Information You Send
What you type into the search forms (a name, a phone number, or an address) goes to the third-party provider that powers the results; our own servers keep no copy of your searches. If you write to us, we see only what your message contains and use it to reply.
Automatic Technical Data
Our hosting keeps ordinary server logs: IP address, browser type, pages viewed, and timestamps. We look at this in aggregate to keep the site healthy and to see which pages readers use. Cookies or similar technologies may support basic analytics and, where applicable, advertising measurement.
How Information Is Used
Operating the site, fixing problems, counting traffic, improving pages. We do not sell visitor lists and we do not build profiles of individual users.
Following Outside Links
We link out to county and state records portals, library collections, archives, and third-party search tools. Their privacy policies, not ours, govern what you submit there. That is especially true of the sponsored search results, which a third-party company provides.
Limited Data Sharing
The service providers that host and support the site process server logs for us. Analytics and advertising partners may receive the automatic data described above. We disclose data when a valid legal process requires it, and not otherwise.
Security Measures
The site runs over an encrypted connection and logs are kept only as long as the purposes above need them. There are no accounts here, so no password or profile of yours exists on this site to be exposed.
Users Under 18
The site is meant for adults and is not directed at children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18; if you believe a minor has sent us information, contact us and we will delete it.
Your Privacy Choices
Depending on where you live, you may hold rights to access, correct, or delete personal data a website keeps about you. Illinois has no single comprehensive consumer privacy statute governing all ordinary website data; specific Illinois privacy laws apply by data type. Because we keep almost nothing, requests usually end quickly: we search our contact mailbox and server logs and remove what we find. Use the Contact page to ask. Public records held by Illinois state, county, or city offices are outside our control; removal requests for those go to the custodian office.
Updates to This Policy
Any change to this policy will be posted on this page. Using the site after a change means you accept the updated version.