, account data and email |
| Google (Analytics, Tag Manager, AdSense, Fonts) | Measurement, ads, and the Site's fonts | Your IP address, browser and device information, cookies (section 5) |
| Vimeo | Meeting videos embedded on our pages | Your IP address and what the player reports to them when you play a video |
Links to other websites (the City's records, the State's, news sites) take you to sites with their own privacy policies, which we encourage you to read.
8. How long we keep information
- Sign-in sessions: up to 30 days. Sign-in links and codes: 15 and 10 minutes.
- Comments: until you delete them (the text is removed and the comment shows as deleted) or we remove them under our Terms of Use.
- Contact messages: as long as we need to answer them and keep a record of our correspondence.
- Server logs and rate-limit counters: briefly, typically days, as our hosting provider keeps them.
- Backups may hold copies for a limited time after deletion.
9. Your choices and rights
Deleting your data yourself. You can delete your own comments at any time.
Your rights. Depending on where you live, including under the privacy laws of several U.S. states, you may have the right to:
- know and access the personal information we hold about you, its sources, why we use it and who we share it with, and get a copy in a portable format;
- correct inaccurate personal information;
- delete personal information, subject to exceptions the law allows (for example, to complete a transaction, keep the Services secure or comply with the law);
- opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information and of targeted advertising (section 5);
- limit the use of sensitive personal information (we do not collect any);
- appeal if we decline your request; and
- not be discriminated against for exercising these rights.
We give these rights to every user, wherever you live in the United States. To use them, contact us through the contact form or email hello@nycpolitics.org. We will verify your request by confirming you control the email address it concerns, and may ask for more information if needed. You may use an authorized agent, who must show us that you authorized them. We aim to answer within 45 days and will tell you if we need more time (up to 90 days in total). We do not charge for requests unless they are manifestly unfounded or excessive. If we decline your request, you may appeal by replying to our answer; if you remain unsatisfied, you may contact your state attorney general.
In Europe and the United Kingdom you also have the right to object to processing based on our legitimate interests, to restrict processing, and to lodge a complaint with your data protection authority.
10. Children
The Services are not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child under 13 has given us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.
11. Security
We protect information with technical and organizational measures suited to its sensitivity: encrypted connections (HTTPS) everywhere, sign-in without passwords, sign-in links and codes stored only as hashes, access limited to the people who need it, and rate limits against abuse. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, so we cannot guarantee security. If a breach affects your personal information, we will notify you as the law requires.
12. Where information is processed
Matics Lab INC is in the United States, and the Services are intended for people in the United States. Our providers, including Cloudflare, may process information in the United States and other countries where they operate. If you use the Services from outside the United States, you understand that your information will be processed in the United States, where privacy laws may differ from those where you live.
13. Changes to this policy
We will post any change on this page and update the "Last modified" date. If we make a material change to how we treat personal information, we will also tell you through a notice on the Site before it takes effect. Continuing to use the Services after a change takes effect means you accept the updated policy.
14. Contact us
Questions, requests or complaints about this Privacy Policy or your information: use the contact form or email hello@nycpolitics.org. The operator of NYC Politics is Matics Lab INC.
See also our Terms of Use.