Cookie Policy

The short version

This site currently sets no cookies whatsoever. Analytics is not configured, so there is no banner to dismiss and no tag to load. The rest of this page describes what would happen if we ever turned analytics on, so that you can read the terms before there is anything to consent to.

A privacy product that tracked you on its own marketing site would be telling on itself. So the analytics tag is not in the page, waiting. It does not exist until you say yes.

Before you choose, we set nothing

Plenty of sites load their trackers on arrival and treat the banner as paperwork. This one cannot do that, because the analytics script is not in the page. It is added to the document only after you click Accept. Until then there is nothing to block.

We also set no strictly necessary cookies. The site is static, there is no website login, no basket and no server-side session, so there is nothing for a functional cookie to remember. Declining costs you nothing: every page works identically either way.

Where your choice is stored

Here is a detail most cookie banners get backwards: they record your refusal in a cookie, which means saying no to cookies gives you a cookie. We do not do that.

Your answer is written to your browser's localStorage under the key pv-consent, with a value of yes or no. That is not a cookie. Unlike a cookie it is never attached to a network request, so it is never transmitted to us or to anyone else. It stays in your browser, on your device, so we stop asking you on every visit. Clear your browser storage and we will ask again, because as far as the site knows you have never answered.

The analytics cookies

There are none, right now. No analytics property is configured for this site, so no tag is shipped and no cookie is set under any circumstances.

If we do enable analytics, it will be Google Analytics 4, it will set two first-party cookies to count page views, and it will not load until you have accepted it on a banner. This page will list each cookie by name and lifetime before any of that happens.

Changing your mind

Withdrawing consent has to be as easy as giving it, so there is a button, not a set of instructions about your browser settings. It clears the stored choice and reloads the page, which brings the banner back so you can answer again.

To remove any cookie already set right now, clear this site's data in your browser: in Chrome, Safari, Firefox and Edge this is under the padlock or site information icon in the address bar. Every browser can also block cookies wholesale, and this site keeps working if you do.

What we never use

• Advertising cookies, retargeting pixels and conversion tags. We do not run ads that follow you around, so there is nothing to retarget with.
• Social network buttons that phone home. Links to our accounts are ordinary links, and they tell nobody anything until you click.
• Fingerprinting, session recording, heatmaps and mouse tracking. We do not want a replay of your visit.
• Third-party fonts and scripts loaded from someone else's server. The typeface is served from this domain, which is why no font vendor gets your IP address.

A note on Global Privacy Control, since privacy-minded people ask. A GPC signal tells a site not to sell or share your data. We do not sell or share it, and nothing loads here without an explicit opt-in, so the outcome GPC asks for is already the default.

The apps set no cookies

The iPhone, iPad, Mac and Android apps are native, not a wrapped web page, so cookies do not enter into it. The iOS app links no third-party advertising or tracking SDKs. What the apps do collect is a separate matter and is listed, item by item, in the Privacy Policy.

Changes

If we ever add a cookie, it will be named on this page before it is set, and your existing consent will not be stretched to cover something you did not agree to. The date at the top moves whenever this page changes.

Contact

Questions about cookies, or anything else on this page, go to privacy@phantomvpn.site.