Privacy policy
As of 30 October 2026 · This is a translation; the German version is legally binding.
1. In short
WorldWatchers needs no account, sets no cookies, shows no ads and uses no third-party analytics or tracking services. We count visits ourselves, only as anonymous daily totals (see 5). Everything your page loads (including the map images) comes from our own server in Germany. We do not pass your IP address on to map services or other third parties. The only exception: you start a YouTube video or live TV yourself (see 10). Before that, your browser has no contact with YouTube.
2. Controller
Danijel Bogdanovic (private individual, portfolio: CreatorMediaX)
Elsässer Str. 36, 81667 München, Germany
kontakt@creatormediax.de · +49 89 20175153
3. Hosting
The site runs on our servers at Hetzner Online GmbH, Industriestr. 25, 91710 Gunzenhausen, Germany, in data centres in Germany. Hetzner processes the data on our behalf (Art. 28 GDPR).
4. Server logs and protection against attacks
With every request, our server processes technically necessary data: IP address, time, requested address, status code, amount of data transferred and your browser's identifier. We keep these logs for at most five weeks; after that they are deleted automatically.
We analyse the logs on our own servers in Germany to detect and fend off attacks. IP addresses from which attacks originate (e.g. mass requests or scanning for security holes) are blocked automatically for a limited time. The IP address of a detected attacker is reported automatically to the CrowdSec security network (CrowdSec SAS, France) so that other operators can protect themselves too; after our manual review it may additionally be reported to AbuseIPDB (USA). We may have individual attack incidents analysed with the help of AI. For this, the incident data is first pseudonymised (IP addresses and other identifiers replaced by placeholders) and transmitted via the intermediary service OpenRouter (OpenRouter Inc., USA) to a language model by Mistral AI (France) that is operated in the EU; storage for training purposes is excluded. Normal visits are not affected.
To prevent overload, we also count requests per IP address per minute. This count is held only in memory and discarded after two minutes at the latest.
The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR. Our legitimate interest is the secure and stable operation of the site.
5. Visitor counting
So that we know how many people use WorldWatchers, we count page views on our own server, without cookies and without third-party services. For this we form a checksum from your IP address, your browser's identifier and a random value that exists in memory for one day only. This lets us recognise repeated views on the same day, but we cannot recognise you across days or recover the IP address. Only aggregated daily figures are stored: number of views and visitors, pages viewed, the website you came from (only the site's name), device type (phone or computer), browser language and the country (derived from the IP address via a database on our server, without any external request), as well as how often features such as “open event” or “translate” are used. We keep these daily figures for at most 13 months. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR; our legitimate interest is developing the service according to demand.
6. Suggesting sources
If you suggest a source via the form in the sources window, we store the source's address, the other details about the source, your reasoning, the time and, if you provide it, your e-mail address for follow-up questions. We use this information only to review the suggestion and, if necessary, reply to you, and delete it no later than 12 months after receipt. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (handling your suggestion).
7. Settings in your browser
Which layers you have switched on, the chosen language, the map view (globe or flat), your alert selection including access identifier if alerts are on and, if you tick “don't ask again”, your consent to loading YouTube videos are remembered by your browser in local storage (localStorage). This information stays on your device and is not transmitted to us. It only serves to keep the view you want (§ 25(2) no. 2 TDDDG). You can delete it at any time in your browser settings.
8. Translation of headlines
If you click “Translate”, we send the displayed headlines and teaser texts via the intermediary service OpenRouter (OpenRouter Inc., USA) to a language model by Mistral AI (France) that is operated in the EU; storage for training purposes is excluded. Only these public texts are transmitted, no data about you (no IP address, no identifier). Insofar as data reaches the USA via OpenRouter, this is based on EU standard contractual clauses or the EU-US Data Privacy Framework.
9. News sources and links
Our server itself fetches the reports, weather data (MET Norway) and satellite images (NASA) from the news sources, authorities and measurement networks; your browser has no contact with them. Only when you click a link do you leave WorldWatchers and open the respective provider's site; its own privacy policy then applies. Some links lead to the actual report via Google News (Google Ireland Ltd.). Our server receives posts by selected newsrooms and organisations on Bluesky via Bluesky's public data stream (Bluesky Social PBC, USA); your browser has no contact with Bluesky until you open a post there.
10. YouTube videos and live TV
For some events we show videos from news channels on YouTube; there is also a live TV window. Our server loads the preview images from YouTube itself and delivers them to you. Our server also uses the YouTube interface to check which channels are currently live and which of our channels' videos match an event. No information about you goes to YouTube in the process. The video player is only loaded when you click “Load video” (two-click solution). From then on your browser loads content directly from YouTube (Google Ireland Ltd., Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland; parent company Google LLC, USA). In particular your IP address, device and browser details and the address of our page are transmitted; a transfer to the USA is possible (EU-US Data Privacy Framework). We embed the player in cookie-free mode (youtube-nocookie.com); YouTube may nevertheless store its own data when playing. The legal basis is your consent by clicking (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR, § 25(1) TDDDG). You can withdraw it by deleting the stored setting in your browser (see 7). More: Google's privacy policy.
11. Alerts (push notifications)
If you switch on alerts under “🔔”, your browser first asks for permission. It then creates an anonymous push address with the push service of your browser vendor (e.g. Google, Mozilla, Apple, Microsoft). We store only this address, your selection (countries, types, thresholds, keyword), a random identifier and a check value of the secret that exists only on your device – no name, no e-mail, no location. Via the push service we only send an empty signal; the app then fetches the notification text directly from us. We delete cached notifications when they are fetched.
The legal basis is your consent (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR, § 25(1) TDDDG). “Turn off alerts” deletes everything immediately; if your browser ends the push address, we delete the entry automatically at the next attempt. Unused entries are deleted after 12 months at the latest.
12. Contact by e-mail
If you write to us, we process your details to answer your request (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR) and delete them when they are no longer needed for this.
13. Your rights
You have the right of access (Art. 15 GDPR), rectification (Art. 16), erasure (Art. 17), restriction of processing (Art. 18), data portability (Art. 20) and to object to processing based on legitimate interests (Art. 21). Contact kontakt@creatormediax.de for this.
You can also lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority. Responsible for us is the Bavarian State Office for Data Protection Supervision (BayLDA), Promenade 18, 91522 Ansbach, Germany.