Privacy policy

Effective September 9, 2026 · Canary Civic LLC dba Know Your Block

This page says exactly what Know Your Block collects when you use it, who else sees it, what the site never does, and how to turn the analytics off. It is written to be read, not skimmed past. If anything here is unclear, ask.

The short version

  • There are no accounts, no sign-in, no ads, and nothing is sold. We never ask for your name or email unless you write to us.
  • We use three analytics tools (Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, Vercel Analytics) to see which features get used and where the site breaks. You can switch them off in one click, and we honor the Global Privacy Control signal automatically.
  • The address you look up becomes part of the page's web address, so those analytics tools can record it. Turn analytics off if that matters to you.
  • Addresses that aren't already in our dataset are sent to OpenStreetMap's geocoder to be located. Map tiles come from CARTO and fonts from Google, so those services see your IP address like any website's image or font server does.
  • The site itself stores one thing in your browser: the width of a panel. Plus the analytics-off switch, if you use it.
  • The complaint records on the map are City of Columbus public records about properties. We don't add to them, and we strip phone numbers from them. If one names you, read this.

Who "we" are

Know Your Block is operated by Canary Civic LLC, an Ohio limited liability company doing business as Know Your Block. In practice that is one person, Gabriel Peck, in Columbus, Ohio. "We" on this page means the company; the person reading your email is Gabe. Reach us at gabe@knowyourblock.org.

What this site never does

  • No accounts. Nothing to sign up for, so there is no profile of you to keep.
  • No advertising. No ad networks, no ad pixels, no retargeting, no "sponsored" anything.
  • No selling or renting data. Not to brokers, not to landlords, not to anyone. Not now and not later without changing this page first.
  • No fingerprinting or cross-site tracking by our own code. The only third-party scripts on the site are the three analytics tools listed below, and you can turn them off.
  • No social-media plugins. Sharing is a plain link.
  • No paid placement or removal. There is no mechanism for a property owner to pay to change what the map shows, and no mechanism for anyone to buy the list of addresses people look up.

What we collect, and who else sees it

Everything below happens in your browser when you load a page. There is no Know Your Block server that logs what you do; the site is static files, and the map runs on your device.

Analytics

  • Google Analytics 4 Records page views and the interaction events listed below, with your rough location (from your IP address, which Google truncates), device and browser type, and a cookie (_ga) that recognizes the same browser on a return visit. Google processes this under its own privacy policy. We do not turn on Google's advertising features.
  • Microsoft Clarity Session replay and heatmaps: where you click, scroll, and move the pointer, and what the page looked like while you did. Clarity masks what you type into fields, but a replay can still show which addresses you looked up, because they appear on the page and in the page's web address. Clarity sets cookies (_clck, _clsk) and processes data under Microsoft's privacy statement.
  • Vercel Analytics Page views and the same interaction events, without cookies. Visitors are counted with a hash that changes every day, so it cannot follow one person across days. Vercel's privacy policy applies.
  • The events Which category or sub-filter you toggled, the hotspot switch, the map mode (heatmap, scatter, markers), that a share link was copied, that a Block Report was opened, that the splash was dismissed, whether an address search found a match and where you started it from (typed, hero card, sample button, or "use my location"), and a load-failure signal for bug hunting. The address itself is not in any event.
  • The page address All three tools record the web address of the page you are on. When you look up an address on the map, that address is written into the page's web address (after the #) so the report can be shared and bookmarked. That means the analytics tools can see which addresses were looked up alongside the rest of the session. This is the one place where something you type reaches a third party through analytics, and the switch below stops it.
  • In the dataset If the address you type is one the city has records for, it is matched inside your browser against data already downloaded. Nothing is sent anywhere.
  • Not in the dataset If there is no match, the text you typed (plus ", Columbus, OH") is sent to Nominatim, the OpenStreetMap Foundation's geocoder, to find the point on the map. Nominatim sees that text and your IP address, under the OSM Foundation privacy policy. We do not store the query.
  • Use my location Only when you choose it, and only after your browser asks your permission. Your coordinates are sent to the same OpenStreetMap geocoder to turn them into a street address, then used to center the map. We never store your location and it is not sent to our analytics tools. Deny the browser prompt and nothing happens.

Map tiles, fonts, hosting

  • Map tiles The base map images come from CARTO. Like any image server, CARTO sees your IP address and which tiles you requested, which reveals roughly what part of the city you were looking at.
  • Fonts Typefaces load from Google Fonts, which sees your IP address and browser type. Google says it does not use Fonts requests for tracking.
  • Hosting The site is served by Vercel. Like any host, Vercel may keep short-lived request logs (IP address, browser type, page requested) for security and operations. We do not have a server of our own and do not keep access logs.

When you write to us

  • Email We get what you send: your email address, the message, and any attachments. It is used to answer you, fix a record, or handle a request, and for nothing else. We don't add you to any list.
  • Contact form The "send a message without email" option is a Google Form. Whatever you type goes to Google Forms and into the same inbox. Google's privacy policy applies to the form itself.

Stored in your browser

  • By us One value in local storage: the width you dragged the side panel to (cci_panel_w), so it stays put next time. Plus kyb-analytics if you use the switch below. That is the complete list. Our own code sets no cookies.
  • By analytics Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity set their own cookies, named above, when they load. They do not load if the switch below is off or your browser sends Global Privacy Control.

Why we collect it

To find out which parts of the site people actually use and which parts confuse them, to catch bugs we can't reproduce ourselves, and to see how people arrive. That is the whole list. Nothing here is used to make decisions about you, build a profile of you, or contact you.

Turn analytics off

Checking your setting…

The switch is saved in this browser's local storage, so it applies to this browser on this device and resets if you clear site data. It stops Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, and Vercel Analytics from loading on every Know Your Block page from the next page you open. It does not delete cookies those tools already set; clear them in your browser settings if you want them gone.

Global Privacy Control. If your browser or an extension sends the GPC signal, we treat it as this switch being off, automatically, on every page. Nothing to click. We do not act on the older Do Not Track header, which browsers have retired.

Other ways. Content blockers and privacy extensions block all three tools cleanly, and the site works normally without them. The map, the search, and every page work exactly the same with analytics off.

How long things are kept

  • Google Analytics Event-level data for at most 14 months, then only aggregate reports (counts, not sessions).
  • Microsoft Clarity Session recordings for 30 days; heatmap and aggregate data for up to 13 months, per Microsoft's retention.
  • Vercel Analytics Aggregate page and event counts. The daily visitor hash is not kept as a record of you.
  • OpenStreetMap, CARTO, Google Fonts, Vercel hosting Their own short-lived operational logs, under their own policies. We receive nothing from them.
  • Your emails As long as needed to deal with them. Correction and removal requests are kept as a record of what was changed and why.

People and properties in the records

The complaints on the map are public records held by the City of Columbus, retrieved from the city's Accela portal and ArcGIS service. They are about properties: an address, a record type, a date, a status, and the narrative the city published. We do not add names, we do not identify who filed a complaint, and we do not know. Before publishing, we strip phone numbers that appear in the city's narrative text; the rest of the text is shown as the city released it, because editing it would make the record less truthful, not more.

Two things follow from that. First, we cannot tell you who complained about a property, because we do not have that information. Second, if a narrative names or describes you in a way that is wrong, out of date, or harmful, write to us through the corrections route. We review every request and can correct how a record is shown here. The underlying public record belongs to the city; changing or removing it is a request to the city, and we can point you to the right office.

Neighborhood and issue pages deliberately do not name individual addresses at all; they work at the block-range level. Address-level detail is only shown when someone searches for that address.

Children

The site is not directed to children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect anything from them. Because there are no accounts and no forms apart from the contact options above, there is nothing for a child to submit; if you believe a child has emailed us, tell us and we will delete it.

Security

The site is served only over HTTPS. There is no database of visitor information to breach: the site is static files, and the only personal information we hold is email correspondence, kept in a standard mail account with two-factor authentication. Analytics data lives with the providers named above under their security practices.

Where data goes

Know Your Block is built for people in Columbus, Ohio, and is operated from the United States. The services named above process data in the United States and, for some of them, elsewhere under their own policies. If you are visiting from outside the US and want to know what we hold about you, ask; the honest answer will usually be "nothing beyond what you emailed us," and we will confirm it.

Your rights, whatever your zip code

You do not need to live somewhere with a privacy law to get these. Email us and we will: tell you what we hold about you (normally only your own emails), delete it, correct it, or stop using it. We will answer within 30 days, usually much faster, and we will never treat you differently for asking. We have no data to "sell" or "share" under any state's definition, so there is nothing to opt out of on that front.

Changes to this page

If what the site collects changes, this page changes first, and the effective date at the top moves. The one-line record:

  • September 9, 2026. First version. Added the analytics switch and Global Privacy Control support at the same time.

Questions

Email gabe@knowyourblock.org or use the contact page. Canary Civic LLC dba Know Your Block, Columbus, Ohio.