Policy
Privacy
What AskReformation collects, why, who processes it, how long it is kept, and how to export or delete it.
AskReformation is a free library of Reformation and Puritan writings with an AI assistant. This page explains what we collect when you use the website, why, and what you can do about it. The separate connector privacy statement covers AskReformation when you use it from your own AI assistant.
What we collect
If you create an account. Your email address and, if you add one, a display name. We sign you in with a six-digit code sent to your email; the code is stored only as a scrambled hash and expires after ten minutes.
If you ask questions without an account. A guest session cookie, so the site can remember your conversation and count your free questions.
Your conversations. Your questions and the assistant's answers, including the library passages it looked up, are saved so you can return to them. You can delete any conversation, or all of them, at any time. A guest's conversations are deleted after 30 days without use unless you create an account, in which case they move to your account.
Your reading, if you're signed in. In the reader's Reading view, where you are in each book (so it can open where you left off), the pages you bookmark and the words you highlight, with the colour you chose. You can remove any bookmark or highlight from the reader's notebook.
Usage records. For each answer we record the time, the mode (quick or deep), how much text the AI processed, the estimated cost, which library tools it used and how long it took. To enforce fair-use limits we also keep a scrambled version of your IP address that changes every day; we don't store the address itself.
Page views. We count page views without cookies: the page, the site that linked to it, the type of device, and a visitor code that changes daily, so a visitor can't be followed from one day to the next. We don't use third-party trackers or advertising. If your browser sends Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control, we don't count your visits.
The newsletter, if you subscribe. Your email address, when and how you agreed to receive it, and whether each newsletter was delivered, opened or clicked. Every newsletter has an unsubscribe link.
Feedback. If you rate an answer or add a note, we keep it with that answer.
Who can see your conversations
The site's operator can read questions and answers to keep the service accurate and safe: to fix wrong answers, to stop abuse, and to see which topics deserve articles. We don't sell or share them, and we don't use them to train AI models.
Who processes your data for us
- DeepSeek generates the answers. To answer a question, the text of the conversation (your question, earlier messages in the same conversation, and the passages the assistant reads) is sent to DeepSeek's API, which is operated from the People's Republic of China. Please don't include personal or sensitive information in your questions.
- Amazon Web Services sends our emails (Amazon SES) and stores backups and article images (Amazon S3), in the United States.
- Cloudflare runs the bot check on sign-in and guest questions (Turnstile) and our domain's DNS.
- Our hosting provider runs the server and the database.
Each of these handles data only to provide its service to us.
Cookies
- A session cookie that keeps you signed in, or keeps your guest conversation.
- Cookies that remember your display choices on this device: light or dark, modern or original spelling, the side pane, and the reader's view, type size and margin notes.
- Cloudflare Turnstile may set cookies needed for its bot check.
We don't use advertising or analytics cookies.
How long we keep data
- Account data, conversations, and your reading (place, bookmarks, highlights): until you delete them or your account.
- Guest sessions and their conversations: 30 days after last use.
- Usage records: kept for statistics; they hold no conversation text and no IP address.
- Newsletter records: until you unsubscribe; we then keep your address on a do-not-email list so we never send you anything again.
- Backups: up to 14 days (daily) and 8 weeks (weekly).
Your choices
- Download your data from your account page.
- Delete conversations one by one or all at once, or delete your account, which removes your conversations, reading, sessions and newsletter subscription.
- Unsubscribe from the newsletter with the link in any email.
- Ask us about anything here, or to correct or delete your data, at hello@askreformation.com.
If you live in the UK, the European Economic Area or another place with data protection laws, you have rights to access, correct, delete and move your data, and to object to how it's used. Contact us to use them, or complain to your local data protection authority.
Children
AskReformation isn't directed at children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect their data.
Changes
If we change this policy, we'll update this page and its date. For significant changes we'll tell account holders by email.