Privacy Policy

This Policy explains what information Inside DC Pulse (“we,” “us”) collects when you visit insidedcpulse.com, submit an opinion, vote, launch a Topic, or claim the Spotlight, and how that information is used.

• Opinion submissions: your statement text, the name/handle you choose to display (real or pseudonymous), and the U.S. state you select. This is published publicly on the Bulletin Board — do not submit anything you don’t want public.
• Spotlight and Topic purchases: a headline, author name/handle, and destination link you provide for display purposes. Your payment card details are entered directly into Stripe’s hosted checkout — we never see or store your full card number.

To prevent spam and abuse (for example, rate-limiting repeated submissions), we generate a one-way salted hash of your IP address combined with your browser’s user-agent string. This hash cannot be reversed back into your original IP address, and we do not store your raw IP address for opinion submissions. Standard web server logs (used for security and uptime monitoring) may temporarily contain connection metadata.

We do not currently use third-party analytics, advertising trackers, or cross-site tracking pixels on this Site.

All payments are handled by Stripe, Inc. Stripe collects and processes your payment details directly under its own privacy policy, available at stripe.com/privacy. We receive limited transaction metadata from Stripe (such as payment status and amount) to activate your Spotlight or Topic — never your full card number.

• To display your opinion, Spotlight, or Topic on the Site as intended;
• To detect and prevent spam, abuse, and rate-limit violations;
• To process payments and deliver the placement you paid for;
• To respond to support requests sent to our contact email.

Published opinions, Spotlight history, and Topics remain visible on the Site indefinitely as part of the public record of the Bulletin Board, unless removed under Section 7 below. IP-hash values used for rate-limiting are retained only as long as needed for abuse prevention.

You may request removal of a specific opinion or piece of content you submitted by emailing insidedcpulse@gmail.com with a link to the content and enough detail to identify it as yours. We will make a good-faith effort to respond within a reasonable time.

Inside DC Pulse is not directed at, and does not knowingly collect information from, anyone under 18. If you believe a minor has submitted information to the Site, contact us and we will remove it.

We take reasonable technical measures to protect information on the Site, including hashing IP data and never handling raw card numbers ourselves. No method of storage or transmission over the internet is fully secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

The Site is hosted and operated in the United States. If you access the Site from outside the U.S., your information will be processed in the United States.

We may update this Policy from time to time. The “Last updated” date above reflects the most recent revision. Continued use of the Site after a change is posted constitutes acceptance of the revised Policy.

Questions about this Policy, or requests to remove your content, can be sent to insidedcpulse@gmail.com.