Substack - privacy + advertising?
July 24, 2020 11:16 AM Subscribe
Substack seems to be a very common platform these days for newsletters/blogs etc. I have questions about their privacy and advertising policies.
Q1: As best as I can tell, their privacy policy says they track you both when you're on the site and elsewhere online, and that they will allow advertisers to target ads to you but not give advertisers your data. Is this an accurate reading? Is their privacy policy any better or worse than anyone else's privacy policy these days? Which I guess means: Is this reasonable in the context of the current "privacy environment"?
Q2: They also state they do not run ads. How is this reconciled with the comments about advertisers in their privacy policy? (Relevant text from this link: "Substack takes a 10% fee on all paid subscriptions. Substack will never run ads or sell user data.")
Q1: As best as I can tell, their privacy policy says they track you both when you're on the site and elsewhere online, and that they will allow advertisers to target ads to you but not give advertisers your data. Is this an accurate reading? Is their privacy policy any better or worse than anyone else's privacy policy these days? Which I guess means: Is this reasonable in the context of the current "privacy environment"?
Q2: They also state they do not run ads. How is this reconciled with the comments about advertisers in their privacy policy? (Relevant text from this link: "Substack takes a 10% fee on all paid subscriptions. Substack will never run ads or sell user data.")
Response by poster: Thanks, hoyland, for the feedback/info and the link to Privacy Badger. I wrote to them over the weekend to ask this question - no reply yet, no surprise. I will let you know if I ever do get an explanation from them.
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 7:01 AM on July 28, 2020
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 7:01 AM on July 28, 2020
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The privacy policy pretty clearly allows them to run ads, though they (apparently) aren't.
This is about par for the course, though saying "we don't run ads", while true, strikes me as kind of obnoxious when they're clearly participating in the online advertising ecosystem.
You may be interested in Privacy Badger from the EFF.
posted by hoyland at 5:38 AM on July 25, 2020