What this site knows about you.
Data Center Record is a public record of data center development. It is not a record of its readers. This page says what the site collects, why, and which companies handle it.
In short
- You can read every page without an account, and the site's own code sets no cookie.
- Three analytics services count visits and watch how pages are used: Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity and Ahrefs Web Analytics. Each is a script from that company, running in your browser. A consent prompt is coming; until it is in place they load with the page.
- Text you type into a form is never recorded by the analytics.
- The site runs on Cloudflare, and Cloudflare's Turnstile checks that a form is sent by a person.
- What you type into a form is stored for 12 months and read by a person. A newsletter address is deleted 30 days after you unsubscribe, and any address is deleted on request within 30 days.
- Contributions go through Stripe on Stripe's own pages. The record never sees a full card number.
- The record takes no money from data center developers, operators or advocacy groups, carries no ads, and does not sell visitor data to anyone.
Reading the site
The pages are static files. Reading them needs no account and no login, and there is nothing to sign up for except the newsletter. The site's own code stores one thing in your browser: whether you chose Reader or Researcher view. That choice never leaves your browser and is not a cookie.
A record page with a map loads aerial imagery from a United States Geological Survey server, so that server receives the request for the map tiles the way any server receives a request for an image.
The detail
The view choice is stored under the key dcr-mode in localStorage by a script in the page layout. The fonts are served from this site, not from a font service. The imagery is the USGS National Map orthoimagery tile service, requested by your browser only on a record page with a located site. The county, city and state maps use boundary files served from this site and no outside tile server.
Analytics
Every public page loads three analytics scripts from the page's head. They exist to show which pages are read, where readers arrive from, and how a page is used, which is how the record decides what to build next. Each one is a script written and run by the company named, and each reports your visit to that company under that company's own privacy policy. A consent prompt is coming. Until it is in place, the scripts load when the page does.
- Google Analytics (GA4), by Google, counts visits and page views. It is used to count visits only. It is not used for advertising and is not linked to any advertising account. Google's privacy policy.
- Microsoft Clarity, by Microsoft, records how a page is used: scrolling, clicks and heatmaps. Microsoft's privacy statement.
- Ahrefs Web Analytics, by Ahrefs, counts visits and page views. Ahrefs's privacy policy.
Every form on the site carries Clarity's masking attribute, so Clarity's recording of a page never includes what is typed.
Cookies. Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity may set cookies of their own; Ahrefs Web Analytics sets none. What each sets is on the vendor's own page: Google Analytics cookies, Clarity cookies, and Ahrefs Web Analytics, which states it works without cookies. A browser setting or extension that blocks any of these scripts does not break any page, because no page depends on them.
The detail
The three tags sit in the head of the one page layout, load asynchronously, and a build check fails the site build when any built page lacks one. Google Analytics runs as the standard gtag script with property G-3CT7PDEJYK and no configuration beyond the default. Clarity runs as the standard tag with project ye6eepyuq3; the tip, contact, correction and newsletter forms carry data-clarity-mask="True", Clarity's documented attribute for masking an element and everything inside it. Ahrefs runs as the standard analytics script with the site's data key. Nothing else from these companies is loaded, and the record's own database holds no analytics data.
Hosting and the bot check
The site is served by Cloudflare. Cloudflare handles every request to deliver and protect the site, and keeps short term logs of those requests under its own privacy policy. The forms on this site use Cloudflare Turnstile, which checks that a form is being sent by a person rather than a script. Turnstile is a script from Cloudflare that runs on the tip, contact and newsletter forms and nowhere else.
The detail
The site is a Cloudflare Worker serving static files; the Worker itself handles only the form and newsletter endpoints and a few redirects. When a form is submitted, the Worker sends the Turnstile token and the sending address to Cloudflare's verification endpoint before anything is stored, and rejects the submission if the check fails. Cloudflare's Workers Logs is on for the site Worker; its log lines carry a submission id and an error code when something fails, never the message or the sender, and Cloudflare keeps them under its own policy. The forms currently run on Cloudflare's published test key, which the form pages say; the check behaves the same way once the real key is issued.
Tips, corrections and the contact form
When you send a tip, a correction, a report of a change on a page, or a message through the contact form, the record stores what you typed: the message, the page or project it is about, a link if you gave one, and your name and email address if you gave them. Both are optional. An address is used only to ask you a follow up question about what you sent.
Each message is stored in the record's database for 12 months and then deleted, and is forwarded by email to the editor. Messages are read by a person. They are not published, and a tip is never itself a source: what enters the record is the document the tip points to.
The detail
The Worker stores each submission as one row in the form_submissions table: the kind (tips, corrections, contact, report a change), the fields typed, the page it came from, the email address if given, the delivery state and the time. The table is not readable by the site or by the public. A weekly job deletes every row older than 12 months. The email forward goes through Resend to the record's own address, with your address as the reply address when you gave one. Nothing about the sending device is stored beyond what the Turnstile check needs.
The newsletter
Signing up stores your email address and the track you chose, the weekly update or the full change log. Nothing is sent until you open the confirmation link, and every issue carries a one tap unsubscribe link. The list is not shared with anyone and is not sold. The newsletter is sent through Resend, an email delivery service, which handles the sending on the record's behalf.
Unsubscribing stops every message at once, and the address is deleted 30 days after the unsubscribe. Any address is deleted on request within 30 days: write to contact@datacenterrecord.org.
The detail
A signup is one row in the subscribers table: the address, the track, a status (pending, confirmed, unsubscribed), a confirmation token, an unsubscribe token, the time of each step, and the word site as the source. The confirmation link and the unsubscribe link carry those random tokens and nothing else. Each issue carries the List-Unsubscribe headers that let a mail client unsubscribe in one tap. An unsubscribe marks the row unsubscribed at once and the weekly retention job deletes it 30 days later. Every message carries the publisher's mailing address in its footer, and no message can send until that address is set.
Contributions
A contribution is made through a Stripe payment link, on a page Stripe runs. Stripe handles the payment; the record never sees a full card number. The email address you give Stripe is used only for your receipt. Payment records are kept as long as tax law requires. Contributions are not tax deductible. Totals are published each quarter on the support page, and supporters are never named unless they ask to be.
The record takes no money from data center developers, operators, tenants or landlords, from utilities or power producers, from their trade associations or lobbyists, or from any advocacy group on any side of a project. The full funding rule and the ownership disclosure are on their own pages.
What the record does not do
- It does not sell, rent or share visitor data with anyone.
- It carries no advertising and no sponsored placement.
- It has no user accounts and keeps no profile of a reader.
- It does not add an address to the newsletter from any form; only the signup box does that, and only after confirmation.
If you are named in the record
The record publishes public statements by named officials, executives and speakers, each with its date and source, as said. If a statement or a fact about you is wrong, write to corrections@datacenterrecord.org with the source that shows the correct information. Corrections are published, dated, on the corrections log.
Who to ask
Data Center Record is owned and operated by Colton Digital Consulting LLC. Questions about this page, and requests to have your message or your newsletter address removed from the record's store, go to the address below. A removal is done within 30 days.
Email: contact@datacenterrecord.org.