Privacy Policy

This website, https://stepanovs.ch (the “Site”), is operated by Roman Stepanovs (“I”, “me”). This policy explains what personal data I collect through the Site, why I collect it, and what rights you have over it.

Data I collect

• Contact form. When you send me a message through the contact form, I collect your name, email address, subject, and the content of your message. I also keep a dated contact record so I can manage our correspondence.
• Newsletter. When you subscribe to the blog newsletter, I collect your email address.
• Security data. The Site processes your IP address, browser information, and bot-check result to prevent automated abuse of public forms. Email addresses are pseudonymised before they are used as rate-limit identifiers.
• Aggregate usage data. Vercel Web Analytics measures information such as pages visited, referring sites, approximate location, device, operating system, and browser type. It provides aggregate statistics without analytics cookies or cross-site visitor tracking.
• Performance data. Vercel Speed Insights measures real-world page performance, including the route, network category, country, device and browser information, Web Vitals, and the page element associated with a performance measurement. Vercel describes these data points as anonymous and not associated with an individual visitor or IP address.

How I use your data

• To reply to the message you sent me, keep a record of our correspondence, and contact you about that enquiry or an ongoing professional relationship.
• To send you new blog posts and occasional updates by email if you subscribed to the newsletter.
• To understand which content readers find useful and improve the Site’s real-world performance.
• To prevent spam, fraud, and abuse of the Site and email service.

I do not sell your personal data and I do not use it for advertising. Sending me an enquiry does not subscribe you to the newsletter.

Legal basis

I process contact form and correspondence data on the basis of my legitimate interest in answering enquiries and maintaining relevant professional relationships. This does not include unrelated promotional outreach. I process newsletter subscriptions separately on the basis of your consent, which you can withdraw at any time by unsubscribing. I process security data on the basis of my legitimate interest in protecting the Site, its visitors, and its service providers. I process aggregate usage and performance data on the basis of my legitimate interest in understanding and improving the Site.

Service providers

The Site is hosted and delivered by Vercel, which also provides cookie-free Web Analytics and Speed Insights. Cloudflare provides Turnstile bot protection. Upstash stores short-lived rate-limit and subscription-confirmation state. Contact form messages and newsletter emails are delivered through Resend, an email service provider. I also use Resend to store contact details and a dated record of relevant interactions for enquiry-related relationship management. These providers process data on my behalf and only to the extent needed to provide their services. You can read the Cloudflare Privacy Policy and the Vercel Privacy Notice.

Retention

I normally keep contact form details and related correspondence for 24 months after the last relevant interaction. I review these records in the first week of January, April, July, and October and delete an expired record at the first quarterly review after that period. I may keep it longer where an active relationship, legal obligation, or the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims requires this. A separate newsletter subscription is kept until you unsubscribe. Unconfirmed newsletter requests expire after 24 hours. Security counters expire automatically, and rate-limit analytics are retained for up to 90 days. On the Site’s current Vercel plan, Vercel Web Analytics has a one-month reporting window and Speed Insights has a seven-day reporting window. Vercel may store Web Analytics data beyond the reporting window to preserve upgrade options.

Cookies

The Site does not use analytics or advertising cookies. Vercel Web Analytics and Vercel Speed Insights use cookie-free scripts or beacons. Vercel Web Analytics discards its short-lived visitor identifier after 24 hours. The Site removes query strings from Vercel analytics events and does not send Vercel analytics or performance events from subscription-confirmation or unsubscribe pages. The Site uses browser storage only where necessary for the Site to function.

Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, or delete your personal data, to restrict or object to its processing, and to data portability. To exercise these rights, email me at contact@stepanovs.ch. You can unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time using the link in every email.

External links

The Site links to third-party websites such as LinkedIn and X. I am not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites.

Changes

I may update this policy from time to time. The date at the top shows when it was last revised.

Contact

Questions about this policy: contact@stepanovs.ch.