Privacy Policy

BingeClub is a publication, not a membership club. We collect as little as we can get away with and we do not sell any of it. This policy explains, in plain terms, what that means in practice.

1. Who we are

The data controller for this site is BingeClub, reachable at [email protected]. This policy covers bingeclub.live and nothing else. When we say we, us or our, we mean BingeClub. When we say you, we mean a visitor to this site. Where the wording here differs from the law that applies to you, the law wins.

2. What information we collect

Information you give us directly. The only place the site asks you to type anything is the newsletter form, which asks for an email address. If you email us, we receive whatever you choose to put in that message, including your address and any attachments. We do not ask for your name, your address, your date of birth, your phone number or any payment detail, and we have no field anywhere on the site that would accept them.

Information collected automatically. Like almost every website, our server records ordinary technical log lines when a page is requested: the page requested, the time, the referring address, the browser and operating system identifiers, and the IP address the request came from. These lines exist so that the site stays online and so that abuse can be traced. They are not used to build a profile of you.

What we do not collect. We do not collect or store your viewing history. Nothing on this site knows what you watched last night. This follows from how the site works rather than from a promise: the pages are static reading pages with no login and no player, so there is no mechanism by which viewing data could be gathered.

3. Cookies and similar technologies

Necessary cookies. If you leave a comment, a cookie may be set to remember your name and email address so that you do not have to type them again. It lasts about a year. Logging in, which almost no reader does, sets further cookies that exist only to keep that session valid.

Analytics cookies. BingeClub does not currently run Google Analytics or any comparable measurement product, and we do not set analytics cookies. If we ever add measurement, we will update this policy before switching it on and, where the law requires it, ask for consent first.

Advertising cookies. BingeClub does not currently operate an advertising network or third-party ad tags on this site, so no advertising cookie is set by us. We are stating a fact about the present configuration, not a promise about the future. If advertising is introduced, this section will be rewritten before that happens.

Affiliate tracking. Some outbound links to streaming services are affiliate links. If you follow one and sign up, the affiliate network may set its own cookie so that the referral can be attributed to this site. That cookie belongs to the network, is governed by its policies, and does not reveal your identity to us. We only ever see aggregate counts of clicks and signups.

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. Blocking the necessary ones will stop comments from remembering you, which is inconvenient but not harmful.

4. Affiliate links

BingeClub earns money when a reader signs up for a streaming service through some of the links on this site. This is disclosed on every page that contains such a link and in our About page. It does not change what we recommend. A title is on a shelf because we think it deserves to be, and a link is added afterwards.

5. Newsletter

The newsletter form collects one thing: your email address. We store the address together with the date it was submitted, so that we can send you the weekly shortlist and so that we can prove consent if asked. We send through our own hosting, not through a third-party marketing platform, which means your address is not passed to an external email service for profiling. Every issue carries a one-click unsubscribe link, and any email asking to be removed is actioned within a week. We will not add you to any other list and we will not sell, rent or trade the list.

6. Comments

Comments are enabled on articles. When you comment we store the name you type, your email address, your IP address and your browser identifier. The email address is used to display a profile picture and is never published. IP and browser data are used only by our spam filter. If you would rather not have a comment published, say so in the message and we will remove it on request.

7. Media and uploaded files

This site does not let visitors upload images or any other files. Photographs used in articles are sourced from public domain or openly licensed collections and are stored on our own server rather than loaded from third-party servers, so reading a page here does not notify anyone else about your visit.

8. Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may embed content from other sites, such as a video player. Embedded content behaves exactly as though you had visited the other site directly: it may set its own cookies, collect data and monitor your interaction with it, under its own privacy policy. We keep embeds to a minimum and only use them where the article genuinely needs the footage.

9. Who we share data with

We do not sell personal information, and we do not share it for advertising. We work with a small number of service providers who process data on our behalf or in the course of delivering the site:

• Our hosting provider, which keeps the server running and holds the log data described above. The server is located in Los Angeles, in the United States.
• Cloudflare, which sits in front of the site as a content delivery network and security layer, filtering malicious traffic and caching pages. Cloudflare therefore sees request metadata.
• Affiliate networks, which receive click and conversion counts for links you follow. They do not receive your name from us because we do not know it.
• Law enforcement or regulators, where we are legally obliged to disclose, or where disclosure is necessary to protect a person from serious harm. We would tell you unless legally barred from doing so.

10. How long we keep data (our retention policy)

Comments and the data attached to them are kept indefinitely, because a comment thread loses its meaning if the replies disappear. Newsletter addresses are kept until you unsubscribe. Server log lines are rotated and deleted on a rolling basis, generally within thirty days. Measurement retention is not applicable at present because no analytics product is in use; should measurement ever be introduced, its retention window will be documented here and will not exceed fourteen months. Email correspondence is kept for as long as it is useful for answering follow-ups, and no longer than two years. We do not keep any analytics profile because we do not create one.

11. Where your data is stored and international transfers

The server hosting this site is in Los Angeles, in the United States, and Cloudflare serves pages from edge locations around the world, so request data can pass through a country other than your own. That means personal data of readers in the United Kingdom, Switzerland and the European Economic Area (EEA) may be transferred outside those territories. Where that happens we rely on appropriate safeguards, in particular the standard contractual clauses approved for such transfers, together with the technical measures our providers apply.

12. Your rights

If you are in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom or Switzerland, the GDPR and the UK GDPR give you, as a data subject, the right to be told what we hold, to access it, to have it corrected, to have it deleted, to have processing restricted, to object to processing, and to receive it in a portable form. You also have the right to withdraw consent at any time, and to raise a marketing objection that is absolute.

If you are a California resident, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) gives you the right to know what personal information is collected, to request its deletion, to request correction, and to be free from discrimination for exercising those rights. BingeClub does not sell personal information and does not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising, so there is no sale to opt out of, but the right to instruct us not to sell remains available should that ever change.

To exercise any of these rights, email [email protected] with the words privacy request in the subject line. We will respond within thirty days. We may ask you to confirm you control the email address involved. If you believe we have handled your data badly you have the right to complain to your local supervisory authority, and we would rather you told us first so we can fix it.

13. Children

BingeClub is written for adults and is not directed at children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under thirteen, and in the European Economic Area we do not knowingly collect data from anyone below the age at which they can consent to information society services. If you believe a child has sent us personal information, write to [email protected] and we will delete it promptly. Note that some titles discussed here are not suitable for younger viewers, but that discussion is about the titles, not an invitation to them.

14. Security

The site is served over HTTPS end to end, which means traffic between your browser and our server is encrypted in transit. Access to the server and to the database is restricted and password-protected, and administrative surfaces are kept to the minimum needed to publish. No system is perfect, and we will not pretend otherwise. If we ever become aware of a breach that affects your rights, we will contact affected readers and the relevant authority without undue delay.

15. Changes to this policy

When this policy changes we will update the date at the top of the page. Material changes, such as adding analytics, advertising or a new processor, will be flagged in the newsletter so that readers hear about them in the same place they hear about everything else.

16. Contact

Questions, corrections and privacy requests all go to [email protected]. Please put privacy request in the subject line if your message is about your data.