Privacy Policy

How we handle the information you share with this magazine — written plainly, kept short, and held to the laws that govern an Indiana publication.

Indiana Korean is an online magazine for Korean readers in the State of Indiana. The masthead is in Carmel; the readers are scattered across Indianapolis, Bloomington, West Lafayette, Fort Wayne, and the smaller towns in between. Most of what we publish reaches you without ever asking you for anything in return. The information you do share with us — your email when you sign up for the newsletter, your name when you write in, your draft when you contribute a story — is what this document is about.

This policy explains, in the order most readers care about: what we collect, what we do with it, what we do not do with it, and the choices you have. The policy is written for the laws that apply to a publication based in the State of Indiana, with carve-outs for readers visiting from California, the European Union, and elsewhere.

i. Who we are, and what governs this policy

Indiana Korean (also referred to in this document as the magazine, we, us, or our) is the publisher of indianakorean.com. The magazine is operated from Carmel, Indiana, in Hamilton County, and serves a Korean-language readership across the State of Indiana and the wider Midwest.

Because we are an Indiana publication, our handling of personal information is principally governed by Indiana's Consumer Data Protection Act (the “ICDPA,” Indiana Code §§ 24-15-1 et seq.), which takes effect in 2026. Where readers reach us from another jurisdiction whose law applies — California, the European Union, the United Kingdom, or another U.S. state — we honor the additional rights that law provides, and we say so explicitly in the sections below.

ii. What we collect

The information we hold about a reader falls into three categories: information you give us on purpose, information your browser hands over automatically, and information we receive from a third party (when, for example, you sign in to comment with a service like Google).

Information you give us

Information your browser hands over

Like every website, our server logs each request: the page you visited, the date and time, your approximate location based on IP, the browser and operating system you used, and the page that referred you. These logs are kept for the period described in section 6 and are used to keep the site running, to defend against attacks, and to understand which stories readers find.

Information from third parties

If we offer social sign-in for comments in the future (we do not at the time of writing), the third party will hand us only what you authorize — typically a display name, a verified email, and a profile picture. The site uses Google Site Kit to surface aggregate readership trends in the editor's dashboard; this draws on Google Search Console and (if Analytics is later enabled) Google Analytics. Where Analytics is in use, it is configured to anonymize IP addresses and exclude advertising features.

iii. How we use the information

We use the information you give us only for the purposes listed below. Each purpose maps to a clear legal basis under the ICDPA and (for European visitors) the GDPR.

1. To deliver what you asked for. Sending the newsletter you signed up for; replying to a message you sent us; reading and considering a draft you submitted as a contributor.
2. To run the magazine. Keeping the website online, defending against spam and abuse, fixing bugs, and understanding which stories readers found useful so we can write more of them.
3. To meet a legal obligation. Responding to a valid subpoena or court order. Keeping records the IRS, the Indiana Department of Revenue, or another regulator may require if money changes hands (for example, if a contributor is paid for a piece).
4. To honor a right you exercise. When you ask us to delete your information, we keep a minimal record of the request itself so we can prove we honored it.

We do not use the information for behavioral advertising, do not sell it to data brokers, and do not pass it to political campaigns or commercial third parties.

iv. When we share, and with whom

The magazine is small enough that the editor reads what you send. Beyond that, your information reaches a third party only in three narrow circumstances.

1. Service providers we rely on to run the site. Our web host (SiteGround), our email-newsletter provider (named in the newsletter footer when one is in use), and a small number of plug-ins that run on the WordPress installation. Each is bound by a written data-processing agreement and is permitted to use the information only to provide the service we have asked for.
2. Legal compulsion. If a U.S. court of competent jurisdiction issues a subpoena or order, we will respond to it. Where the law allows, we will tell you first.
3. A change in publisher. If the magazine is ever sold, merged, or transferred to a successor publisher, the reader and contributor records will move with it under the same terms set out here. We will notify subscribers by email before any such transfer.

v. Cookies, logs, and analytics

This site uses a small number of cookies. WordPress sets a cookie when you log in to the editor and another when you leave a comment so the next comment field can remember your name. SiteGround's caching layer sets a cookie to serve you the right cached page. If we ever enable Google Analytics, an analytics cookie will follow; we will list it in the cookie banner that goes live alongside this policy and will not enable it without consent in jurisdictions that require consent.

Server logs are kept on the host's infrastructure under SiteGround's standard log retention. We do not sell or share log data.

A fuller account of every cookie this site sets, the YouTube embeds we serve through the privacy-enhanced youtube-nocookie.com domain, and the analytics and advertising products we deliberately do not run, lives at our Cookie Policy. The two documents are written to be read together.

vi. How long we keep things

vii. Your rights — Indiana ICDPA and elsewhere

Under the Indiana Consumer Data Protection Act, residents of Indiana have the following rights with respect to the personal information we hold about them:

• Right to confirm and access. You may ask whether we hold information about you, and request a copy.
• Right to correct. You may ask us to fix information that is inaccurate.
• Right to delete. You may ask us to delete the information we hold, subject to a small set of legal exceptions (for example, an order we received before the request, or a published article you authored).
• Right to a portable copy. You may ask for a copy of the information you provided to us in a portable, commonly used format.
• Right to opt out of the sale of personal data, of targeted advertising, and of profiling that produces legal or similarly significant effects. We do not engage in any of these practices, but the right exists and is honored as a matter of policy.
• Right to appeal. If we deny a request, you may appeal in writing; we will respond to the appeal within 60 days. If the appeal is denied, you may contact the Office of the Indiana Attorney General to file a complaint.

To exercise any of these rights, write to admin@indianakorean.com with the subject line Privacy Request. We will respond within the 45-day period the ICDPA allows, and may take a single 45-day extension where the request is unusually complex.

viii. A note for California visitors

If you reach the magazine from California, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), gives you the rights listed above and a parallel right not to be discriminated against for exercising them. We honor those rights regardless of whether the magazine is technically subject to the CCPA in any given year. Our Do Not Sell My Information page is the dedicated channel for the opt-out the CCPA requires; you may also write to the same address above.

ix. A note for European and UK visitors

If you reach the magazine from the European Union, the European Economic Area, or the United Kingdom, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the UK GDPR provide rights that overlap with the ICDPA: access, rectification, erasure, restriction, portability, objection, and the right to lodge a complaint with your supervisory authority. The legal basis for our processing is one of the following, depending on the activity:

• Consent — for the newsletter, for any non-essential cookies, and for behavioral analytics (when consent is given through the cookie banner).
• Contract or pre-contract — for processing a contributor pitch you sent us.
• Legitimate interest — for site security, basic readership measurement, and replying to a message you sent us, where that interest is not overridden by your rights.
• Legal obligation — for tax records, where applicable.

European visitors should also note that data may be transferred to the United States, where the magazine is hosted. We rely on the European Commission's adequacy decision for the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework and, where required, on Standard Contractual Clauses with our service providers.

x. Newsletter and CAN-SPAM

The magazine's newsletter is sent only to readers who opt in by entering an email address on a signup form. Every issue carries a one-click unsubscribe link, the magazine's mailing address, and a clear identification of the sender, in line with the federal CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. We do not buy or rent email lists, and we do not transfer the subscriber list to a third party except as set out in section 4.

xi. Children under 13

The magazine is written for adults and older teens making their lives in Indiana. It is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from a child under 13. If you believe a child under 13 has sent us information, please write to admin@indianakorean.com and we will delete it. This policy reflects the U.S. Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA, 15 U.S.C. §§ 6501–6506).

xii. How we protect what you send us

The site runs over HTTPS, with TLS certificates provided through SiteGround. Administrator accounts use long passwords stored as bcrypt hashes and a separate application password layer for editorial scripts. The reader email list is held inside the newsletter platform under that platform's security regime; the editor accesses it from a single hardened workstation. We will notify affected readers and the relevant authority of any breach we believe has compromised personal information, in line with Indiana's breach-notification statute (Indiana Code §§ 24-4.9-1 et seq.).

xiii. Changes to this policy

We will update this policy when the law changes, when our practices change, or when a reader points out something that ought to be clearer. The version date at the top of the page will move forward, and any material change will be announced on the homepage and in the next newsletter issue. Earlier versions are kept on file and are available on request.

xiv. How to reach us

For any privacy question, complaint, request, or correction:

• Email: admin@indianakorean.com
• Postal: Indiana Korean, c/o the Editor, Carmel, Indiana, USA. (Mail address provided on request to confirm receipt.)
• Indiana Attorney General complaint: in.gov/attorneygeneral