The short version: this site doesn't ask you to create an account, doesn't require you to hand over any personal information to use it, and doesn't sell data to anyone. Here's the fuller version, in plain language rather than dense legal text.
The Groundswell uses your browser's local storage — a mechanism similar to cookies — to remember a few things between visits, purely to make the tool more convenient:
None of this is transmitted to us or to any third party — it stays in your browser, on your device, and you can clear it at any time through your browser's own settings.
When you accept cookies via the banner on this site, you're enabling optional analytics and advertising cookies used for site analytics and, in future, advertising. If you decline, only the essential local storage described above is used; no analytics or advertising cookies are set.
You can change your mind at any time by clearing your browser's site data for The Groundswell, which will bring the cookie banner back on your next visit.
This site pulls live weather, wave, and tide data from several public services to build the conditions you see: Open-Meteo, the Marine Institute's Irish Weather Buoy Network, and Cefas WaveNet. These are one-way data sources — the site requests weather data from them, they don't receive any information about you as an individual beyond the standard technical connection information inherent in any web request (such as your general location, used only to fetch the right regional data).
If you click through to a product on our gear page, you'll leave this site and land on Amazon, where Amazon's own privacy policy and cookies apply, not ours. We use standard Amazon Associates affiliate links, which let Amazon attribute a purchase to this site for commission purposes — we don't receive any personal information about you or your purchase.
Similarly, if you click through to Booking.com to search accommodation, you'll leave this site and Booking's own privacy policy applies. Our affiliate link with them uses a standard tracking pixel to attribute bookings for commission purposes — again, we don't receive any personal information about you or your booking.
If and when Adsterra is active on this site, Adsterra may use cookies to serve and measure advertising, subject to your consent choice above. Adsterra's own privacy policy governs how they handle that data.
What we don't do: we don't require sign-up, we don't collect your name, email, or any personal details through normal use of the site, and we don't sell or share data with anyone for marketing purposes.
Under UK GDPR, you have rights over any personal data held about you, including the right to know what's held, to have it corrected, or to have it deleted. Given this site doesn't collect personal data through normal use, there's generally very little to request — but if you have any question about this, or about anything else on this page, get in touch.
Questions about this policy, or about the site generally: hello@thegroundswell.co.uk
If how this site handles data changes in any meaningful way — for example, when GA4 analytics or AdSense are actually switched on — this page will be updated to reflect that honestly, with the date at the top revised accordingly.