How we handle your data.

Last updated: May 2026

Who we are

The Townland is a sole-trader business operated by Jim Mulvihill, tax-resident in Ireland, providing genealogical research and family-history website services. References to "we", "us", or "The Townland" in this policy mean Jim Mulvihill trading as The Townland.

For all privacy matters, contact us at hello@thetownland.com.

What data we collect

When you purchase

Stripe (our payment processor) collects:

Your name
Your email address
Your billing address
Your payment-card details (held by Stripe — we never see or store full card numbers)

Stripe shares with us your name, email, billing address, the last four digits of your card, transaction amount, and transaction ID. We do not store full card information at any time.

When you complete the intake form

Through our intake form (hosted by Tally) we collect:

The names of ancestors you ask us to research
Dates and locations associated with those ancestors
Religion (if you choose to provide it)
Family stories and context you share
Whether the order is a gift, and if so, the recipient's details

What we discover during research

As we research your family history, we may discover information about deceased individuals (your ancestors) and, in some cases, living relatives. Deceased persons are outside the scope of GDPR. Living individuals' personal data is treated under the protections described below.

How we use your data

Lawful bases (GDPR Article 6)

Performance of contract — to deliver the research you have paid for.
Legitimate interest — to research deceased ancestors, communicate with you about your order, and improve our service.
Consent — for any optional marketing emails. You can withdraw consent at any time.
Legal obligation — to retain transaction records for Irish tax purposes (typically six years from the end of the relevant accounting period).

Special category data (GDPR Article 9)

Religious affiliation is sometimes inferred from parish records during Irish genealogical research. Where this constitutes special-category data about a living person, we process it on the basis of explicit consent or, where the data subject is deceased, outside the scope of GDPR. We do not display inferred religious data about living relatives on the family-history website we deliver to you, by default.

Living relatives discovered during research

We treat data about living relatives with particular care:

By default, living individuals do not appear on the family-tree website we deliver to you.
We do not share contact details, addresses, or other identifying details of living relatives with you unless you have a legitimate connection and the information is from public sources.
If a living person contacts us to exercise their rights (see below), we will assist them, including informing you only to the extent strictly necessary.

How long we keep your data

Transaction records — six years from the end of the accounting period, as required by Irish tax law.
Intake form responses — kept for the duration of the customer relationship, plus three years for legitimate-interest research learnings, then deleted on request or at our discretion.
Research artefacts (the evidence pack we deliver) — retained indefinitely so we can re-deliver to you on request, unless you ask for deletion.
Email correspondence — kept while it has business value, generally up to three years.

You can ask us to delete your data at any time. Some retention is required by law (tax records); in that case we will retain only the minimum required and confirm deletion of the rest.

Third-party processors

To operate The Townland we use the following services. Each has its own privacy policy:

Stripe — payment processing — stripe.com/privacy
Tally — intake forms — tally.so/help/privacy-policy
Cloudflare — website hosting and email routing — cloudflare.com/privacypolicy
Findmypast, irishgenealogy.ie, the National Archives of Ireland, the National Library of Ireland, FreeBMD, FamilySearch, the Library of Congress — we query these archives in the course of research; we do not share your personal data with them.

Some processors (notably Stripe) operate from non-EU jurisdictions. Transfers are protected by EU Standard Contractual Clauses or equivalent safeguards.

Cookies and analytics

This website does not currently use analytics or tracking cookies. Cloudflare automatically processes server logs (your IP address, browser, requested URLs) for security and performance, retained for up to 30 days. If we add analytics in the future, we will update this policy and, where required, ask for your consent.

Your rights

Under GDPR and Irish data-protection law you have the right to:

Access the personal data we hold about you
Rectify incorrect personal data
Have your personal data erased ("right to be forgotten") subject to legal retention requirements
Restrict our processing of your personal data
Receive your personal data in a portable format
Object to processing based on legitimate interest
Withdraw consent at any time, where consent is the lawful basis
Not be subject to fully automated decision-making with legal effects (we do not do this)

To exercise any of these rights, email hello@thetownland.com. We aim to respond within 30 days.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Irish Data Protection Commission (dataprotection.ie) if you believe we have mishandled your data.

Children

Our service is not intended for children under 16. We do not knowingly collect data from children. Genealogical research may involve ancestors who were children; the historical nature of that data means GDPR does not apply.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. When we do, we will update the "Last updated" date above and, for material changes, contact customers directly by email.

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