plainews

Last updated: March 2026

plainews is built on a simple principle: your reading habits are none of our business. This privacy policy explains what we collect (almost nothing), what we do with it (nothing personal), and what rights you have (complete control).

What we do not collect

plainews does not collect, store, or transmit any of the following:

• Your name, email address, or any personally identifiable information
• Your IP address or precise location
• Your search history or reading history
• Any cookies used for tracking or advertising
• Device identifiers or browser fingerprints
• Payment or financial information of any kind
• Health, communications, or any other sensitive data

There are no user accounts. There is no login. There is no registration. plainews does not know who you are and does not want to.

What we do collect

plainews collects only basic, anonymous aggregate analytics to understand how the site is used. We also use your approximate location (city/region, inferred from your IP by Cloudflare) solely to show local news headlines. This is never stored, logged, or shared. Other analytics:

• Page views — a simple counter of how many times pages are loaded
• Device type — whether visitors are on mobile, desktop, or the installed PWA app (detected from the browser User-Agent string)
• Feature usage — anonymous counts of which features are used (e.g., how many times the Good News or Random Article buttons are clicked)

This data is stored in Cloudflare KV (key-value storage) as simple counters. It contains no personal information and cannot be used to identify any individual user. Daily counters are automatically deleted after 90 days.

Your search history

When you search on plainews, your recent searches are stored in your browser’s localStorage — on your own device only. This data is never sent to our servers. You can clear it at any time by clearing your browser’s local storage, or by clicking the “clear” button in the recent searches row on the plainews home page.

Third-party services

plainews uses the following third-party services to operate:

• Cloudflare Workers — plainews is hosted on Cloudflare’s global network. Cloudflare may process request metadata (such as IP addresses) as part of standard network operations and DDoS protection. See Cloudflare’s Privacy Policy.
• Anthropic Claude API — search queries are sent to Anthropic’s API to generate news summaries and search results. Queries contain only the topic you searched for — no personal information is included. See Anthropic’s Privacy Policy.

plainews does not use Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, or any advertising or tracking networks.

The browser extension

The plainews browser extension collects no data whatsoever. It contains no tracking code, makes no network requests of its own, and stores nothing. The extension only opens plainews.com URLs in new browser tabs when you click the buttons. It cannot read your browsing history, access other tabs, or interact with any page content.

Cookies

plainews does not use cookies for tracking, advertising, or analytics. No cookies are set on your device when you visit plainews.com.

Children’s privacy

plainews does not knowingly collect any information from children under the age of 13. The service contains no features directed at children.

Changes to this policy

If this privacy policy changes materially, we will update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page. Continued use of plainews after any changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

Contact

Questions about this privacy policy can be directed to us via www.plainews.com.