Effective 10 September 2026. This version replaces the policy dated 9 June 2024.
Tech X Telco is an Australian publisher of technology and telecommunications guides at techxtelco.com. This policy explains what information we collect when you read the site, subscribe to the newsletter, send us a message or vote in a poll, why we collect it, who handles it on our behalf and the choices you have. We handle personal information in line with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles.
The short version
You can read every page without an account and without giving us any personal information.
We collect only what a feature needs: an email address for the newsletter, your name, email and message for the contact form, and an anonymous device token for polls.
We do not sell personal information, run a separate analytics tool, or allow comments.
Advertising on the site is served by Google, which uses cookies. You can opt out of personalised ads.
Information you give us is stored in Australia with trusted service providers who act only on our instructions.
You can ask to see, correct or delete your information at any time through the contact form.
Information we collect and why
Newsletter
When you subscribe we store your email address, the wording of the consent you gave and the time you gave it, and the page you subscribed from. We also keep a protected, non-reversible record derived from your connection that is used only to prevent abuse of the form. We send a confirmation link first and add you to the list only after you use it, so nobody can subscribe an address they do not control. Every email we send includes an unsubscribe link, and unsubscribing takes effect immediately.
Contact form
When you send a message we store your name, email address, subject and message so we can read and reply, together with the same kind of protected abuse-prevention record. Messages are used only to respond to you and, where a message reports an error, to correct the article. They are never added to a marketing list and never shared with advertisers.
Reader polls
Voting in a poll stores the poll, the option you chose and a random token that your browser generated and keeps on your device. The token is not linked to you, contains no personal information and exists only so that one device casts one vote per poll. Published results are aggregated counts. Individual votes are not visible to readers.
Serving and protecting the site
Like every website, the systems that deliver our pages receive technical details with each request: your IP address, browser type, the page requested, the referring page and the time. This information is used to deliver pages, to keep the site available and to detect and block attacks, automated abuse and spam, including a check on our forms that confirms a real person is submitting. We do not use it to build a profile of you.
Advertising
We show advertising served by Google. Google and its partners use cookies and similar identifiers to show ads and to measure them, and may use your visits to this and other sites to personalise the ads you see. Where the law where you live requires consent, Google asks before personalised advertising is used. We do not receive your identity from Google; we receive aggregated reporting only. See our Cookie Policy for the cookies involved and how to opt out of personalisation.
Settings stored on your device
Your theme choice, the stories you save with the bookmark button and your poll choices are stored in your browser only. They never leave your device and we cannot see them. Clearing your browser data removes them.
What we do not collect
No user accounts, passwords or profiles.
No separate analytics or tracking tool beyond the advertising described above.
No comments or user-generated content.
No precise location, contacts, health, financial or other sensitive information.
No information from children knowingly. The site is written for adults and is not directed at anyone under 16. If you believe a child has given us personal information, tell us and we will delete it.
Who handles your information
We use a small number of established service providers to host the site and its data, to deliver pages securely, to protect against abuse, to send our emails and to serve advertising. Each is bound by contract and by its own published privacy commitments, acts only on our instructions and may not use your information for its own purposes. We do not publish the identity of individual providers, and we may change them; this policy is updated if a change affects how your information is handled.
Some guides embed live plan comparison tables and other content from partner sites. That content loads from the partner inside a contained area of the page, and the partner’s own privacy policy applies to anything you do within it.
We disclose personal information to no one else, except where the law requires it, to protect our rights or safety, or if the site changes hands, in which case the new owner takes on the commitments in this policy.
Sending information overseas
Information you give us is stored in Australia. Some processing may occur outside Australia in the ordinary course of delivering pages to you or sending you email, including in the United States and in the region closest to you at the time. We take reasonable steps to ensure that any overseas handling is consistent with the Australian Privacy Principles.
How long we keep information
We keep personal information for as long as it is reasonably needed for the purposes described in this policy, and for as long afterwards as the law allows us to keep it to meet legal obligations, resolve disputes and establish, exercise or defend legal claims. In Australia that period is generally up to seven years after our last dealing with you, which matches the limitation periods that apply to most claims. After that we delete the information or de-identify it so that it can no longer be linked to you.
Newsletter subscribers: for as long as you are subscribed. After you unsubscribe we keep your address, the consent you gave and the unsubscribe time as a permanent suppression record, so we can prove you consented while you were subscribed and never email you again.
Unconfirmed subscriptions: confirmation links expire after 48 hours. We keep the request for up to 12 months as a record of the attempt and to prevent abuse of the form.
Contact messages: up to seven years after our last exchange with you, so that we can answer follow-ups, evidence any correction we made to an article and defend the accuracy of what we publish.
Abuse-prevention and security records: up to seven years, so that we can investigate and evidence attacks, misuse and repeated abuse.
Poll votes: indefinitely. They are anonymous entries that cannot be linked to you.
Technical delivery logs: kept by the systems that deliver the site for their standard period and not exported by us, except where an incident requires it, in which case the relevant extract is kept with the incident record for up to seven years.
If you ask us to delete your information, we do so unless we must keep it for a legal reason, in which case we keep only what that reason requires and tell you what we have kept and why.
How we protect information
All traffic to the site and between our systems is encrypted. Links in our emails use one-time tokens that are stored in a form that cannot be reused if copied. Records derived from your connection are protected so that they cannot be turned back into an address. Access to subscriber and message data is limited to the people and systems that need it, and the browser never holds credentials that can read that data. No system is perfectly secure, and we cannot guarantee that unauthorised access will never occur, but we take these steps seriously and review them as the site changes.
Your rights and choices
Access and correction: ask us what personal information we hold about you and to correct anything that is wrong.
Deletion: ask us to delete your newsletter record, your messages or both. We will do so unless we must keep a record for a legal reason, and we will tell you if that is the case.
Unsubscribe: use the link in any email, or ask us through the form.
Advertising: opt out of personalised ads at Google Ads Settings or through Your Online Choices, and control cookies in your browser as described in the Cookie Policy.
Settings on your device: clear your browser data to remove saved stories, theme and poll choices.
To exercise any of these, use the contact form and tell us the email address involved. We respond within 30 days and do not charge for a request. If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, you also have the rights to restrict or object to processing and to data portability. Our lawful bases are your consent for the newsletter and for advertising personalisation, and our legitimate interests in running, securing and improving the site for everything else.
Complaints
If you think we have handled your information badly, tell us first through the contact form with “Privacy” in the subject line. We will acknowledge your complaint within seven days and aim to resolve it within 30. If you are not satisfied, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.
Cookies
Our Cookie Policy explains the cookies and browser storage the site uses and how to manage them.
Changes to this policy
We update this policy when the site changes in a way that affects your information. The effective date at the top always shows the current version, and the previous version is available on request. Significant changes are noted at the top of the page for 30 days.
Contact
Tech X Telco, Australia. Privacy questions and requests go to our Privacy Officer through the contact form.