Privacy Policy

Effecetive Date:

01 January 2026

Welcome to my personal portfolio website. I value your privacy and am committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy policy explains how I collect, use, and safeguard information when you visit my website, AndreBothma.com, and possibly make use of any of the “Contact” forms provided. 

1. Information Collected And Used

When you visit AndreBothma.com, you are not required to register an account or provide any personal information. However, the following information may be collected and used:

  • Contact Form Data: If you choose to make contact via any of the contact forms provided, the information you explicitly provide, such as your name, email address, and the content of your message, is stored to be able to respond to you.
  • Technical Data (Bot Protection): The website makes use of Cloudflare Turnstile to prevent spam and abuse on primarily the contact forms. Cloudflare Turnstile may collect browser and device data to verify that you are human.
  • Anonymised Technical Data (Analytics): The website makes use of Google Analytics and Statcounter for analytical purposes (to monitor how it is used/viewed). These services receive technical data, so they cannot use any data passed to them to personally identify you.

2. How Your Information Is Used

Your information is collected for the following purposes:

  • To Respond to You: To reply to queries/enquiries/requests submitted via any of the contact forms provided.
  • Website Security: To protect the website from automated spam, bots, and malicious activity using Cloudflare Turnstile.
  • Analytics: Anonymised traffic data is used to understand how my portfolio/website is being used/viewed (e.g., total visitors, pages viewed, time spent on the website/pages, website exit pages, etc.).

3. Third-Party Services Used

Cloudflare Turnstile (Anti-Spam/Human Verification)

This website makes use of Cloudflare Turnstile, a service provided by Cloudflare Inc. (101 Townsend St, San Francisco, CA 94107, USA), to determine whether data entry on the contact forms are performed by a human or an automated program.

How Cloudflare Turnstile works:

Initial Page Load & Assessment

  • Widget Rendering: The website embeds a JavaScript snippet that renders a Turnstile widget (often invisible or a simple checkbox).
  • Behavioural Analysis: When Turnstile loads, it starts analysing how the browser is behaving without intentionally bothering the user.
  • Challenge Generation: The JavaScript initiates a series of non-interactive, lightweight challenges to identify human behaviour.
  • Browser Fingerprinting: It checks browser attributes (e.g., user agent, web APIs, and canvas rendering) to detect if it is a real browser or an automated bot.
  • Proof-of-Work: The browser performs small computational tasks (proof-of-work/space) to prove it is a genuine browser and not a script.

Challenge Outcome (Managed/Invisible)

  • Low-Risk Traffic: If the user is identified as human (most cases), no interaction is required, and the process completes seamlessly.
  • High-Risk Traffic: If the user looks suspicious, a simple checkbox (“I am not a robot”) may appear to challenge the user.
  • No Puzzles: Turnstile eliminates image-based puzzles (e.g., “click all traffic lights”).

Token Generation and Validation

  • Token Issuance: Once the challenge passes, Turnstile generates a cryptographic token (cf-turnstile-response) and injects it into the website form.
  • Form Submission: The user submits the form, sending the token to the website’s backend server.
  • Server-Side Verification: The website’s server sends the token to the Cloudflare Siteverify API to confirm it is valid.
  • Final Approval:<.strong> Cloudflare verifies the token and confirms the user is human, allowing the server to process the form submission.

For more information about Cloudflare’s privacy practices, visit the Cloudflare Privacy Policy.

Google Analytics (Analytics)

This website makes use of Google Analytics, a service provided by Google LLC (1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, California 94043, USA), to analyse traffic to understand how users interact with it, such as page views and visitor demographics. Google Analytics uses cookies to collect anonymous usage data.

How Google Analytics works:

  • Tracking Code Installation: A small snippet of JavaScript (or a tag via Google Tag Manager) is placed on every page of a website.
  • Data Collection (Event-Based): When a user visits the site, the tracking code executes, collecting “events”—such as page views, button clicks, video views, or purchases—rather than just recording sessions.
  • Cookie Usage: The code sets first-party cookies in the user’s browser to identify unique users, returning visitors, and session information.
  • Data Sending: The collected data is packaged and sent to Google’s servers (“collect” request).
  • Processing: Google Analytics takes the raw data, aggregates it, filters out unwanted traffic (if configured), and organises it based on dimensions (attributes like location or device) and metrics (quantitative data like count).
  • Reporting: The processed data is displayed in the Google Analytics interface within 4 to 24 hours (or in real-time) through standard and custom reports.

For more information about Google’s privacy practices, visit the Google Privacy Policy, or for more information on the Google Analytics service, please visit Google Analytics Terms of Service.

StatCounter (Analytics)

This website also makes use of StatCounter, a service provided by GSquad Ltd (1st Floor, 7-8 O’Connell Street, Dublin 1, Ireland), to provide statistical analysis of site visitors. Statcounter tracks the pages visited, the browser type used, and the visitor’s geographic location.

How Statcounter works:

  • Installation: A small, invisible JavaScript snippet is added to the HTML of every page the user wants to track.
  • Visitor Tracking: When a visitor loads a page, the code executes, collecting data about the visit without interrupting the user experience.
  • Data Collection: The script collects various data points, including IP address, browser type, operating system, screen resolution, referring site, and visitor path.
  • Unique Visitor Identification: Statcounter uses cookies to distinguish between new and returning visitors.
  • Real-Time Transmission: Data is instantly sent to Statcounter servers, allowing users to see visitor activity as it happens.
  • Analytics Processing: The collected data is analysed and compiled into actionable reports, such as page views, visitor locations, and exit links.
  • Live Visitor Feed: Users can watch a real-time log of individual visitors, including their location and navigation behaviour.
  • Bot Detection: Statcounter filters out automated bot traffic to provide accurate human activity metrics.
  • Global Stats Generation: By aggregating data from over 1 million member sites, Statcounter calculates global trends regarding browser, operating system, and search engine market share.

For more information about Statcounter’ privacy practices, visit the Statcounter Privacy Policy.

4. Personal Information Safety

Your personal information collected is not sold, rented, or traded in any form. Your information is not shared with any third parties except for your data, and only for the necessary technical processing of bot detection by the Cloudflare Turnstile service and the analytical services provided by Google Analytics and Statcounter, as described above. 

5. Data Retention

  • Contact Forms: Your contact form messages will be retained only as long as necessary to respond to your query/enquiries/request, after which they will be automatically deleted.
  • Turnstile Data: Cloudflare processes data strictly to identify bots and does not use it for ad targeting.
  • Google Analytics Data: Google Analytics processes data in strict accordance with GDPR regulations and does not share it with other Google services for ad targeting.
  • Statcounter Data: Statcounter operates as an anonymous web tracking service that retains a limited log of visitor data (IP address, browser, and OS) primarily to provide analytics, where log files are automatically overwritten once the account’s storage capacity is reached.

6. Your Data Rights

Depending on your location, such as under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) in California, or the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) in South Africa, you may have the following rights:

  • Access: The right to request copies of your personal data.
  • Deletion: The right to request that your personal data be deleted.
  • Correction: The right to request corrections to inaccurate data.

To exercise these rights, contact the webmaster via email: Webmaster@AndreBothma.com

7. Changes To This Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy may periodically be revised, and by your use of the website, you automatically agree to the collection and use of your information in accordance with this policy. You are thus encouraged to regularly read through this Privacy Policy, as the “Effective Date” at the top (under the page title) will reflect the latest revisions, if any.