Privacy notice

This page describes the data Parallax processes, as the service processes it today. The controller is Atlas Digital SRL.

To read

Reading Parallax needs no account. No audience-tracking or advertising cookie is set.

With an account

Parallax stores your e-mail address, which is never shown, your password in a form that cannot be reversed, your pseudonym, the date you accepted the rules and declared your age, then your positions, arguments, reactions, reports and appeals. When you sign in or sign up, your IP address is used to limit abusive attempts: it stays in memory for a minute at most and is not stored.

With Mastodon

If you sign in with Mastodon, Parallax asks your server only to read your account: it keeps that account's id on your server and its address (@name@server), to recognise you, then gives back at once the access your server granted. It reads neither your posts nor your follows and posts nothing on your behalf. Since Mastodon shares no e-mail address, your Parallax account asks for one, which it confirms as for any account. You unlink Mastodon from your account.

Why

This data runs your account and the debates. It is also used to moderate messages under the European Digital Services Act (DSA): every decision gives its reason and can be appealed.

Posts and images

Your posts, their images and their videos are kept until you delete them. Before it is kept, each image is copied by Parallax without its metadata, the place where it was taken included. Its text is read automatically and, with the image and your post, sent without your address or your pseudonym to Anthropic (United States) for the moderation and, if it lacks context, for a note of context. A video is copied by Parallax without its metadata, cut to an excerpt of three minutes at most that you choose. A few frames of each video, drawn by Parallax, are sent likewise for the moderation; no person watches them. Deleting a post or your account erases its text and files, except those a removal for terrorism or the sexual abuse of a minor keeps as evidence. Parallax also notes, once, which posts and messages you read, to count their readers: only that number is shown, and the record goes with your account.

Automated analysis

When automated moderation is on, the text of your arguments is sent, without your address or your pseudonym, to Anthropic (United States), Parallax's artificial intelligence provider. The framing analysis only processes press titles and excerpts, with no personal data. When the team decides against the AI's decision, an anonymised excerpt of the message (without links, addresses, pseudonyms or numbers) may serve as an example to the automated moderation for 90 days at most.

Reporting without an account

To report a message without an account, you may leave your name and e-mail address: they are used to send you the receipt and the decision (Digital Services Act, article 16), then erased as soon as the decision is sent. The reason and your explanation stay with the decision. Without an address, nothing of you is kept.

Notifications

If you turn them on, Parallax keeps your browser's notification address and its encryption keys. Each notification travels encrypted through your browser's push service (Google, Mozilla, Apple or Microsoft, depending on the browser) and holds only numbers, never a name or a message. The daily digest, if you turn it on, goes to your confirmed address through our e-mail provider, Brevo (France). You turn them off from your account.

The fediverse

Parallax publishes on the fediverse (Mastodon and the open networks that speak ActivityPub) the title, the question and the coverage of each analysed event. Your messages go out there only if you chose it in your account, with your pseudonym, never your address. Your followers' servers keep a copy: when a message leaves the debate, when you switch the option off or delete your account, Parallax asks them to erase it, without being able to guarantee that they do.

How long

Your data is kept as long as your account exists. When you delete it, your positions, reactions, reports and appeals are erased; your arguments stay in place so that the replies keep their meaning, but without their text or any link to you.

Your rights

From your account, you can correct your pseudonym, download all your data and delete your account. For any other request, write to contact@atlasdigital.be. You can also lodge a complaint with the Data Protection Authority in Belgium.

Cookies

Three cookies at most, all needed by the service: your session's when you sign in, the language's when you choose one, and the theme's when you choose light or dark. None is used to track you. Your browser also keeps two settings, on your device only: that you have seen the introduction, and the Mastodon server you share a debate to. While you sign in with Mastodon, two cookies of a few minutes are added: one checks that your server's answer matches your request, the other keeps the recognised account while yours is created.