Who we are
Island (island.nz) is an independent publication made in Aotearoa New Zealand. We’re responsible for the personal information described on this page under New Zealand’s Privacy Act 2020.
Our privacy officer can be reached at hello@island.nz. Use that address for any privacy question, request or complaint.
What we collect
Cookies
Island sets no cookies of its own. You don’t need an account to read anything, and there’s no cookie banner because there’s nothing for you to agree to.
Visit statistics
We count visits with Cloudflare Web Analytics. It doesn’t use cookies or local storage, doesn’t fingerprint your device and doesn’t follow you to other sites. We see totals, such as how many people read a page and roughly which countries they came from, never individual visitors.
The Island Letter
If you subscribe to our monthly email, we hold your email address and the date you signed up. Our email provider, Buttondown, also records the IP address you signed up from, and keeps delivery records, such as whether an issue reached you or bounced. We don’t track whether you open an issue or click its links.
Emails you send us
If you email hello@island.nz, we receive your address, your message and anything you attach. Cloudflare Email Routing passes your email on to the mailbox where we read it, a Gmail account run by Google, and it’s stored there.
Server logs
Like every website, our host and content delivery network, Cloudflare, sees your IP address and browser details when you load a page. It keeps these logs for a short time to run the site and protect it from attacks. We don’t use them to identify anyone.
Partner sites
When you follow a partner link to a booking site, that site collects information under its own privacy policy and may set its own cookies. Partners tell us when a booking earns a commission; we don’t receive names or contact details. Our disclosure explains how partner links work.
Why we collect it
- Visit statistics: to see which pages are useful, and fix the ones that aren’t.
- Your email address: to send you the Letter you asked for, and nothing else.
- Your emails: to reply, and to correct anything you tell us is wrong.
- Server logs: to keep the site running and secure.
What we don’t do
- We don’t sell, rent or trade personal information.
- We don’t share it with partners or advertisers.
- We don’t use advertising trackers, social media pixels or fingerprinting.
- We don’t build profiles of readers.
Where it’s stored
Under section 11 of the Privacy Act, a service that holds personal information only on our behalf isn’t receiving a disclosure: the information is treated as held by us, and we stay responsible for it wherever it’s stored.
The services we use this way are based in the United States:
- Buttondown, LLC sends the Letter and holds the subscriber list.
- Cloudflare, Inc. hosts the site, counts visits, and routes email sent to hello@island.nz on to our mailbox.
- Google LLC stores that email in the Gmail account we use only for Island.
Buttondown and Cloudflare work under data processing agreements written for the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, which are designed to give safeguards comparable to New Zealand’s.
Information privacy principle 12 limits sending personal information to organisations overseas that would use it for their own purposes. We don’t do that.
How long we keep it
- Visit statistics are totals, with nothing in them that identifies you.
- Your email address stays on the list until you unsubscribe, using the link in every issue. That stops the Letter at once. Ask us, and we’ll delete your address from Buttondown entirely.
- Your emails are kept while we deal with what you raised, and deleted no later than two years after your last message.
- Server logs are kept by Cloudflare for a short time, under its own retention rules.
Keeping it safe
We hold as little as we can, which is the best protection there is. What we do hold sits with established providers, behind accounts only we can use.
If a privacy breach is likely to cause you serious harm, we’ll tell you and the Privacy Commissioner as soon as we practicably can, as the Act requires.
Your rights
You can ask for the personal information we hold about you (information privacy principle 6), and ask us to correct it if it’s wrong (principle 7). Email hello@island.nz and tell us what you’d like. We may need to check it’s really you, for example by asking you to write from the address in question.
We’ll respond as soon as we reasonably can, and within 20 working days, as the Act requires. There’s no charge.
If we don’t agree that something needs correcting, you can ask us to attach a statement of the correction you wanted, and we will.
Complaints
If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your information, tell us first at hello@island.nz, so we can try to put it right. If you’re still not satisfied, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz.
Children
Island is written for adults planning travel. We don’t knowingly collect information from children. If you’re under 16, ask a parent or caregiver before you subscribe to the Letter. If you think a child has given us their details, email us and we’ll delete them.
Changes to this policy
If we change how we handle personal information, we’ll update this page and the date at the top. If the change matters and you subscribe to the Letter, we’ll also tell you in the next issue.