Privacy Notice

Effective Date: January 08, 2026
Notice Version: 1.0

Data Controller Contact Information
The Qurious Effect
PO Box 91118
Santa Barbara, CA 93190
hello@thequriouseffect.com

This privacy notice describes how we handle personal data when you use our website and any related subdomains, mobile applications, or online services that link to this privacy notice (collectively, the ‘website’).

Our privacy notice tells you what personal data and nonpersonal data we collect from you, how we collect them, how we protect them, how we disclose them, how you can access and change them, and how you can limit our disclosure of them. Our privacy notice also explains certain legal rights that you have about your personal data.

DEFINITIONS

These definitions may vary slightly from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. ‘NONPERSONAL DATA’ (NPD) means any information that is in no way personally identifiable.

‘PERSONAL DATA’ (PD) means any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person (‘data subject’); an identifiable natural person can be identified directly or indirectly by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier, or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural, or social identity of that natural person. PD is in many ways the same as Personally Identifiable Information (PII). However, PD is broader in scope and covers more data.

‘SENSITIVE PERSONAL DATA’ (SPD) means a consumer’s social security, driver’s license, state identification card, or passport number; a consumer’s account log-in, financial account, debit card, or credit card number in combination with any required security, access code, password, or credentials allowing access to an account; a consumer’s exact geolocation; a consumer’s ethnic or racial origin, religious or philosophical beliefs, or union membership; the contents of a consumer’s mail, text messages, and email unless the business is the intended receiver of the communication; a consumer’s genetic data; the processing of biometric data to uniquely identify a consumer; personal information collected and analyzed about a consumer’s health; sex life or sexual orientation; personal data about any individual under the age of 16.

Topics Covered in Our Privacy notice

YOUR RIGHTS
LEGAL BASIS FOR COLLECTING AND PROCESSING YOUR PD
UPDATING AND DELETING YOUR PD
INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND HOW WE COLLECT IT
DATA RETENTION POLICY
HOW YOUR PD IS USED AND DISCLOSED
PROTECTING THE PRIVACY RIGHTS OF THIRD PARTIES
DO NOT TRACK SETTINGS
LINKS TO OTHER WEBSITES
PROTECTING CHILDREN’S PRIVACY
OUR EMAIL POLICY
OUR SECURITY POLICY
USE OF YOUR CREDIT CARD OR DEBIT CARD
TRANSFERRING PD FROM OTHER COUNTRIES
CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY NOTICE

YOUR RIGHTS

Contact us using the information at the top of this privacy notice to exercise any of your legal rights contained within this privacy notice. We will respond to your request within 30 days of receiving it. Occasionally, it may take longer for multiple requests or complex circumstances.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT NOT TO HAVE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION SOLD

You have the right to request that we do not sell any of your personal information.

Our policy is that we do not “sell” or “share” our users’ or customers’ PD, as those terms are defined under certain U.S. state privacy laws, except in connection with a merger, acquisition, or other transfer of our business as described in this privacy notice. Some privacy laws require businesses that sell or share PD to provide specific information and opt-out rights regarding those activities, if and to the extent such laws apply to us. For that reason, the following disclosures and rights language are included to help you understand your options, even though we do not engage in these practices in the ordinary course of our business.

When you use our website and submit PD to us, you may have certain rights under privacy laws that apply to you. These may include, for example, privacy laws in the United States (such as the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), and similar U.S. state laws), in the European Union (the EU General Data Protection Regulation (EU GDPR)), in the United Kingdom (the UK GDPR and the UK Data Protection Act 2018), in Canada (Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA)), and other global privacy laws.

The specific rights available to you will depend on the laws that apply in your location. Even where we are not legally required to do so, we will use reasonable efforts to honor your data subject/consumer rights requests (for example, requests to access, correct, or delete your PD). However, we may decline a request where we are not legally obligated to comply with it or where an exception applies under applicable law. Subject to the conditions and exceptions in the laws that apply to you, your rights may include, but are not limited to, the following:

The right to equal service and price, and not to be discriminated against even if you exercise your privacy rights.
The right to one or more means where you can submit requests under this privacy notice, including (at a minimum) a toll-free telephone number and an email address if the business operates a storefront and a website. If the business operates only an Internet website, then it must have a dedicated email address where you can submit requests for information required to be disclosed by law.
The right to know whether your PD is sold or disclosed and to whom.
The right to request that we do not sell any of your PD.
The right to be informed about the PD that we collect from you and how we process them.
The right to get confirmation that your PD are being processed and you can access your PD.
The right to have your PD corrected if they are inaccurate or incomplete.
The right to request the removal or deletion of your PD if there is no compelling reason for us to continue processing them. However, the right to deletion is not absolute and can be overridden to continue data processing in some cases where we still have a legal ground or overriding legitimate interest to process your data.
The right to ‘block’ or restrict the processing of your PD. When your PD are restricted, we are permitted to store your PD, but not to process them further.
The right to request the PD that you provided to us and use them for your own purposes. Upon express request, we will provide your data to you or another service or product provider within 30 days of your request, subject to commercial and industrial secrets.
The right to object to our processing your PD for the following reasons:
a. processing was based on legitimate interests or the performance of a task in the public interest/exercise of official authority (including profiling);
b. direct marketing and targeted advertising (including profiling);
c. processing for purposes of scientific/historical research and statistics.
The right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects regarding you or similarly significantly affects you.
The right that we limit the collection of your PD to that which is adequate, relevant, and reasonably necessary for the purposes for which the data is processed.
The right that we do not process your PD for purposes that are neither reasonably necessary nor compatible with the disclosed purposes for which such personal data is processed, as disclosed to you, unless the controller obtains your consent.
The right to designate an authorized agent to make a request on your behalf. When designating an authorized agent, you must provide a valid power of attorney, the requester’s valid government-issued identification, and the authorized agent’s valid government-issued identification.
The right to file a complaint with supervisory authorities if your information has not been processed in compliance with your rights under privacy laws.

LEGAL BASIS FOR COLLECTING AND PROCESSING YOUR PD

When you buy our products or services, we process your PD because it is necessary to perform a contract with you or take steps at your request before entering into a contract (for example, to set up your account and process your order). If you sign up for our newsletter or request free information (such as videos, webinars, or other free products or services), we process your personal data based on your consent, which you may withdraw at any time.

UPDATING AND DELETING YOUR PD

You can update or delete your PD using the services found on our website. If no such services exist, you can contact us using the email address at the top of this privacy notice under the section “Data Controller Contact Information” to make your request.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND HOW WE COLLECT IT

Based on our current data collection methods, and including our practices over the last 12 months, we collect the following categories of PD, SPD, and other information about you:

AUTOMATIC INFORMATION

When you use our website or applications, we automatically collect certain technical information from your browser or device. This may include your IP address or proxy server, the name of your Internet service provider, browser type and settings, device type, operating system, referring and exit pages, and information about how you interact with our website (such as pages viewed, links clicked, and the date and time of your visits). We collect this information using server logs, cookies, pixels, and similar technologies. We use it to operate and secure our services, understand how our website is used, diagnose and fix technical issues, and improve our content, products, and marketing. We may also use this information in aggregated or de-identified form for analytics and reporting.

When Entering and Using Our Website

When you enter and use our website and agree to accept cookies, some of these cookies may contain your PD.

Our Use of Cookies

Our website uses cookies. A cookie is a small piece of data or a text file downloaded to your computer or mobile device when you access certain websites. Cookies may contain text that can be read by the web server that delivered the cookie to you. The text in the cookie consists of a sequence of letters and numbers that uniquely identifies your computer or mobile device; it may contain other information as well.

By agreeing to accept our use of cookies, you are giving us and the third parties with which we partner permission to place, store, and access some or all the cookies described below on your computer and/or mobile device.

Strictly Necessary Cookies - These cookies are necessary for the proper functioning of the website, such as displaying content, logging in, confirming your session, responding to your request for services, and other functions.
Performance Cookies - These cookies collect information about the use of the website, such as pages visited, traffic sources, users’ interests, content management, and other website measurements.
Functional Cookies - These cookies enable the website to remember users’ choices, such as their language, usernames, and other choices while using the website.
Media Cookies - These cookies can be used to improve a website’s performance and provide special features and content. They can be placed by us or third parties who provide services to us.
Advertising or Targeting Cookies - These cookies are usually placed and used by advertising companies to develop a profile of your browsing interests and serve advertisements on other websites that are related to your interests.
Session Cookies - These cookies allow websites to link the actions of a user during a browser session. They may be used for remembering what a user puts in their shopping cart as they browse a website. Session cookies also permit users to be recognized as they navigate a website so that any item or page changes they make are remembered from page to page. Session cookies expire after a browser session.
Persistent Cookies - These cookies are stored on a user’s device between browser sessions, which allows the user’s preferences or actions across a website or across different websites to be remembered. Persistent cookies may be used for remembering users’ choices and preferences when using a website or targeting advertising to them.
We may also use cookies for:
- identifying the areas of our website that you have visited;
- personalizing the content that you see on our website;
- our website analytics;
- remarketing our products or services to you;
- remembering your preferences, settings, and log-in details;
- targeted advertising and serving ads relevant to your interests;
- allowing you to disclose content with social networks.
  Most web browsers can be set to disable the use of cookies. However, if you disable cookies, you may not be able to access features on our website correctly or at all.

TRACKING PIXELS

We may use tracking pixels on our website, emails, and other online content. These are small electronic files that help us understand how you interact with our content—for example, whether an email was opened, which links were clicked, and when a page was viewed. If you prefer that we do not use email tracking technologies, you can disable images in your email client which may block some tracking pixels, or unsubscribe from our marketing emails by using the link included in those messages. You can also manage certain tracking technologies through your browser settings.

LOCATION INFORMATION

When you use our services, we may collect and process information about your location. This may include precise location (for example, GPS data) or approximate location, for example, based on your IP address or mobile cell towers. Where required by law, we will obtain your consent before collecting precise location information. You can control our access to your device’s location data using your device or browser settings and, where available, through the settings in our services.

USE OF GOOGLE APIs

Our services may access or receive personal data (PD) from Google services when you choose to connect a Google account or use features that rely on Google APIs. We use information obtained through Google APIs only as necessary to provide and improve the features you have selected and in accordance with the Google API Services User Data Policy. Your use of those Google services is also subject to the Google Privacy Policy and Google Terms of Service.

CONTACT FORMS AND LIVE CHATS

Our website may include contact forms, live chat, or similar tools that allow you to communicate with us, with or without purchasing our products or services. When you use these features, we collect the information you choose to provide, which may include your name, email address, and the content of your message or chat. We use this information to respond to your inquiries, provide customer support, keep records of our communications, and improve our services. We may use third-party providers to host and operate these tools, and they process your personal data only for the purposes described in this privacy notice.

WEBSITE ANALYTICS

We use analytics services provided by third parties (such as Google Analytics and similar providers) to help us understand how users access and use our website and services. These analytics providers may collect information such as:

Pages you visit and the time you spend on them
Links you click and features you use
The website or page that sent you to our site
Your approximate location, device type, browser type, and operating system
Other technical information about your device and interaction with our website

We use this information to analyze and improve the performance of our website, understand how our content is used, and support our marketing and advertising efforts. Our analytics providers typically use cookies, pixels, and similar technologies to collect this information.

Where required by law, we will rely on your consent for the use of analytics cookies and similar technologies. You can manage your preferences through our cookie banner or settings (where available) and through your browser or device settings.

REMARKETING AND INTEREST-BASED ADVERTISING

We work with advertising partners to show ads for our services on other websites after you visit or use our services. This is sometimes called “remarketing,” “retargeting,” or “interest-based advertising.” Our partners may show you ads based on the pages you viewed, your actions on our website or apps, or similar information. To do this, we and our advertising partners use cookies, pixels, and similar technologies to collect information about your visits to our services and other sites and apps. You can control how we and our partners use cookies and similar technologies for advertising. You may be able to manage your preferences through our cookie banner or settings tool, your browser, and industry opt-out pages such as the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) opt-out page or the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) opt-out pages.

Google Ad Content Network (Google AdSense)

Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies, pixels, and other technologies to serve ads based on a user's past visits to our website. These technologies are also used to track your activities on our website and other websites, including the web pages that you visited, the ads or content that you clicked on, any items you may have purchased, and the search terms you used to deliver tailored advertising to you. Users may opt out of the use of Google’s cookies for interest-based advertising by visiting http://www.aboutads.info/choices. For European users, visit http://www.youronlinechoices.eu.

Lookalike and Similar Audience Advertising

We may work with advertising partners to show ads to people who may have interests similar to yours. To do this, we use certain identifiers (such as your email address) to create “custom” or “lookalike” audiences with platforms such as Google or Meta (Facebook and Instagram). Before sharing, we may hash or otherwise transform these identifiers so that they are not directly readable by the advertising partner. The partner then uses this information to find other users on its platform who may be interested in our services and to show our ads to them. We do not allow these partners to use our custom audiences to advertise their own products or services. Where required by law, we will rely on your consent or provide you with a way to opt out of this type of advertising. You can opt out of our use of your information for lookalike or similar audience advertising by contacting us using the details at the top of this privacy notice.

DATA RETENTION POLICY

Including our practices over the last 12 months, we collect some or all of the following categories of PD when you register as a user or when buying our products or services:

We retain your PD and SPD for as long as necessary to provide our products and services, and to fulfill the purposes described in this privacy notice. We may also retain your data as required by applicable legal, regulatory, or contractual obligations, or until you request that we delete it (and we are not legally required to keep it). Once the applicable retention periods have expired, we will securely delete or anonymize your data so that it can no longer be used to identify you.

What Happens If You Don’t Give Us Your PD

You are not always required to provide us with your PD. However, if you choose not to provide certain information that we identify as required (for example, to create an account, process a payment, or respond to a request), we may not be able to provide you with some products, services, or features. You can still browse parts of our website and access some content without providing PD, although certain functionality may be limited or unavailable.

HOW YOUR PD IS USED AND DISCLOSED

We use the information we receive from you to:

respond to any requests from you regarding sales and support;

contact you about any agreements or terms that you may have with us;
collect payment and bill you for our services;
interact with other users if applicable;
diagnose and resolve problems and prevent fraud;
provide the products and services you have requested or purchased from us;
contact you with updates to our website, products, and services;
resolve problems and disputes;
respect and apply your decisions to opt-out of any data sharing, such as a ‘data sale’ or similar concept under applicable laws or regulations;
We may share your PD with our affiliates, in which case we will require those affiliates to honor this privacy notice. Affiliates include our parent company and any other subsidiaries or joint venture partners.

Emails and Marketing Communications

We use the email address you provide to send you service and account-related communications, such as registration confirmations, security alerts, and updates about your use of our services. These communications are necessary to provide our services to you, and you generally cannot opt out of them while continuing to use the services. Where permitted by law, we may also use your contact details to send you marketing or promotional messages about our services or those of our affiliates. You can opt out of marketing emails at any time by using the “unsubscribe” link in the message or by updating your contact preferences in your account (where available) or by contacting us using the details provided at the top of this privacy notice.

Logging In with Social Media or Third-Party Accounts

Our services may allow you to register for, or log into, your account using a third-party account (for example, a social media or single sign-on provider). When you do this, the third-party provider may share certain information with us, such as your name, email address, profile picture, and any other information you agree to share with us through that provider.

We use this information to create and manage your account, provide our services, and (where applicable) enable social features on our website or apps. We do not control the privacy practices of any third-party providers, and their use of your information is governed by their own privacy notices.

Text Messaging, Push Notifications, and Telephone Calls

If you provide us with a mobile or landline telephone number, we may use that number to contact you by call or text message where permitted by law. This may include service and account-related communications (for example, security alerts, verification codes, or updates about your use of our services). Where required by law, we will obtain your separate consent before sending you marketing or promotional messages by text, push notification, or telephone call. You are not required to consent to receive marketing messages as a condition of using our services. You can stop receiving marketing calls, texts, or push notifications at any time by following the instructions in the message, adjusting your device or app settings for push notifications, or contacting us using the details provided in this privacy notice.

Disclosing Your Non-PD to Third Parties

We may create aggregated, anonymized, or de-identified information derived from your PD and other data. This information does not identify you personally and may be used or disclosed for our legitimate business purposes, including analytics, research, and improving or marketing our services. Where permitted by law, we may share or sell such aggregated or de-identified information to third parties, provided that it does not identify any individual.

Disclosing Your PD to Third Parties, Service Providers, and Contractors

We may disclose your PD to third parties, service providers, and contractors that we engage to support our business and provide our products and services. These may include, for example, payment processors, web analytics providers, call centers, data hosting and management providers, help desk providers, accountants, auditors, e-commerce/shopping cart providers, email service providers, and shipping or delivery companies. We use service providers and contractors under written agreements that require them to use your PD only to provide services to us, to protect it appropriately, and to comply with applicable law.

Disclosures to Business Partners and Affiliates

If we choose to do so in the future, and with your consent where required by law, we may disclose your PD to our business partners and corporate affiliates for their own business purposes, such as joint marketing activities, co-branded offerings, or improving and developing their products and services. If we do this, those partners and affiliates will be responsible for their own use of your PD and should provide you with their own privacy notices explaining how they handle your PD and how you can exercise your rights.

Legally Required Releases of Information

We may disclose your PD if such disclosure is (a) required by subpoena, law, or other legal processes; (b) necessary to assist law enforcement officials or government enforcement agencies; (c) necessary to protect us from legal action or claims from third parties, including you and or other users; or (d) necessary to protect the legal rights, personal and/or real property, or the personal safety of our company, users, employees, and business partners.

Disclosures to Successors

If we are involved in a merger, acquisition, reorganization, sale of assets, bankruptcy, or other similar transaction, your PD may be transferred to the relevant third party as part of that transaction. Any successor entity that continues to operate our business or provide the website and services will be permitted to use your PD only in a manner consistent with this privacy notice, unless you are informed of different uses and, where required by law, given a choice or your consent is obtained.

Blogs, Discussion Boards, and Similar Features

Our website may offer areas where you can post information, such as blog comments, community discussion boards, or similar features (“Community Areas”). Any information you choose to post in a Community Area may be viewed, collected, or used by others and may be indexed by search engines. Please do not post any sensitive personal data or information that you would not want to be publicly available. Although we may remove content that violates our terms or applicable law, we generally do not control how other users or third parties use information you make public. We are not responsible for the use or disclosure by others of any information you choose to submit in Community Areas.

PROTECTING THE PRIVACY RIGHTS OF THIRD PARTIES

If you make any postings on our website that contain information about third parties, you agree that you have permission to include that information. While we are not legally liable for the actions of our users, we will remove any postings about which we are notified if such postings violate the privacy rights of others.

DO NOT TRACK SETTINGS

Some web browsers have settings that enable you to request that our website not track your movement within our website. Our website does not obey such settings when transmitted to and detected by our website. You can turn off tracking features and other security settings in your browser by referring to your browser’s user manual. Where required by law, we treat certain recognized opt-out signals as a request to opt out of sale/sharing or targeted advertising.

LINKS TO OTHER WEBSITES

Our website may contain links to other websites. These websites are not under our control and are not subject to our privacy notice. We have no responsibility for these websites, and we provide links to these websites solely for your convenience. You accept that your use of and access to these websites are solely at your risk.

PROTECTING CHILDREN’S PRIVACY

Our website is intended for use by individuals aged 18 and older and is not directed to children under 18. We do not knowingly collect PD from anyone under the age of 18. If you are a parent or legal guardian and believe that a child under 18 has provided PD to us or is using our website, please contact us using the details provided in this privacy notice. Before we remove any information, we may request reasonable information to verify your identity and your relationship to the child, to prevent fraudulent or malicious requests. You understand that we do not systematically verify the age of our users, but we take reports about underage use seriously and will act in good faith to address them.

OUR EMAIL POLICY

You can always opt out of receiving email correspondence from us or our affiliates. We will not sell, rent, or trade your email address to any unaffiliated third party without your permission except in the sale or transfer of our company, or if our company files for bankruptcy as described in the section Disclosures to Successors.

OUR SECURITY POLICY

We use reasonable and appropriate technical, organizational, and physical safeguards to protect the PD and SPD we process through our website and services. We and the third parties who provide services to us maintain security measures designed to protect your data against accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, unauthorized access, or misuse. Where required by law, SPD is subject to additional safeguards in light of its sensitivity. However, no security measure is perfect, and no method of transmission or storage over the Internet is completely secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security of your PD. You are responsible for keeping any password or account credentials confidential.

USE OF YOUR CREDIT OR DEBIT CARD

If you purchase products or services through our website, you may be asked to provide your credit or debit card details to a third-party payment processor. We do not process or store your full card number on our own systems.

We use commercially reasonable efforts to work only with payment processors that use industry-standard encryption and security measures to protect your card information from unauthorized use. However, no method of transmission or storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee the absolute security of your card information. To the extent permitted by law, we are not liable for acts or omissions of any third-party payment processor. You should review the payment processor’s own terms and privacy notice for more information about how they handle your card information.

TRANSFERRING PD FROM OTHER COUNTRIES

International Transfers. We transfer PD as needed to provide our services. Where the European Economic Area (EEA), U.K., or Switzerland is the source, we use a lawful transfer mechanism: e.g., the EU Standard Contractual Clauses and, as applicable, the U.K. IDTA/Addendum. In exceptional, non-repetitive situations where no other mechanism is suitable, we may rely on a GDPR Article 49 derogation with your explicit consent or contract necessity.

CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY NOTICE

We reserve the right to change this privacy notice at any time. If our company decides to change this privacy notice, we will post those changes on our website so our users and customers are always aware of what information we collect, use, and disclose. If at any time we decide to disclose or use your PD in a method different from that specified at the time it was collected, we will provide advance notice by email sent to the email address on file in your account. Otherwise, we will use and disclose our users’ and customers’ PD in agreement with the privacy notice in effect when the information was collected. Your continued use of our website, services, and products after any change to this privacy notice will constitute your acceptance of such change. If you have questions about our privacy notice, please contact us through the information at the top of this privacy notice.

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