Legal information and contact

Ealing Pulse publishes its own summaries, explanations and local context based on facts from publicly available sources. The source name and link allow readers to verify the original material. A source acknowledgement does not by itself create permission to copy an entire work.

• We do not republish complete copies of third-party articles. Copy must be independently written and limited to information useful to residents.
• Short quotations may be used only where fair and necessary for quotation, criticism, review or reporting current events under the fair-dealing provisions of section 30 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
• A quotation should carry sufficient acknowledgement and must not exceed what is required by its specific purpose.
• We do not copy press photographs merely because they relate to current events. We use original, licensed, public-domain or purpose-generated images.
• Automated tools may assist discovery, translation, summarisation and illustration, but editorial responsibility remains with the portal publisher.

If you believe material is inaccurate, infringes privacy or copyright, is defamatory, or is otherwise unlawful, email ealingpulse@gmail.com. The notice will be logged and reviewed as quickly as reasonably possible.

Please include:

1. your name and contact details;
2. the exact page or post URL;
3. the precise statement or material complained of;
4. why it is inaccurate, unlawful or infringes your rights;
5. the remedy requested: correction, label, restricted visibility or removal;
6. for copyright notices, identification of the protected work and your authority to act for the rights owner.

Content may be temporarily restricted while a complaint is checked. For complaints about user posts, the operator may contact the poster, preserve relevant records and follow the procedure applicable to website operators. Immediate danger should also be reported to the appropriate emergency service.

The data controller is Jack Woznicki acting for Ealing Pulse UK. Data-protection enquiries: ealingpulse@gmail.com.

Information we may process

• account details such as name, email, securely hashed password, area or postcode, language and profile image;
• for the newsletter, the email address, selected language, confirmation status, subscription and unsubscribe times, and limited technical delivery history. The newsletter covers new local stories and published Resident articles;
• content submitted by users, including messages, comments, listings, issue reports, locations and photographs;
• for resident-submitted articles, private verification information such as full name, email, phone number, supporting material and editorial decision history. Contact details are not published; they are used to verify the author and facts, handle complaints and protect safety. They may be disclosed to an appropriate authority only where required by law or necessary in response to a credible and urgent safety risk;
• technical data needed for security and service delivery, including sessions, limited device details, push subscriptions and an anonymous presence identifier;
• basic usage statistics such as pages viewed, page-view counts and last-active time. Historical analytics do not retain raw IP addresses or complete user-agent strings. In the primary-administrator-only live visitor monitor, an IP address may be retained briefly in encrypted form (up to about 5 minutes) together with an approximate city/country and network organisation. When IP location is enabled, the server sends the IP address to GeoJS solely to obtain an approximate location; geographic coordinates are not retained.
• official public-role information about councillors, such as name, ward, party, public office, official email, official phone and a link to the official profile, obtained from the public Ealing Council / ModernGov directory. Private addresses and information from private profiles are not collected.

Purposes and lawful bases

Information is used to provide the service, administer accounts and communications, secure and moderate the portal, handle reports, prevent abuse and improve functionality. Depending on the feature, the lawful basis may be performance of a contract, legitimate interests in operating a safe community portal, legal obligation or consent. The newsletter is sent only after email confirmation and relies on consent, which can be withdrawn at any time through the unsubscribe link. The councillor directory is intended to help residents contact elected representatives and relies on a legitimate informational interest and information that public-office holders, or the Council on their behalf, have clearly made public. The directory is limited to information necessary for public-role contact.

Retention and recipients

Account data and published content are kept until the account or content is deleted, unless longer retention is needed for a dispute, security or legal duty. Newsletter data is used until the address unsubscribes; after unsubscribing, a minimal suppression record may be retained to respect the request and prevent further delivery. Presence records are automatically removed after about 90 days and daily activity records after about 180 days. The encrypted IP used by the live monitor is removed after about 5 minutes of inactivity. Hosting, email, push-notification, translation, GeoJS (approximate IP location) and other technical providers may process limited data only where necessary to run the service.

Your rights

You may request access, correction, erasure, restriction or portability, and may object where processing relies on legitimate interests. Consent can be withdrawn, including through the Unsubscribe link in every newsletter email. You may also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

Cookies and device storage

The portal primarily uses essential session, language-preference and login-security cookies. It may also use a first-party random identifier for local preferences or content-discovery features. Selected public information pages use Google AdSense. Google and its partners may use cookies, device storage and technical data to serve, frequency-cap and measure advertising, according to the user’s consent choice. Ads are not loaded in private messages, chat, account or administration areas, report forms, or individual Disability & Carers advice and letter-builder pages. A limited number of clearly labelled adverts may appear on the public Disability & Carers hub. For users in the UK and EEA, advertising consent should be handled by a certified consent management platform (CMP). Learn more about Google’s use of data at Google advertising technologies. Blocking essential cookies may prevent login or saved settings from working.

• The portal provides local information and community communication. It is not a substitute for official notices, professional legal, medical or financial advice, or emergency services.
• Verify important information with the named source or responsible authority before acting on it.
• Users retain rights in their content but grant Ealing Pulse a non-exclusive permission to store, display and technically process it for operation of the service.
• Resident-submitted articles are not published automatically. Editors may verify the author and facts, request evidence or changes, shorten or edit the material, decline publication and retain moderation records. The contributor remains responsible for the accuracy of the information and for having the necessary rights to submitted text and images.
• Users must not post unlawful, defamatory, discriminatory, threatening, fraudulent, privacy-infringing or copyright-infringing material, unsupported personal data about others, or content creating a safety risk.
• The administrator may hide, restrict or remove content or accounts where reasonably necessary for safety, legal compliance or community protection.
• External links lead to independent services. Ealing Pulse does not control their content, availability or policies.

The laws of England and Wales apply to use of the portal and disputes connected with it, subject to any mandatory rights available to users and consumers.

Users can report content to the administrator by email or available moderation tools. Reports involving illegal content, threats, child exploitation, fraud or immediate risk are prioritised. The administrator maintains a service risk assessment, records safety measures and updates them as chat, private messaging and user-content functions develop.

For immediate danger or a crime in progress, call 999. Use 101 or the relevant authority for non-emergency reports.