Privacy Policy

Last updated: October 2026

This page explains what information shotokai.com (The Shotokai Encyclopedia) collects when you visit, how it is used and the choices you have. We have tried to keep it short and plain.

1. Who runs this site

shotokai.com is an independent, non-commercial educational archive about Shotokai karate-do, online since 1995. It is run by the team behind The Shotokai Encyclopedia and does not represent any karate organization.

Contact: [email protected]

2. Information we collect

Email. If you email us (for corrections, credits, removal requests or historical material), we receive your email address, your name if you include it, and whatever you write or attach.

Dojo directory form. If you submit a dojo through the Worldwide Dojo Directory form, we receive what you type: dojo name, instructor, email, country and city (required), and optionally the dojo name in kanji, affiliation, website, phone, training schedule, address and notes. We also receive the country your connection comes from, as reported by Cloudflare. The submission is sent to us by email through our email delivery provider, Resend, so we can review it. After review, the dojo details you submit, which can include the contact email and phone, may be published in the directory so students can reach the dojo.

Information collected automatically. The services that deliver this site record basic technical data: IP address, browser type, device and operating system, referring page, pages visited and date and time. This keeps the site running, secure and fast.

There are no user accounts, no comments and no newsletter.

3. Cookies, Google AdSense and Google Analytics

Advertising. This site shows ads from Google AdSense (publisher ID pub-0171454548762777). Google and its partners use cookies and similar technologies to show ads, limit how often you see them, measure their performance and, where allowed, personalize them based on your visits to this and other websites.

Analytics. We use Google Analytics 4 to see, in aggregate, which pages are read and how visitors find the site. IP anonymization is on, and we do not use it to identify individual visitors.

Learn how Google uses this information: How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services.

4. Your consent and choices

• Visitors in the EEA, the UK and Switzerland are shown Google's consent message before personalized ads or related cookies are used. You can accept, refuse or choose specific purposes. Google's consent message also provides a "Privacy and cookie settings" link on the page, which you can use at any time to change or withdraw your choice.
• Anywhere: turn off ad personalization at Google My Ad Center, or opt out of many ad networks at aboutads.info and youronlinechoices.eu.
• Analytics: install the Google Analytics opt out browser add on.
• Your browser: block or delete cookies at any time. The site still works without them.

5. Third parties

• Google (AdSense and Analytics), as described above.
• Cloudflare, which hosts, delivers and protects the site. It processes technical data such as IP addresses and may set strictly necessary security cookies. See Cloudflare's privacy policy.
• Resend, which delivers dojo form submissions to our inbox. See Resend's privacy policy.

We do not sell or rent personal information, and we do not share it for anyone else's marketing. Links to other websites follow those sites' own policies.

6. How long we keep information

• Emails and dojo form submissions: up to 2 years, then deleted. Dojo details you asked us to publish stay in the directory until you ask us to change or remove them.
• Google Analytics: event data is kept for 2 months, as set in Google Analytics.
• Technical logs: short term, under our providers' own policies.
• Google's advertising cookies: as described in Google's policies.

7. Your rights

Wherever you live, you can ask us to tell you what personal information we hold about you, to correct it, to delete it or to send you a copy. You can also object to or limit how we use it, and withdraw your consent at any time. If you are in a place with its own privacy law, such as the GDPR in the EU and UK or the CCPA in California, you keep all the rights that law gives you, including complaining to your data protection authority.

We rely on your consent for advertising and analytics cookies, and on our legitimate interest to run and secure the site and answer your messages. We do not sell personal information for money. Ad cookies may count as "sharing" for cross context advertising under some US state laws; you can opt out using the choices in section 4.

Write to [email protected]. We reply within 30 days.

8. Children

This site is for a general audience and is not directed at children under 13 (16 in the EU). We do not knowingly collect their information. If you think a child has sent us information, tell us and we will delete it.

9. Changes

If this policy changes, we will update this page and the date at the top.

10. Contact

Questions about privacy: [email protected]