Privacy policy

Last updated 6 Oct 2026

UULKA is designed to need as little personal data as possible. There are no accounts, no sign-ups, no comments and no analytics. This page says exactly what happens to your data. The data controller is Digitallo, New Zealand; contact details are on the contact page.

What we do not collect

• We do not run analytics, tracking pixels, session recording or fingerprinting.
• We do not ask for your name, email address or any account details.
• We have no database. Nothing about you is stored on our servers beyond the standard server logs described below.

Your location

To show a forecast we need coordinates. They come from the city you pick or, only if you press "Use my location", from your browser's geolocation (your browser asks permission first). The coordinates are sent to our server, which asks the weather provider for the forecast for that spot. The weather provider (MET Norway) receives coordinates truncated to four decimal places and our own identifying User-Agent; it never receives your IP address or any information about you, because our server makes the request, not your browser. NOAA's space-weather data is likewise fetched by our server and contains no personal data.

The other pages (Overhead, Sky, Earth, Listen, Feed, Radio, Lab)

The sky, planet and satellite positions on these pages are calculated inside your browser from your chosen coordinates, so those coordinates are not sent anywhere for that purpose. Our server is asked only for your place's time zone and (on Listen) tonight's forecast. Satellite orbit data, NASA Deep Space Network status, space headlines and the picture of the day are fetched by our server from CelesTrak, NASA and the Spaceflight News API and shared between visitors; none of them sees your IP address or location from us. Two things go straight from your browser to NASA: the Earth image on the Lab page (epic.gsfc.nasa.gov) and, when shown, the picture of the day (apod.nasa.gov), so NASA's servers will see your IP address like any website you visit. Links to other sites (Radio and Feed pages) are ordinary links; those sites have their own privacy policies. The Listen page generates sound in your browser; it does not use your microphone and records nothing.

Stored in your browser

These items are saved with your browser's local storage on your own device. They are never sent to us as cookies and you can delete them at any time by clearing site data:

• your last chosen location (name and coordinates);
• your optional Bortle light-pollution class;
• your theme (dark, light or red night vision) and units (°C/°F, 12 h/24 h);
• the last forecast we sent you, so the page can show it, clearly labelled, when you are offline;
• an offline cache of the site's own pages and scripts (service worker), so the app can open without a connection.

Server logs

Like every web server, ours records technical details of each request: IP address, time, the page or API address requested (which includes the coordinates for forecast requests), browser type and response status. We use these logs only to run, secure and fix the service and to enforce rate limits. They are kept for [LOG RETENTION, e.g. 14 days] and then deleted. Legal basis (where GDPR applies): legitimate interests in keeping the site secure and working.

Advertising and cookies

[ADSENSE / COOKIE DISCLOSURE PLACEHOLDER: complete this before switching ads on.] UULKA is intended to be supported by Google AdSense. No advertising script is installed or active at the time of writing, so no advertising cookies are set. When ads are enabled, Google and its partners may use cookies or similar technologies to show and measure ads, and to personalise them where you consent. Visitors in the EEA, UK and Switzerland will be shown a consent choice before any such cookie is set, and you will be able to change your choice at any time. Details of how Google uses data are at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites, and you can manage ad personalisation at adssettings.google.com.

Your rights

Under New Zealand's Privacy Act 2020, and depending on where you live (for example under the GDPR or UK GDPR) you may have the right to access, correct or delete personal data we hold, to object to its processing and to complain to your data-protection authority. Because we hold essentially nothing beyond short-lived server logs, the most practical step is to write to us with the approximate time and your IP address and we will search for and delete matching entries.

Children

UULKA is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect personal data from them.

Changes

If this policy changes we will update the date at the top. Material changes, such as enabling advertising, will be reflected here before they take effect.