If you run a blog you may be wondering does my blog need a Privacy Policy?

The answer is YES, your blog absolutely needs to have a Privacy Policy. It is a legal requirement as soon as you begin to collect any personal information from your readers. Examples of collecting personal information are using cookies, using Google Analytics, when you request email addresses for your newsletter or when you sell any products or services.

Why you need a Privacy Policy as a blogger

Your are required by law to have a Privacy Policy as soon as you begin to collect any personal information from your users. You may think that since you are not selling anything on your website, you don't collect personal information but this is not the case.

For instance do you use Google Analytics? If so, you are required to have a Privacy Policy. It is part of their terms & conditions.

"You will have and abide by an appropriate Privacy Policy and will comply with all applicable laws, policies and regulations relating to the collection of information from Users. You must post a Privacy Policy and that Privacy Policy must provide notice of Your use of cookies, identifiers for mobile devices (e.g., Android Advertising Identifier or Advertising Identifier for iOS) or similar technology used to collect data. You must disclose the use of Google Analytics, and how it collects and processes data."

Taken from Security section of Google Analytics Terms of Service

Do you run a newsletter for your readers? If so you are collecting their emails, which is personal information. For this you require a Privacy Policy.

Do you use an affiliate program? If so you will be required to have a Privacy Policy. Amazon's Associates program for instance, requires that you will be responsible for:

 "disclosing on your Site accurately and adequately, either through a privacy policy or otherwise, how you collect, use, store, and disclose data collected from visitors, including, where applicable, that third parties (including us and other advertisers) may serve content and advertisements, collect information directly from visitors, and place or recognise cookies on visitors’ browsers, and providing information on the visitor’s choices with respect to opting-out from online advertising where required by applicable law"

taken from Amazon Associates Participation requirements policy

Do you participate in an advertising program? For instance Google Adsense? Google Adsense requires you to have a Privacy Policy which includes the following:

"Your privacy policy should include the following information:

Third party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on a user's prior visits to your website or other websites.

Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads to your users based on their visit to your sites and/or other sites on the Internet.

Users may opt out of personalised advertising by visiting Ads Settings. (Alternatively, you can direct users to opt out of a third-party vendor's use of cookies for personalised advertising by visiting www.aboutads.info.)"

Adsense Required Content

Having a Privacy Policy on your blog is reassuring to your readers. It shows them that you are taking measures to protect their personal information and that you understand the need to be careful with personal data.

What Needs to be Included in Your Privacy Policy?

There are a number of things which should be included in your Privacy Policy. As you have read above, if you participate in any of the programs there may be specific things you need to include. Here are the main areas you need to be covering for your blog:

1. Personal Information: you need to let your users know what type of personal information you are collecting from them, how you collect it and for what purpose. You need to outline how you keep it secure and also to be compliant with the GDPR, you must let them know how they can opt out of supplying personal information and how this will effect their use of your site if they choose this option.
2. Cookie Policy: All websites use cookies to collect information from their users in order to perform different functions which give the user a better experience. You need to include a Cookie Policy in your Privacy Policy, which defines what cookies are, outlines which cookies you use on your site, what their function is and also give your users instructions on opting out if they desire.
3. GDPR Compliance: under the General Data Protection Regulation, you are legally required to disclose your users data protection rights. The rights are as follows: The right to: be informed, access, rectification, be forgotten, restrict processing, object to processing, data portability and object to automated processing.
4. Children's Privacy: you need to ensure you are complying with COPPA, which stands for the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act. You must include a clause in your Privacy Policy which states that you are NOT collecting information from children under the age of 13.
5. Contact Information: You must ensure your readers can contact you with regards to anything in your Privacy Policy. So include your contact email in your policy.

Generate a Privacy Policy You can Trust

At Privacy Terms we understand that hiring a lawyer to create a Privacy Policy is not in most people budgets, that's why we have come up with a very affordable solution.

Our Privacy Policy is lawyer drafted and approved. It is compliant with all major privacy laws. It is highly customisable to ensure you only need to include what is relevant to your own website.

So for your peace of mind, generate your own Professional Privacy Policy today and make sure your blog is legally covered.

GENERATE YOUR PRIVACY POLICY