Privacy
Privacy
What happens when you use The Name Journal, in plain language.
When you search for a name
The name you type is sent to our server securely over HTTPS, inside the request itself rather than in the web address. That means it does not appear in your address bar or in your browser history.
We use the name to provide the search result and operate the service.
Automatic name overviews
If a name does not yet have a full profile in the Journal, the site may show a short automatic overview of its meaning and origin instead. To create it, our server sends the name you searched to OpenAI, an AI service provider. Only the name is sent, with our own standard instructions; no other information about you or your visit is included.
To find the meaning, OpenAI may run a web search, which our site limits to two name reference sites: Behind the Name and Wiktionary. Links to the pages it used are shown with the overview. If you open one of those links, you leave our site and that site’s own privacy policy applies.
Our request asks OpenAI not to store it for later use. That does not mean nothing is kept: under OpenAI’s standard API terms, request content may be kept in abuse-monitoring logs for up to 30 days, or longer if the law requires it. OpenAI states that data sent through its API is not used to train its models unless the customer opts in.
How long a searched name is kept
A searched name may be kept temporarily on our systems for no longer than 15 minutes. After that, it is removed automatically, normally within about a minute. We do not keep a history of the names people search for.
Protecting the search from misuse
To stop automated programs from flooding the search, we limit how many searches can arrive from one network in a short time. To do this, your network (IP) address is scrambled together with a private key into a code that cannot be turned back into your address without that key. The code changes every minute and is deleted within a couple of minutes. Our application does not store your IP address itself.
What we do not do
- We do not ask you to create an account or give us your contact details.
- We do not show advertising or use advertising or analytics trackers.
- These public pages do not set cookies.
- We do not sell searched names or use them for marketing or profiling.
Our service providers
The site runs on third-party hosting and database services. Like most online services, they may keep limited technical records of requests, such as the time of a request and the network address it came from, under their own policies.
Changes to this page
If the way the site handles information changes, we will update this page and the date at the top.