Do all bloggers need a Privacy Policy

Ideally yes. You might be running a blog which writes an article or posts a photograph and allows users or readers comments. Apart from this there is no other activity allowed on your blog. Even in this scenario, your comment system will collect the IP address, Email address and Website name of the commenters. This information is stored somewhere. It can be used by you or someone else or might be shared with someone intentionally or otherwise.

Other than a simple blog, you might have a website allows membership. You send out newsletters and hold contests. There might even be a forum or a social networking website using the BuddyPress WordPress Plugin. In all such scenarios, you must have a well defined Privacy Policy.

Every blogging platform has some mechanism to track visitors. In addition the blog is submitted to tracking apps like Google Analytics. It is a good idea to let your visitors know about this in details.

How to make a Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy is a legally worded document. There are three primary ways to make a privacy policy page.

• Write it down on your own
• Use a plugin for WordPress
• Use an online privacy policy generator

or for WordPress Users, copy the Privacy Policy of Automattic, the creators of WordPress. Yes, it is permitted and one WordPress plugin actually does that.

Use of WordPress Plugins to generate privacy policy

WordPress Plugins make life so simpler. But bloggers who are concerned about site speeds should avoid this route as another plugin on your blog will create an overhead. One of the most popular WordPress plugin is Auto Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. This makes a copy of Automattic policy page and amends it for your blog.

Other notable WordPress Plugins are

Guerrilla’s Legal Pages

https://wordpress.org/plugins/guerrillas-legal-pages/

and

Legull

Use an online privacy policy generator

A Google search gives lots of options who generate a free policy online. One such website URL is as follows

https://www.freeprivacypolicy.com/

It features high in Google search results and the presentation is professional enough. They track each act passed by govt and corporations.

Writing down your own policy

Penning down your own policy is actually lots of fun. You can junk the legal tone and write down your thoughts in plain English. Easy enough for most of us to understand. Your policy should primarily cover the following aspects clearly.

• Which visitor info is collected by your website and how
• Who all has access to this info and how they may use it
• If your website has members, the privacy of their personal information
• Info on advertisements on your website and what info they collect
• A link to your website cookie policy
• A link to Contact Us Page

Cover each part in minute details. It is a good idea to read site policy of other websites.

There is only one problem in this approach. There is always a possibility that you must have missed something.

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