Privacy policy

Last updated: 1 October 2026.

THE OBSERVATORY PTE. LTD. (UEN 202644875H), the publisher of The Observatory, is responsible for the personal information we process through this website and our official social media accounts. Our registered office is 10 Anson Road, #20-05 International Plaza, Singapore 079903. You can contact us at privacy@theobservatory.io. Our company details are in Legal.

Our representative for data protection matters in the European Economic Area is Euverify Limited (Ireland), Unit 3D, North Point House, North Point Business Park, New Mallow Road, Cork T23 AT2P, Ireland, email gdpr@euverify.com. Our UK representative is Euverify Ltd (UK), 3rd Floor, 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE, United Kingdom, email gdpr@euverify.com. You may contact the relevant representative or write directly to privacy@theobservatory.io.

The representatives’ appointment can be verified, and data protection requests can also be submitted to them, at https://gdpr.euverify.com/verify/ba863a00-86c3-489e-b06a-fcc78206fcd1.

You can read the public website without creating an account. We do not operate a public payment service or a public comments forum in this version of the website.

Our hosting and security services process technical information needed to deliver and protect the website. This can include your IP address, browser or device information, requested address, request time and diagnostic information. Security reports may also contain technical details of an error or blocked request. We use this information to operate the service, investigate problems and prevent abuse.

Restricted operator functions are separate from public readership. When an authorised operator signs in, a necessary session cookie supports access control and security for 12 hours. It is not used to create a reader profile.

Anonymous audience statistics. Where the law of your country allows measurement of this kind without prior consent, we count readers anonymously: how many people read The Observatory each day, from which country, and which pages they read, with device, browser and operating system categories and the website that referred you. It uses no cookie and stores nothing on your device. It creates no identity we hold: our provider derives a short-lived marker from the request itself and discards it after 24 hours, and we receive totals, never a person.

What we use it for, and what we never use it for. These statistics are used for audience measurement and to improve this website. They are never used for advertising, personalisation, contacting you or building a profile, they are never combined with any other record we hold, and they never follow you to another website.

Your objection. You can object at any time through Privacy choices. It is one click, it is free, it takes effect immediately, and declining the optional measurement described below is a separate and different choice. Where the law of your country requires your prior consent instead, this counting does not run at all until you give it.

Where it does not run. We only count in countries whose own regulator we have read. Everywhere else, and wherever we cannot establish your country, no measurement script runs in your browser at all. Our own servers still record the requests they answer, as any web server does; those records count requests, not people, and they are what make automated crawlers visible to us.

We use an analytics service to measure readership and a performance-monitoring service to assess website performance. Their scripts send limited technical and usage information to our analytics and performance provider. This includes the page address and route, referrer information, approximate location, device and browser information, and event time. The performance-monitoring service also reports network information, performance measurements and technical information identifying the page element involved in a measurement.

The analytics service uses a short-lived hash derived from the incoming request to distinguish visits; the provider describes a 24-hour lifetime for this identification. This is distinct from the retention of measurement records and aggregate reports. These tools do not use analytics cookies in the configuration described here.

Optional audience measurement. With your consent, we also measure readership in more detail — reading sessions, the pages of a visit, the time a page is actually visible, interactions, films watched and whether you return — and we use those results to understand readership, improve the website, choose topics and markets, and plan and assess our communications and campaigns. This is optional, it is off until you allow it, and it is never joined to the anonymous statistics above. We do not include names, email addresses, form contents or customer identifiers in any measurement event.

Measurement records are retained by our analytics provider for at least the 12-month reporting window of our service plan, and possibly longer under the provider's own terms. We retain genuinely anonymous aggregate statistics for historical comparison. The international processing arrangements described below apply to these services.

We also use the reports that search engines provide to website owners about the website’s appearance in search results, such as search impressions, clicks, queries, pages, countries and device categories. We use the reports supplied to us by the search engine; they do not add a visitor-tracking script to this website.

Your choice. Optional audience measurement remains off until you allow it, and you can withdraw it through Privacy choices at any time. Your choice is stored in your browser. When you allow optional audience measurement, a record of that choice is sent to us together with the measurement events, so that each event is tied to a valid consent. When you withdraw it, the measurement record is removed from your browser and we are told to stop using it.

What the website stores in your browser. Only the following items:

• obs-theme (local storage), if you choose a display theme: remembers the presentation you selected until you change it or clear the website’s local storage.
• obs-privacy-choices (local storage): your privacy choices as a small versioned record (version, date, decision and categories), kept for six months. It contains no identifier and no personal information.
• w7-measurement (local storage), only after you allow optional audience measurement: a random device identifier and a session token that connect your measured visits to your choice. It lasts no longer than your choice itself (at most six months) and is deleted from your browser when you withdraw your consent.
• obs_gate (cookie), only while the website is in private preview and only when you enter the private-access password: a strictly necessary cookie that keeps your access open for 30 days. It is not used for measurement or profiling.
• Operator session cookie, only when an authorised operator signs in: described under Operator access above.

When you email us, we receive your email address, the information you choose to provide and relevant correspondence records. We use them to respond, verify a request where necessary and manage the issue you raise. Please avoid sending sensitive personal information or identity documents unless they are needed and we request them.

If you submit a statement for publication, we will identify the statement and attribution intended to be public. Your private contact details and supporting correspondence are not automatically published. Our correction and reply process is explained in Method.

When you register on Follow, we receive your name, work email, organisation, role and country, the markets and companies you choose to follow, whether you want the Brief, and any message you add. We send a verification email first: nothing is followed or sent until you confirm your address with the link it contains. If you did not make the request, you can ignore that email.

We use this information to verify and manage your registration and to send the updates you asked for. The basis is your own request. We keep it while you follow at least one market, company or the Brief, and until you stop following or delete your registration.

You stay in control through the preferences link in every email, or by requesting a new link on the Preferences page: you can pause or stop each item you follow, stop all optional email, or delete your registration.

Optional offers are separate. We send them only if you tick the separate box on the registration form, which is never ticked in advance. These messages may present offers from The Observatory and from AAI KERNEL PTE. LTD. (UEN 202644705E), the separate company incorporated in Singapore that operates AAI Kernel, and only on the subjects you selected. You can withdraw this choice at any time from your preferences, without affecting the updates you follow.

When you interact with our official social media accounts, we may receive your public profile information, comments, messages and the activity or audience reports made available by the platform. We use this information to publish and discuss our readings, respond to enquiries and understand which content reaches our audience. A public comment may be visible to others; a direct message is handled as correspondence. The platform also processes information under its own privacy policy and account settings. Any advertising activity we operate is explained in this policy when enabled.

Our readings describe organisations and the behaviour of search and AI systems. Some source material may also refer to identifiable people, including representatives or sole traders. Where personal information is involved, its public availability does not remove the need for an appropriate purpose and protection. You may contact us about personal information in a publication; we consider the request in its context, including accuracy, privacy, the public record and applicable law.

We use information necessary to provide and protect the website, handle correspondence and maintain an accurate publication record. Where EU or UK data protection law applies, these activities are ordinarily assessed on the basis of our legitimate interests, taking account of the person’s rights. We use information where necessary to comply with legal obligations. Optional measurement, marketing or non-exempt tracking relies on the appropriate separate choice, as explained when that function is offered. We do not treat agreement to the website’s Terms as consent to marketing.

We use service providers for hosting, delivery, storage, communications and security. They receive the information needed for their role: hosting and security services process delivery and diagnostic data; storage and publication services process the material held in those systems; communications services process the correspondence and subscriptions they handle for us. A provider’s role in storing published content does not mean it receives every visitor’s contact information. Advertising partners and a separate recipient of marketing subscriptions are identified in the relevant sections when those services are enabled.

AAI Kernel supplies the governed source intelligence. Search capture, model and image services used in producing that intelligence are separate from ordinary visitor measurement. We do not send your correspondence or contact details to those services merely because you visit the website.

We may disclose information where required by law or where necessary and lawful to address a security issue or protect legal rights. We do not sell website visitors’ personal information or share it for cross-context behavioural advertising in the configuration described here. Service providers may process limited service, security and account information for their own purposes under their applicable privacy terms; this is distinct from using our readers’ contact details for AAI marketing.

We do not use this website to track you across unrelated websites for advertising, and we do not enable advertising partners to do so here. The browser’s legacy Do Not Track setting does not change the necessary delivery and security processing described above. Optional measurement choices are explained in this policy and in Privacy choices. We honour the Global Privacy Control signal for any future site-based advertising activity to which it applies: while the signal is present, personalised advertising cannot be turned on. You may also contact privacy@theobservatory.io with a request concerning sale or sharing, including a Nevada opt-out request.

Our publisher is based in Singapore and our services may process information in other countries. Publication infrastructure includes processing in Singapore, and our providers' delivery networks, support and subprocessors may process information in other countries, including the United States. The location of a publication database or application server does not determine every processing location. Where applicable law requires safeguards for an international transfer, we use the standard contractual clauses adopted by the European Commission and, for UK personal information, the UK addendum to those clauses, as incorporated in our providers' data processing agreements, or an adequacy decision where one applies.

Ordinary contact and press correspondence is kept while the matter is handled and normally for 24 months after it is closed. Selected records may be kept longer where needed for an unresolved dispute, a legal obligation or the protection of legal rights; the reason and continued need are reviewed.

Published corrections and replies may remain with the publication they concern. Supporting private material is limited to what is needed for the issue and any relevant legal period.

We retain historical market readings and genuinely anonymous statistics for long-term comparison and audit where lawful. This is not a commitment to keep every item of personal information indefinitely.

Our own copies of raw operational logs are normally retained for no more than 30 days, except where selected records are needed for an identified incident or legal requirement. Native provider logs and backups follow the retention periods of each provider's service plan, after which the provider deletes or overwrites them; we do not export provider logs to separate storage. Deletion from active systems and expiry from protected backups may occur on different schedules.

Contact privacy@theobservatory.io to ask about your information or exercise applicable rights. Depending on the law and circumstances, these may include access, correction, deletion, restriction, portability and objection. You may withdraw consent for processing based on consent. A request to stop direct marketing will be respected. Rights concerning published information can involve exceptions for lawful publication or legal claims; we will explain the response to your request.

We may ask for proportionate information to verify your identity or authority. We respond within the applicable legal period and do not discriminate against you for exercising a privacy right. If we decline your request, we explain the reason and any available appeal. You can ask us to review the decision by emailing privacy@theobservatory.io with “Privacy appeal” in the subject line; where the law provides a further complaint route, we include it in our response. You may complain to the relevant data protection authority, including Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Commission and, where applicable, your European authority or the UK Information Commissioner.

We use safeguards appropriate to the information and the service, including restricted access to operational functions. No website or transmission method is completely secure. Where an incident triggers a legal notification duty, we will notify the appropriate authority or affected people as required.

The website is intended for a general and professional readership and is not designed to solicit personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided information that should not have been collected, contact us so that we can review it.

We update this policy when our practices change. The date above identifies the current version. We make material changes clear through a notice on this website and, where appropriate and we have a relevant contact address, by direct notification. A new use requiring a separate choice will not be authorised simply by changing this page.