Data Retention Policy

Our approach Swindon Now keeps personal information only for as long as it is reasonably needed for editorial, operational, security, legal, accounting or service purposes. Our retention controls are enforced automatically by a nightly system job, with safeguards for records that need to be kept longer because of a complaint, dispute or other legitimate reason. Published editorial content Published articles are normally retained on the public website for up to 1 year 365 days . After that period, they may be automatically removed as part of our editorial and platform-retention process. We may retain an article for longer where there is a continuing editorial, legal, historical, public-interest or operational reason to do so. Articles may also be removed earlier where appropriate. Removing an article from public view does not necessarily mean that every associated editorial record is immediately erased. We may retain a limited editorial record where this is reasonably necessary for accuracy, corrections, accountability, legal claims or the historical record of our publishing activity. Story submissions Unpublished or rejected story submissions are normally retained for 1 year 365 days after the submission is closed or rejected, unless there is a continuing editorial, legal or operational reason to keep them. Where a submission results in a published article, we normally remove or anonymise unnecessary contributor contact details and related conversation data after 1 year 365 days . We may retain a limited editorial source record, including information needed to support the published article, attribution, corrections or editorial accountability. Contact messages Ordinary contact messages are normally deleted 6 months 180 days after they are resolved or archived. Complaints, correction requests and plagiarism or copyright-related correspondence are normally retained for 2 years 730 days after they are resolved or archived because they may be relevant to editorial accountability, disputes or legal claims. Fact-check requests Fact-check request and reply data is normally retained for 1 year 365 days after the request is completed or closed. A published fact-check is part of the editorial archive and is not automatically deleted merely because the original request data reaches the end of its retention period. Retention holds Automatic deletion does not apply while a record has been placed on a retention hold. A hold may be used where material is needed for an active complaint, correction, copyright or privacy issue, legal claim, safeguarding concern, investigation or other continuing editorial or operational need. Once the hold is removed, the normal retention period applies. Newsletter records Newsletter subscriber information is normally retained while the subscription remains active. If you unsubscribe, we remove the active subscription record immediately. We retain a minimal unsubscribe audit record containing the real email address, newsletter edition/reference and timestamp for up to 12 months for operational evidence and suppression troubleshooting; we do not retain the subscriber's IP address in that audit record. Security and analytics support data Short-lived anti-abuse logs contain only hashed identifiers and are normally deleted within 24 hours. Consented first-party audience measurement uses short-lived one-use capability records and opaque hashed session/daily-visitor markers; those support records are automatically removed after they expire and are not intended to identify named individuals. Advertising, invoicing and payments Business, advertising, invoice and payment records are kept separately from the editorial retention schedule and may be retained for the periods required for accounting, tax, contractual, fraud-prevention and dispute-resolution purposes. Corrections, audit and security records Correction records, essential editorial audit information and security records may be kept for longer where this is reasonably necessary for accountability, system security, the defence of legal claims or the integrity of the published record. Requests for deletion You can ask us to review personal information we hold about you using the Contact /contact page. A deletion request does not always require every record to be erased. We may need to keep some information because of legal obligations, journalism and freedom-of-expression considerations, security needs, contractual obligations, the defence of legal claims or other lawful reasons. See our Privacy Policy /legal/privacy-policy for more information about your rights. --- Retention schedule last aligned with system settings: September 2026.