CommonDocs.org

Privacy Policy

Effective 10/18/2026

This policy explains what information CommonDocs.org collects, how we use it, which service providers handle it on our behalf, and the choices you have.

Public Information

CommonDocs.org is a public community. Your username, profile photo, and bio may be visible to anyone who visits this website. Social activity on this website is public. Comments, likes, and shares are visible to others, along with the vote totals on comments. Who voted on a comment is not shown publicly.

You do not have to use your real name on CommonDocs.org. If you wish to protect your identity or remain anonymous, you can use an alias for your username. Your username is displayed publicly, so make sure it does not contain any identifying information if you do not wish to be identified.

Private Account Information

Your private account information contains other details such as your first and last name, email address, password, and personal preferences or website settings. We use your email to send out essential information related to your account such as password resets, privacy requests, and account verification. Non-essential emails are opt-in only and may be opted out at any time. If you wish to opt out from essential emails, you must submit a request to delete your account, which removes all your data from this website.

If you sign up through this website, we will collect a password from you. Passwords are stored as a one-way hash and are never visible to us. If you sign up through social services, such as Facebook or Google, we only collect your name and email.

Purchases, Subscriptions & Donations

If you purchase a product or subscription from us, or make a donation, we collect your name, email address, and the details of the transaction (what you bought, the amount, and the date). Where needed for shipping, taxes, or fraud prevention, we may also collect your billing or physical mailing address.

Payments are handled by third-party payment processors. Your card or bank details go directly to the processor and are never received or stored by CommonDocs.org. We keep records of your purchases, subscriptions, and donations for as long as tax and accounting laws require.

Information We Collect As You Use the Site

Beyond your account, we collect the following when you use these features:

  • Comments. The name, email address, and text you submit, or your account if you are signed in. Your email is only visible to moderators. Every edit to a comment is saved as a version, so earlier wordings remain visible to you and to staff after you edit a comment. Comments may be held for review before they are published.
  • Guide feedback. When you report a correction or suggestion, we collect your name, email address, your message, and which guide and section it refers to. Feedback is private: only staff can read it, and it may be emailed to staff so it can be acted on.
  • "Was this guide useful?" ratings. These are counted anonymously. We only store the totals for each guide, not who voted.
  • Comment votes. Your thumbs up or down on a comment is linked to your account so you can change it later. Other readers see the totals only.
  • Quizzes and interactive exercises. We store your answers and scores. If you are signed in, they are linked to your account. If you are not, they are linked to an anonymous visitor ID stored in a cookie, or, if your browser blocks cookies, a one-way scrambled (salted hash) value made from your IP address and browser type. We do not store your raw IP address. We use this to count how many different people have taken an exercise.
  • Flashcard progress. If you are signed in, your progress through a flashcard deck is saved to your account. If you are not, it stays in your browser.
  • Notes. Notes you write are saved to your account (see "Your Notes" below).
  • Spam and abuse protection. Comment and feedback forms are checked with Google reCAPTCHA, and the resulting score is stored with your submission. Your IP address is used briefly to limit repeated sign-in attempts and form submissions. It is held in memory only and is not saved.

Information Stored Only in Your Browser

Some preferences are kept in your browser's local storage rather than on our servers. This includes your light or dark theme, your recently viewed guides, the layout of the notes window, flashcard progress when you are signed out, and the name and email you last entered in a comment or feedback form while signed out, so you don't have to type them again. This information is not sent to us unless you submit a form. You can remove it at any time by clearing your browser's site data.

Your Notes

Notes you save to your account are private to you, meaning other readers cannot see them. However, notes are stored on our servers in the same way as the rest of your account data and may not be encrypted. Site administrators and staff responsible for maintaining the website may be able to access them.

Do not store sensitive information in your notes or anywhere else in your account. This includes passwords, financial or banking details, government ID numbers, medical information, or anything else you would not want exposed if the website were compromised.

Security

CommonDocs.org, its files and databases, are protected by encryption, firewalls, and physical server security. It is your responsibility as the user to remember your username and password in a safe location. The safeguards in place help to protect your data, but NO GUARANTEE CAN BE MADE THAT YOUR PUBLIC OR PERSONAL DATA WILL REMAIN SECURE FROM INTRUSIONS, THEFT, EXPLOIT, OR OTHER UNAUTHORIZED RELEASE TO THIRD PARTIES. Therefore, you should not store any sensitive personal information on this website, such as social security numbers, credit card numbers, bank accounts, licenses, etc.

Staff Access

Staff accounts can only reach what their role requires. Depending on their permissions, staff may be able to see account details (such as your name and email address), comment emails and edit history, feedback reports, and notes. Staff use this access to run and moderate the website, answer requests, and keep the site secure, and for no other purpose.

Analytics & Advertising

In addition to the information you provide, CommonDocs.org uses analytics tools from Google and Facebook (Meta) to track user activity for the purpose of analyzing user engagement, website performance, advertisement metrics and accessibility. We may also track the link of the website which referred you to CommonDocs.org.

CommonDocs.org shows ads through Google AdSense. Google and its partners use cookies to show ads based on your previous visits to this website and other websites, and to measure how ads perform. You can learn more in How Google uses information from sites that use its services. Where the law requires it, such as for visitors in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland, we ask for your consent before using cookies for personalized ads.

Cookies

We use the following cookies:

  • Sign-in session (payload-token): keeps you signed in. Removed when you sign out or the session expires.
  • Visitor ID (kg_vid): an anonymous ID set when a signed-out visitor submits a quiz or exercise, used to count unique participants. Expires after one year.
  • Analytics and advertising cookies: set by Google Analytics, Google Ads, Google AdSense, and Meta to measure traffic and show and measure ads.

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings, though signing in requires the session cookie. To limit analytics and advertising, you can use the Opt-out preferences page, Google Ads Settings, the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, and Meta ad preferences.

Third-Party Service Providers

We rely on the following providers to run CommonDocs.org. Each receives only the information it needs to provide its service:

  • Amazon Web Services (Amazon SES): sends account emails such as verification, password resets, and privacy request confirmations. Receives your email address and the message content.
  • Google reCAPTCHA: protects comment and feedback forms from spam. It collects hardware and software information and interaction data from your browser. Use of reCAPTCHA is subject to the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service.
  • Google Analytics: measures website traffic and engagement.
  • Google AdSense and Google Ads: show advertisements and measure ad performance.
  • Meta (Facebook): analytics and ad measurement through the Meta Pixel, and Facebook sign-in.
  • Google Sign-In: lets you sign up or sign in with your Google account.
  • Payment processors: process subscription payments, purchases, and donations.
  • Hosting and database providers: store and serve the website and its data.

Disclosure

We do not sell your personal data for money. We share data with the service providers listed above so they can run the features of this website, such as sending email, preventing spam, processing payments, providing social logins through Facebook and Google, and serving and measuring ads. Aggregate non-identifiable data may be shared with outside analytics organizations for business purposes. Beyond this, we will only share your data with outside entities where we are legally obligated to, such as to comply with a court order, or to protect the safety of our users or the website.

Data Retention

We keep your account information, notes, and progress for as long as your account exists. Comments stay published, along with their edit history, until you or a moderator deletes them. Feedback reports are kept for as long as they are useful for improving our guides. Anonymous quiz statistics and guide ratings are kept as totals. Purchase and donation records are kept for as long as tax and accounting laws require. When data is deleted, copies may remain in encrypted backups for a limited time until those backups are replaced.

Children's Privacy

CommonDocs.org is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you are under 13, please do not create an account or submit personal information. If you believe a child under 13 has given us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.

Your Privacy Rights

Depending on where you live, including under the EU and UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), you may have the right to:

  • access the personal data we hold about you and receive a copy of it,
  • correct inaccurate information,
  • delete your account and personal data,
  • object to or restrict certain uses of your data,
  • opt out of personalized advertising, which some laws treat as "sharing" or "selling" personal information, and
  • withdraw consent you have given, such as for advertising cookies.

We will not treat you differently for exercising these rights. You can make a request from the Privacy Requests page or through the contact form. If you are in the EEA or UK, you also have the right to complain to your local data protection authority.

Accessing and Modifying Your Personal Information

You may view or change your saved personal information on your Account page, which you can reach from the account menu in the site header once you are signed in.

Account Removal & Data Export

You may request to have your account deleted from the Privacy Requests page or by writing a request through the contact form. You will receive an email at your primary email address which you must confirm in order to approve the deletion request. Deletion requests are usually processed within 24 hours, but may take up to 72 hours to complete. This will erase your account and any personal data you have saved. Your public posts may still remain visible, though your username will be deleted. You will cease to receive further communications from CommonDocs.org after deletion unless you reach out directly to us or create a new account.

You may also request an export of your data from the Privacy Requests page. The export includes your account details, comments, notes, and progress.

Changes To This Policy

If significant changes to this policy are made regarding the handling of your personal user data, a prominent notice will be placed on the front page of this website and users will receive an email.

Contact

If you have questions about this policy or your data, reach us through the contact form.