Privacy Policy

1. Who We Are

TNLA26 (digitaldemocracy.xyz) is an independent, citizen-run election dashboard tracking the 2026 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly Elections. We are not affiliated with the Election Commission of India (ECI), any political party, or any government body.

2. What We Collect — and What We Don't

For general visitors (no sign-up required)

• Anonymous analytics: Page views, browser type, and device type. No cookies. No personal identifiers.
• Local preferences: Language (English/Tamil) and theme (light/dark) stored in your browser's localStorage. This data never leaves your device.

For survey participants (optional sign-up)

When you join the post-poll survey, we collect:

• Constituency name (e.g., "Kolathur") — used to show you local results.
• Age range (e.g., "26–35") — optional. Enables demographic breakdowns in results.
• Gender (Male / Female / Other / Prefer not to say) — optional.
• Occupation category (e.g., "IT/Software", "Student") — optional. Enables cross-tab stats like "IT professionals in your constituency voted…"
• First-time voter status (Yes / No / Prefer not to say) — optional.
• Survey responses (who you voted for, key issue, satisfaction rating) — optional per question. Published only as aggregate statistics, never individually.
• Anonymous session token: A random ID stored in an HttpOnly cookie (valid for 30 days). This identifies your device so we can prevent duplicate survey submissions. It cannot be used to identify you personally.
• Browser fingerprint hash: A one-way cryptographic hash (SHA-256) of non-personal browser signals (screen resolution, timezone, language). This helps detect duplicate registrations. The raw signals are never stored.

What we do NOT collect

• ❌ Your name
• ❌ Your email address or phone number
• ❌ Your GPS coordinates or precise location (only the constituency name you confirm is stored)
• ❌ Your Voter ID or Aadhaar number
• ❌ Your IP address (in persistent form — Cloudflare may log it temporarily for security purposes)

3. How We Use Your Data

• Constituency data: To show you your constituency's candidate information and survey results.
• Demographics: To generate aggregate breakdowns (e.g., "What did 26–35 year olds in Kolathur say?"). Never used to identify individuals.
• Survey responses: To compute aggregate statistics displayed on the Results page after 6:30 PM on April 23, 2026 (in compliance with §126A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951).
• Session token: To prevent duplicate survey submissions and to control ad display frequency.

We do not sell, rent, or share your data with any third party for marketing purposes.

4. Legal Basis for Processing (DPDP Act 2023)

Under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023, we process your data on the basis of explicit, informed consent obtained at the time of survey sign-up via a clearly worded, non-pre-checked consent checkbox.

You may withdraw consent at any time by deleting your data (see Section 6 below). Withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of processing before withdrawal.

5. Election Law Compliance

This survey collects responses on election day (April 23, 2026), but aggregate results are not published until 6:30 PM on April 23, 2026, after polling closes — in compliance with Section 126A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, which prohibits publishing exit poll results while voting is in progress.

All results are clearly labelled as unofficial citizen survey data, not affiliated with ECI or any political party.

6. Your Rights — Data Deletion

You have the right to request deletion of all data associated with your session at any time. To do so:

• Self-serve: Visit your survey profile and click "Delete my data". This immediately removes your user profile and survey response from our database.
• Via email: Contact us at privacy@tnla26.in from any email address with the subject "Data Deletion Request". We will delete your data within 7 days.

Automatic deletion: All user profiles and individual survey responses are automatically deleted 90 days after election results are declared. Only anonymised aggregate statistics (e.g., "total % voted DMK in Kolathur") are retained permanently.

7. Cookies & Session Tokens

If you join the survey, we set one HttpOnly, SameSite=Strict cookie containing your anonymous session token. This cookie:

• Cannot be read by JavaScript (prevents XSS attacks)
• Is not shared with any third party
• Expires after 30 days
• Is also used to control ad display frequency (ads shown no more than once every 5–10 minutes per session)

For general visitors who do not sign up, we set no cookies whatsoever.

8. Third-Party Services

• Cloudflare: Our site is hosted on Cloudflare Pages and uses Cloudflare Workers for API endpoints. Subject to Cloudflare's Privacy Policy.
• Ad networks: If ads are displayed, they are served by third-party networks with their own privacy policies. These ads may use their own cookies, which are outside our control. We encourage you to review your browser's cookie blocking options.

9. Children's Privacy

The survey is intended for registered voters (age 18+). We do not knowingly collect data from anyone under 18. If you believe a minor has submitted survey data, contact us at privacy@tnla26.in.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy. Significant changes will be announced on the home page. The "Last updated" date above reflects the most recent revision.

11. Contact

For privacy-related questions or data deletion requests:
📧 privacy@tnla26.in