Rest of World is a nonprofit publication that challenges expectations about whose experiences with technology matter. We connect the dots across a rapidly evolving digital world, through on-the-ground reporting in places typically overlooked and underestimated. This policy explains what personal information that Rest of World collects, how we use it, and who we share it with. We don’t sell your information.
Information We Collect
The information we collect depends on how you interact with the services.
- When you browse our website, we collect technical information, such as browser, operating system, language preference, IP address, and referral URLs. We also collect cookies, which are small files placed on your device or computer. We de-identify this data so that it is not traceable to specific readers.
- When you sign up for our newsletter, we collect your name and email.
- When you make a purchase, we collect name, email, credit card information, and mailing address, if applicable.
- When you donate, we collect name, email, and credit card information.
- If you respond to an optional survey, we may collect email and survey responses about demographics, media preferences, and giving behaviors
- If you enter a sweepstakes, we collect name, email, and mailing address, if applicable.
- We may also collect information about you from publicly available sources.
How We Use Information
- Communicate with you: We may send newsletters, conduct fundraising outreach, and share relevant opportunities. You can always opt out at any time. We may also send service-related messages, such as updates to our terms.
- Purchases, donations, and sweepstakes: We use your payment or contact information to process purchases and donations, manage sweepstakes entries, and provide the services or benefits you’ve asked for.
- Plan events: We use information about our donors and subscribers to plan and host events that are relevant to our readers.
- Conduct surveys and research: We may send you optional surveys for feedback in order to better serve our audience. We’ll use your responses to improve our services.
- Gather analytics: We run analytics for reasons that include understanding which stories are of most interest to our readers, or tracking the success of our outreach and fundraising campaigns. For example, we use information about usage patterns to better understand the ways that our readers interact with our site. We de-identify this data so that it is not traceable to specific readers.
- Operate our website: We use technical information, cookies, and usage patterns to improve our website. For example, we monitor traffic to our site for network health purposes, and our web hosting provider uses that information for billing.
Legal Bases of Processing
- Consent: We rely on reader consent to send you our newsletter if you sign up. You can always withdraw your consent by unsubscribing.
- Legitimate Interests. Legitimate interest refers to something that is desirable to us or someone else (including you), is reasonably expected given the nature of our services, and doesn’t create any undue risk to you. We rely on legitimate interest to operate our website, plan events, fundraise, share relevant opportunities, perform analytics, and run research and surveys.
- Legal Obligations: We process information to comply with legal obligations, including complying with good faith legal requests or to defend or establish legal claims.
How We Share Information
- Service Providers: We share your information with third-party service providers to help us provide our services. We use service providers for things like web hosting services, newsletter delivery, hosting events, processing donations, surveys, analytics, and research.
- Legal Purposes: We may also share your information if it’s required by law or legal process. For example, we may share your information in response to government requests, or to establish or defend legal claims. We also may share information in connection with institutional reorganization (for example, a merger).
- Data Transfers: Some of the recipients described in this section may be in different countries with different privacy laws. For our users located in the European Economic Area, UK or Switzerland, if we transfer your information to a country that has not been recognized as providing an adequate level of data protection, we rely on safeguards such as agreements with terms approved by the European Commission or ensuring that the recipients are certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework.
Your Rights
Users located in the EEA, the UK, Switzerland, and certain U.S. states have the right to access, delete or correct personal information we hold. You may also have the right to object to certain processing, such as processing based on legitimate interests. In certain cases, you also may request that we provide you with a copy of your personal information in a portable format. To exercise any of these rights, please contact us as described in the “Contact Us” section below.
Please note that, because of the steps we take to minimize data collection on our site, if you have never provided us with your name or email address to receive one of our newsletters, we are not in a position to identify you based on the information we hold. For example, we do not associate IP address, device information or other information collected through automated means with named actual persons. If we do not have your email address, we will not be able to identify you for purposes of responding to a request to exercise any of the rights described above.
Changes
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time in order to reflect changes to our practices or for other operational, legal or regulatory reasons.
- May 12, 2020 – First published
- June 5, 2020 – Updated
- September 9, 2025 – Updated
Contact Us
Rest of World is responsible for the processing of your personal information as described in this Privacy Policy.
For more information about the processing of your personal information or to exercise your rights, please contact us by e-mail at privacy@restofworld.org.