Privacy Policy

GoodNews Junction ("we", "us", "our") is a Christian news and media aggregator operated from Uganda. We surface uplifting, faith-affirming stories from around the world and provide a platform for community members to share their own testimonies and stories.

This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, store, and protect your personal data when you visit goodnewsjunction.com or interact with our services, including our weekly digest, community story submissions, and contact form.

This policy is written to comply with Uganda's Data Protection and Privacy Act, 2019 (DPPA) and, where applicable to visitors from the European Economic Area or United Kingdom, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and UK GDPR.

Information you provide voluntarily:

• Story submissions: Your full name, email address, country, story title, story content, and any image you choose to upload.

• Weekly digest subscriptions: Your email address when you subscribe to receive our digest.

• Contact form: Your name, email address, and the content of your message.

Information collected automatically:

• Server logs: Your IP address, browser type and version, operating system, referring URL, pages visited, and timestamps. This data is used solely for security monitoring and aggregate traffic analysis.

• Session cookies: A temporary session cookie is set to support story-submission and admin workflows. It expires when you close your browser.

• Analytics cookies (with consent only): If you consent via our cookie banner, a first-party analytics cookie may be set to help us understand how readers use the site. You may withdraw consent at any time.

We do not use advertising cookies, third-party tracking pixels (including Facebook Pixel or Google Ads tags), or any cross-site behavioural tracking.

We process your personal data on the following legal bases:

• Consent — for analytics cookies and for subscribing to our weekly digest. You may withdraw consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of prior processing.

• Contract performance — to process your story submission and communicate with you about it.

• Legitimate interests — for server security logging and aggregate traffic analysis, where our interest in operating a secure and functional website does not override your rights.

• Legal obligation — where we are required by law to retain or disclose data.

For visitors in the EEA or UK, these bases correspond to Article 6 of the GDPR. For all users, they align with the lawful grounds set out in the Uganda DPPA.

We use the information we collect to:

• Review, moderate, and (with your permission) publish submitted stories on the site and our social media channels.

• Send you a confirmation email when you submit a story or contact us.

• Send you our weekly digest if you have subscribed.

• Respond to your contact form messages.

• Monitor and improve site performance and security.

• Comply with applicable laws and respond to lawful requests from authorities.

We do not sell, rent, trade, or otherwise share your personal information with third parties for their own marketing purposes.

When you submit a story or testimony, you grant GoodNews Junction a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to publish, edit for clarity and length, and share your story on the site and our social media channels, with attribution to your name (or anonymously, if you request it).

All submissions are reviewed by our editorial team before publication. We reserve the right to decline or remove any submission that does not meet our community standards.

Your email address is used only to communicate with you about your submission and is never displayed publicly.

If you upload an image with your submission, you confirm that you own the image or have the right to share it, and that it does not infringe any third-party rights.

You may request removal of a published story at any time by contacting us. We will action removal requests within 14 days.

When you subscribe to our weekly digest, we store your email address for the sole purpose of sending you the digest.

Every digest email includes an unsubscribe link. Clicking it will immediately remove your email address from our mailing list.

We do not share subscriber email addresses with any third party. Digest emails are delivered via a transactional email service; your address is transmitted to that service solely to deliver the email.

• Contact form messages: Retained for up to 12 months, then deleted unless an ongoing correspondence requires longer retention.

• Story submissions: Retained as part of our editorial archive for as long as the story remains published. Unpublished or rejected submissions are deleted within 90 days. You may request earlier deletion.

• Digest subscriber emails: Retained until you unsubscribe or request deletion.

• Server log data: Automatically purged after 30 days.

• Session cookies: Expire at the end of your browser session.

When data is no longer needed for the purpose for which it was collected, we securely delete or anonymise it.

GoodNews Junction uses the following third-party services. Each has its own privacy policy:

• Wikipedia REST API — used to fetch "Today in History" events. No personal data is transmitted.

• RSS feed providers — we aggregate publicly available RSS feeds from Christian news organisations. No personal data is shared.

• Transactional email service — used to deliver story-submission confirmations, contact-form acknowledgements, and weekly digest emails. Your email address is transmitted to this service solely to deliver your message and is not used by the service for any other purpose.

• Daily Bible Facts — used to fetch the Bible Fact of the Day. No personal data is transmitted.

We do not use Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, Google Ads, or any other advertising or cross-site tracking service.

GoodNews Junction is operated from Uganda. If you access the site from outside Uganda — including from the European Economic Area, United Kingdom, or elsewhere — your data may be transferred to and processed in Uganda.

For EEA and UK visitors, we rely on your explicit consent (where applicable) and our legitimate interests as the basis for any such transfer, and we take reasonable steps to ensure your data is handled securely.

Where we use third-party service providers based outside Uganda, we ensure appropriate safeguards are in place in accordance with the Uganda DPPA and, where applicable, GDPR Chapter V.

Under the Uganda Data Protection and Privacy Act 2019 and, where applicable, the GDPR, you have the following rights:

• Right of access: Request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.

• Right to rectification: Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete data.

• Right to erasure ("right to be forgotten"): Request deletion of your personal data, subject to our legal obligations.

• Right to restrict processing: Ask us to limit how we use your data in certain circumstances.

• Right to data portability: Receive your data in a structured, machine-readable format (where processing is based on consent or contract).

• Right to object: Object to processing based on legitimate interests.

• Right to withdraw consent: Where processing is based on consent, you may withdraw it at any time without affecting prior processing.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us via our Contact page. We will respond within 30 days. We may need to verify your identity before actioning your request.

If you are in the EEA or UK and are not satisfied with our response, you have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection supervisory authority.

We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal data against unauthorised access, accidental loss, destruction, or disclosure. These include encrypted connections (HTTPS), access controls, and regular security reviews.

No method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure. While we strive to protect your data, we cannot guarantee absolute security. In the event of a data breach that is likely to result in a risk to your rights and freedoms, we will notify affected individuals and relevant authorities as required by law.

GoodNews Junction is a general-audience news site. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13 (or 16 where required by local law). If you believe a child has submitted personal information to us, please contact us immediately and we will delete it promptly.

We use the following types of cookies:

• Strictly necessary cookies: A session cookie required for the story-submission and admin workflows. This cookie does not track you and is deleted when you close your browser. No consent is required for this cookie.

• Analytics cookies (consent required): If you accept analytics via our cookie banner, a first-party cookie is set to help us understand site usage. You may decline or withdraw consent at any time by clicking the cookie settings link in the footer.

We do not use advertising, retargeting, or third-party tracking cookies.

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or applicable law. When we do, we will revise the "Last updated" date at the top of this page.

For material changes, we will take reasonable steps to notify you — for example, by posting a notice on the homepage or (for digest subscribers) including a note in the next digest.

Continued use of the site after changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy.

If you have any questions, concerns, or requests relating to this Privacy Policy or how we handle your personal data, please contact us via our Contact page.

We are committed to resolving privacy concerns promptly and fairly. If you are not satisfied with our response, you may escalate your complaint to the Personal Data Protection Office of Uganda or, if you are in the EEA or UK, to your local data protection authority.