This policy explains how PoloniaRoots handles personal data submitted through this website and during a research project.
Data controller: Marcin Polak, sole proprietor trading as PoloniaRoots, Sienna 9, 70-542 Szczecin, Poland. EU VAT ID PL5252912507. REGON 522349247. Privacy requests may be submitted by email to info@poloniaroots.com, through the secure contact form, or by mail.
What we collect
- Contact details you provide: name and email address
- Family and ancestral information you submit through our order and intake forms, which may include details about living relatives
- Documents and images you upload
- Payment confirmation from Stripe. We never receive or store your card details
- Technical server logs kept by our hosting provider for security, such as IP address, browser type and pages requested
Why we collect it
To carry out the research you have paid for, to communicate with you about your case, to meet accounting and tax obligations, and to understand how the site is used.
Information about living people
Order and intake forms often contain details about living relatives. If you send order details but do not complete payment, we do not start any work, and those details are kept only as long as needed to answer your questions. We treat this as sensitive, use it only for your research, and do not publish it.
Who we share it with
- Archives and record offices, to the minimum extent needed to make a specific inquiry
- Stripe, which processes payments under its own privacy terms
- Our hosting provider, which stores the website and its data
We do not sell your data and we do not share it for advertising.
Service providers may process limited data on our behalf where necessary for website hosting, email delivery, secure payment, file storage and technical security. They receive only the information needed for their task and are subject to their own legal and contractual safeguards. A research request may require us to send identifying details to an archive, civil registry, parish or other repository named by the scope of the project.
How long we keep it
We keep inquiries, project correspondence and research files only for as long as needed to provide the service, answer follow-up questions, protect legal claims and meet accounting or tax obligations. When data is no longer required, it is deleted or anonymized. Backup copies expire through the normal backup rotation.
Your rights
You may request a copy of the personal data we hold about you, ask for corrections, or ask for deletion, subject to legal retention obligations.
Submit a privacy request by email to info@poloniaroots.com or through the secure contact form, and write “Privacy request” at the start of your message. You may also send it by mail to the controller address above. We may need to verify your identity before disclosing or deleting personal data.
Cookies and analytics
The website does not load Google Analytics or an advertising tracker. It uses essential technical cookies where required for security, forms and WordPress operation. We also keep daily totals of views of service and order pages, clicks to our services and order pages, and successful order-form submissions that lead to payment. These counters use no cookies, browser storage or visitor identifiers. They record only the date, the public page ID, the type of action and a service code. They do not store names, email addresses, form contents, IP addresses, referring websites or URL query parameters. Counts are retained for up to 90 days and are not shared with an analytics provider. They do not identify unique visitors or confirm purchases. The counters are disabled when your browser sends Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track. Our hosting provider may separately keep technical access logs for security and operation. If analytics that uses identifiers or additional non-essential cookies is enabled later, this policy and the consent controls will be updated before those tools are activated.
Last updated: October 2, 2026